Single father handling disabled daughter’s period
LYND Mangemba, 18, is glued to a small television set in a two room house in Lusaka’s Mtendere Township not because she wants to but because of a disability she was born with keeping her confined in the house.
She is being taken care of by her father. Lynd cannot easily walk as she wobbles with every step she takes. Her hands, too, are not stable, they shake making it difficult for her to be on a wheelchair without an aid. She is not the only sibling with a disability in the family.
Her brother, Innocent, 21, is also confined to a wheelchair.
Innocent is paralysed from the waist going down.
Lynd can hardly speak and to get an idea from what she is trying to communicate, one has to get used to the kind of speech she uses.
Her father, Mr Makina Mangemba, 52, is the only helper in all that Lynd depends on.
Her mother, Susan Mulenga Makoloka, allegedly left her matrimonial home in 2007, almost a year after Lynd and her twin brother were born.
To date, Lynd has not set sight on her mother. Now the situation is unbearable because it has been worsened by her failure to care for herself whenever she is having her monthly menstruation.
It is her father who has taken up the responsibility of making pads for her using his clothes and sometimes Lynd’s clothes.
“It has not been easy to take care of Lynd because of her disability. She is totally different from Innocent, who is wheelchair-bound but can do certain things on his own,” Mr Mangemba said.
Each time Lynd is having her menstruation and there are no pads, whatever pieces of clothing used are discarded in the pit latrine.
“I will never get used. It is a hard job to do caring for a girl and worse off during her menstruation as a father. I never imagined such a time would come but I have no choice. I am the only person that is available.
Credit: Zambia Daily Mail
