ALYSSE Leite-Rogers, a Lynn Valley mother of three boys, felt overwhelmingly blessed.
Back in 2006, she caught an episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show that tackled a topic she was unfamiliar with: fistula, a devastating medical condition affecting hundreds of thousands of women around the world.
According to the Fistula Foundation, a San Jose, Calif.-based non-profit organization that raises awareness of and funding for fistula treatment, as well as prevention and educational programs internationally, obstetric fistula is a childbirth injury common in countries where women give birth without medical assistance. Due to advances in health care as well as the use of C-sections to relieve obstructed labour, fistula was largely eliminated in North America in the late 19th century. A fistula is essentially a hole created internally between the birth passage and the rectum or bladder, leading to incontinence. The injury occurs during childbirth, the result of contractions and the pushing of a baby - which often does not survive.
Another common cause of fistula is sexual violence endured by women, through rape or internal violation with implements including wood, bayonets or rifles.
These women, if they survive the injury at all, due to their resulting foul smell and inability to have more children, are at times rejected by their partners, families and communities as a whole, leading to isolation, according to the foundation.
"It's almost like being a leper," says Leite-Rogers, 46.
"They spend the rest of their lives alone in this state of shame. It's really quite awful," she adds.
Continuing to watch the Oprah episode, Leite-Rogers experienced what she describes as a "moment of absolute gratitude," realizing she experienced an obstructed labour with her first child. With access to health care, she underwent an emergency Csection that saved both her life and that of her son, Noah, who's now 16. "It's not something that we even think of here.. .. We think of childbirth as such a great, wonderful thing because of the medical attention that we have," she says.
"As women, we're incredibly privileged to live where we do and I think with privilege comes responsibility," she adds.
Interested in offering support to those affected by fistula, Leite-Rogers has long made donations to the Fistula Foundation in support of fistula treatment, a surgical procedure costing $450 per woman. "I have supported them in small ways but I've always felt I wanted to do something a little bit bigger," she says.
Calling her initiative Climbing For Fistula, Leite-Rogers, a local Realtor, has committed to raising enough funds to allow for 10 women to undergo the life-altering surgery through the foundation and plans to climb Tanzania's Mount Kilimanjaro, an eightday journey. She is set to leave the North Shore Aug. 15.
"I'm not a mountain climber, so this is my first climb," she says. "I hike and run and I'm active, but I've never done anything that challenges me in this way. I've always had a desire to go to Africa, and I thought, well, this is a perfect opportunity to do something while travelling in a country. I always feel that it's important to do something for that country that you visit somehow."
The $450 covers the surgery as well as post-operative care and transportation costs as well as a new dress that, as a whole, are intended to give the women "a complete new lease on life," says Leite-Rogers.
For more information, or to make a donation in support of Leite-Rogers's climb, visit shesellsvancouver. com. For more information on the Fistula Foundation, visit fistulafoundation. org.
