I’m Shweta Sarfare, 29 years old, married to Vilas and have a beautiful 6 year old daughter.
My family wanted to discontinue my education after 10th standard due to family financial crisis and strong gender discrimination and wanted me to get married at early as 15 years.
I was determined and didn’t lose hope, just than I found my guardian angel in my aunt who supported me financially to pursue 12th std and then Nursing course. After competition of Nursing course from Sumeet Academy in 2005, I wanted to pursue graduation in Nursing but again due to family objection I took up nursing job to save money for college fees.
But at 22, my parents got me married against my will because of cultural pressure of being eldest daughter and fear of most nurses remaining single throughout their life. I continued working in hospital but was passionate to work in NGO and that’s when social worker friend shared her experience of working in NGO and offered job opportunity.
Without thinking much, I grabbed the opportunity and joined Foundation for Mother and Child Health NGO in 2013 as Nurse. Initially it was challenging to work in community, juggling with family responsibilities and travelling for 4 hours to reach work but determination and will to impact lives of underprivileged community made it easy.Today, at FMCH I’m not just a Nurse but also actively involved in community mobilizations, project implementations, influencing young nursing students and other NGO activities.