The Cry of Baby Faatuma: A Story of Pain, Awakening, and Hope

I never knew how many girls have suffered and died from this terrible cutting, I am now totally against any form of it.

- Mohammed


I need to warn you—what you’re about to read is deeply distressing. But it’s a story that must be told.

I am going to tell you about an innocent baby, Faatuma, whose life was altered forever by the brutal tradition that is Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

Inflicted on young girls, and even vulnerable babies, like Baby Faatuma whose genitals were cut with a dirty knife and sewn closed with a needle as soon as she came into the world.

Faatuma is among the one in two baby girls on Ethiopia who go through this extreme form of FGM.

Like any caring father, Mohammed has only ever wanted the best for his baby girl. He loved little Faatuma unconditionally from the moment she was born. But having lived all his life in the remote Afar region of Ethiopia, he thought this meant ensuring his daughter was cut. You see, Mohammed believed this was vital to keep his baby girl clean and fit for marriage.

So before she was born, he asked the women attending his wife's birth to cut only the clitoris - a less severe form of FGM.

But due to enduring tradition and an almost complete lack of education, the birth attendants thought they were doing the right thing when they cut this tiny baby and stitched together her genitalia.

Mohammed watched his baby girl scream in pain day after day. She was unable to pass urine. Her wound was brutal, and her pain was unfathomable. He knew something was terribly wrong, and he felt completely helpless. He began to realize that the practice he had always believed to be beneficial to girls was actually causing his beautiful child to suffer untold agony.

Her little body was so badly damaged all because of a tradition he had never thought to question. He was consumed with guilt and feared for his baby’s life.

Mohammad Hasan & Faatuma

 

Did you know, a baby or child can die of shock due to severe pain of FGM. She may even bleed to death.

If the girl does survive, she suffers for the rest of her life. She may have difficulty passing urine, which can cause life-threatening infections.

Once she begins to menstruate, she may have painful clotting and infection if the blood flow is blocked.

When she’s older, sexual intercourse is difficult and extremely painful. If she has a child, during labour she’ll have to be cut open with a traditional birthing knife. If she isn’t cut open, she may suffer an obstructed birth which can result in a fistula, a hole which constantly leaks urine and faeces. Worst case, both she and her baby die in the process.

She may suffer lifelong psychological problems, including anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress and low self-esteem.

Those who carry it out believe they are doing the right thing. Yet we know that once they understand the pain and lifelong suffering this torture causes they ofter become outspoken activists against it. In fact, most Ethiopians now believe it should end.

Mohammed, once a believer in the practice, is now one of its fiercest opponents. He speaks out in clan leader meetings, urging others to abandon the tradition that nearly cost him his daughter.

I never knew how many girls have suffered and died from this terrible cutting, I am now totally against any form of it.

 

Thanks to the compassion of people like you, change is happening. But progress is too slow—and too many girls are still at risk.

Here’s how your support can help end FGM:

  1. Emergency Care and Counseling

    Thanks to the kindness of people like you, Faatuma received the urgent treatment she needed. Without it, she may have died a slow, agonizing death like so many others before her.

    You will help provide life-saving care for a baby like Faatuma to stem bleeding, cut open stitching in hospital under trained healthcare workers, and help provide medicine needed for any infections.

  2. Training Women Extension Workers

    A Woman Extension Worker was the one who helped Mohammed rush Faatuma to hospital for emergency care. She had been trained in the dangers of FGM. These Workers also walk alongside a pregnant woman throughout and after her pregnancy. They provide support and explain the dangers of FGM. And after birth, the Worker is there to check-up on mum and her new baby.

    In this way, she can continue to protect the baby from Female Genital Mutilation, or act quickly if it has been carried out.

  3. Clan Leader Conferences

    Your support is channeled into life-changing community workshops, conferences, radio broadcasts and film screenings to educate communities about the dangers of FGM. Thanks to your wonderful support, attitudes towards FGM are changing.

 

For over 30 years, the Afar Pastoralist Development Association (APDA) has worked tirelessly to end FGM through education, advocacy, and care. But they can’t do it alone.

You can be part of this change.

Stand with fathers like Mohammed. Stand for girls like Faatuma. Help end the pain and suffering of FGM—forever.

Thank you for your compassion, your courage, and your commitment to the girls and women of Ethiopia.

 

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