donations from yoga studios, coffee shops,
churches, schools. My two young boys were
coming home with backpacks full of bras and
there was nothing taboo about it. This is a
grassroots movement that has blossomed into
large collections from dozens of companies and
organizations.
When the Washington Post story hit, my inbox
flooded ridiculously. I was surprised by its reach
and I couldn’t keep up with the emails, the
phone calls, the Facebook private messages - it
was so overwhelming. Everyone had the same
dozen questions to ask
me. So one morning I got
up at 4 am before I was
supposed to be flying out
to Boston, I sat down,
bought a domain and
created isupportthegirl.
org. Then, I woke up my
husband and told him
that I need him to create
me a website. I told
him, “I’m giving you the
instructions. I need you
to include everything and
I need it before I land in
Boston. I need this done
urgently.” With a website,
I was able to copy and
paste responses to my
most asked questions.
But I didn’t because this movement had grown
legs. Instead of turning my back, I could solve
the problem in a collaborative way. I pulled in
friends in Communications and Public Relations,
in Strategy and Operations and we developed an
infrastructure.
I worked hard on collaborating to develop a
backbone that could support affiliate programs
all over the country. I thought, what if I empower
other women and girls to do this in their local
communities, to collect and donate these
products? We have requests from all over the
world, from Canada and
Mexico and Thailand.
At this point, we have
collected over 32,000
bras and over 135,000
menstrual products.
“There are all of
these little fortuitive
moments in life
and this was one of
them. I realized that
HF: How do you
think other people
can help start this
conversation in their
own communities?
DM: I think anyone
who understands the
topic and is willing to
talk, that they can help
with the stigma. We are
talking about dignity
and coverage, not sexy
lingerie. I think we need
to find a way to get the
tampon tax revoked
and to get products into the hands of people
who need them. This is part of a much bigger
discourse on human rights and women’s dignity
and it’s happening right now.
I don’t know what I
don’t know.”
SD: Tell us a little bit
about the conversation
and the movement towards menstrual equity
that Support The Girls has sparked.
DM: After receiving responses from thousands of
people who wanted to contribute, I realized I had
hit a nerve. This was something very tangible,
every women understood it immediately. I didn’t
have to explain or prove anything. There was a
very instant connection and people wanted to
help. The more folks that got on board, the more
it snowballed in this organic, beautiful way.
This moment became a movement without me.
I was the catalyst. It got to the point where I
could have turned away and said “I’m done.”
I’m very normal and unassuming, there’s nothing
particularly special about me. Finding a way to
execute this undertaking and work fulltime could
have become my excuse to stop. But “I’m busy”
is not an excuse to me anymore. I could have
been done back in July. I could have pulled the
plug, but more and more and more people ask
me to talk. As long as people want to talk about
it, there exists a way to break down the barriers