A New Talent Discovered: Wanyama

MEET WANYAMA, a 41-year-old widow, who lost her husband 4 years ago, and has lost 3 of her children to AIDS.

Her depression score at pre- assessment was severe and she had no interest in joining the StrongMinds Talk Therapy Group but the Mental Health Facilitator kept encouraging her to join.

During the initial therapy sessions, Wanyama was withdrawn and never spoke. At the 3rd session, however, she opened up about her triggers and what caused her to become depressed.  The members of the group thanked her for sharing, and encouraged her to be strong and face her problems.

Around the 8th session, she started learning how to make beaded bags on her own as her family’s means of survival. Now Wanyama is an expert in making beaded purses of all different patterns. Although she has the challenge of how to make her products in large quantities, she is able to earn an average of 60,000 UGX (roughly $ 20) a week.

At termination of 12-weeks of StrongMinds Talk Therapy, Wanyama and her group members opted to continue meeting to support one another and collaborate in addressing any new challenges.

Wanyama describes the StrongMinds Talk Therapy Group as “magic words” which are changing her life and the lives of her new friends.

In her own words, she said, “Thank you StrongMinds for those magic words that changed my life.”