Meet Helen Gebregiorgis. A women of great Perseverance, Faith and Love. These are the three words that come to mind when I think about this remarkable woman, her story and her current mission to give back to others who are less fortunate. In this feature, Helen shares her background and upbringing, her heartbreak and her resilience to Live a large life and leave an even greater Legacy behind.

Where are you from and where do you reside?

I was born in Tigray, Ethiopia in a small town named Shire. When I was two years old, my father and pregnant mother fled a war-torn Ethiopia in the early 80’s. Often under constant airstrikes, my parents and I, along with many others, hid in the day and traveled by night. My family, which started off as three, arrived safely in Sudan as a family of four, as my mother gave birth to my younger sister during the long and frightful migration. Today, I reside in Seattle, WA with my 4 year old twin toddlers.

Tell us a little about your background and your family.

Shortly after immigrating to America, my father suffered a heart attack at the age of 62 and my mother suddenly found herself widowed with four young children. While she was working multiple jobs to support us, the responsibility fell onto me as the eldest, to care for my siblings.

Maternal instincts came naturally for me, so it was no surprise when I gave birth to my first child, Joseph at the young age of 18. Knowing firsthand the importance of having siblings, I soon added to my own family a daughter, Nisreen and a son, Yaseen.

Being a single mother of three proved to be a big challenge, but I readily embraced the struggle and worked hard to provide my children the stability I didn’t have growing up. With the help of my mother, siblings and friends, my children were surrounded by love, joy, and laughter with many family trips and sleepovers.

In the early morning of June 12, 2010, during a sleepover, a fire broke out in my apartment and claimed the lives of all three of my children: 13 year old Joseph, 6 year old Nisreen and 5 year old Yaseen, as well as that of my youngest sister, 22 year old Jerusalem and 7 year old niece Nyella. This was the deadliest fire in Seattle in decades, so, the sudden and tragic loss of young, beautiful lives was hard to fathom not only in Seattle but throughout the nation.

“There are no words that can adequately describe a mother’s loss of a child, much less the horrific, sudden experience of losing all three at once and along with a sister and a niece. It is unimaginable losses such as these that defy and test one’s faith in God, and yet, in the darkest moments of her life, Helen remarkably turned to God and reaffirmed her faith in Him.” –Fiveangels.org

Tell us more about your project, why you chose this particular mission and how you’re making a difference.

Five Angels is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing medical services and quality care for women and their families in Shire Ethiopia.

We create clinics in Ethiopia where travel distance is too far to reach a hospital for care. Ethiopia has one of the world’s highest rates of maternal deaths and disabilities in the world. Women have a 1-in-52 chance of dying from childbirth-related causes each year. Every year, more than 257,000 children under the age of 5 die and 120,000 die in the neonatal period.

I wanted to give back to my country and find a way to create a legacy in honor of my children.

Does the infrastructure for this clinic already exist?

No. I’m building a clinic, from scratch. My goal is to build many of them all over Africa, not just Ethiopia. We will be working with Doctors without Borders to staff clinicians and onsite staff at this clinic. It’s an entire production from the ground up.

How can we support you in your mission? Will you have any fundraising efforts or awareness campaigns coming up?

Currently, I am working on sharing my project and mission with prospective donors at various events. I will share upcoming fundraisers on my Facebook page, so please stay tuned for announcements there.

As far as donations, the clinics I currently visit and donate to are always in need of reusable diapers or cloth diapers for the newborns. Another thing that stood out to me was the lack of disposable gloves at these clinics. A lot of times, in these remote areas, patients have to purchase gloves from the pharmacy and bring it to the clinic for staff to use on them. If you would like to donate any of these items, please contact me.

And last- as a mother, what is the greatest thing you’d like to instill in your children? If you could be sure to teach them One thing over anything else, what would that be and why is it important to you?

I want to teach them to not settle for less. To go for their dreams; and most importantly, be kind and humble. That’s my goal for my kids. It goes a long way.

Again, thank you SO much for sharing your story with us! I’m a firm believer in sharing our truth and our journey with others, in order to inspire and empower them in their own walks.

www.fiveangels.org
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Email: helen@fiveangels.org