My Embarrassing Story Turned Into Something Amazing
Thousands of Period Products Donated to Foster Care After One Mom's Mortifying Story Went Viral
Two weeks ago, I shared an embarrassing story on Facebook about a trip to the Target restroom with my 4-year-old twin boys. I thought a few people might get a kick out of my horrifying tale (any maybe a few people would call me crazy)— but I never expected what would follow.
Almost immediately, it went viral. My inbox was flooded with similar (and equally hilarious/mortifying) stories from others, as well as several people thanking me for normalizing periods. Though, to be honest, this wasn’t my intention— I’m certainly grateful for the dialogue that it opened on our social media platforms.
In all of her wisdom, Stephanie suggested that we do something productive with the attention.
As Stephanie and I have both adopted children from foster care, we know that the need for period products within the foster care community was great. We learned that period products are the most requested yet least-donated items, likely because of the stigma that surrounds them.
We created an Amazon Wishlist to include tampons, pads, menstrual cups, and period panties to distribute to local group homes, foster care closets, and DFCS. When we received 10 orders, we were floored. It was working! Our community was showing up!
And then, the boxes kept coming.
50 one day. 75 the next. Our sweet mailman was both amazed and annoyed. It was definitely the largest shipment of tampons that he’d ever delivered- ha!
Before we knew it, we were DROWNING in boxes. People from all over the world were sending period products for our cause. We shared our deliveries day after day in our Instagram stories, continually amazed by our community puling together in such an incredible way. After a week, we had to close our wish list because we physically didn’t have any more room!
Today, we delivered all donated items to local group homes, foster care closets, and DFCS. We are SO PROUD to share our grand total with you all…
CAN YOU BELIEVE IT!? YOU ALL DID THIS. You all made this happen. You continually show us how incredible this community is, and we are so humbled and thankful to be a part of it. From the bottom of our hearts, THANK YOU! We are so proud to be a part of this movement!
