June 21, 2022
Here at Hlanganani, a significant amount of our children are teenage girls! Therefore, over the last couple of months, we have been working on talking to them about all things related to the ups and downs of being a teenager. They have highly valued having a safe space to ask their questions and have been more engaging than ever before!
Specifically, discussions on relationships, sex, caring for their bodies, and how they conduct themselves. The girls were initially asked to write down any questions on the above subjects; many of the questions were on sex and their menstrual cycle and how it all works.
We were more than happy to teach them about safe sex, abstinence, etc. as in South Africa, this is no subject to shy away from, given that in 2020 there were 136,386 babies born to girls aged between 10 to 19; this number is staggeringly high, especially given the number of abortions that were also documented for girls ages 10-13.
Please pray that our teenagers will make wise choices to practice being safe and thoughtful in how they conduct themselves and know that they are loved by God and do not need physical approval from man. Ryan also is mentoring the boys on the importance of being men of integrity and making wise relationship choices. We would also like to thank Mercy Chikwanda for giving of her time to talk to the girls from her training course on “Inner & Outer Beauty.”