She gives hope to childless
couples
By CHINENYE OKOYE (nenye4us@yahoo.com)
Saturday, August 26, 2006
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•Florence
Photo By Sun News Publishing |
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After ten years of childless marriage and the agonies that
go with it, Florence Onyeka decided to take it upon herself
to give hope to couples in her similar condition.
Now, the founder of Lorie Charles, Onyeka embarked on her
selfless endeavour after she was thrown out of her matrimonial
home by her husband and his relations.
“Within the crises in my husband’s house, I always
sat down and thought of all the difficulties childless couples
are going through and I found out that, it has done a lot
of damage to women’s psyche in particular because they
are the vulnerable ones. So, based on that, I made up my mind
that something must be done to bring these problem to the
public, so that people can come to the aid of these childless
couples, especially the less privileged ones.
But, I didn’t know how this could be done until on 23rd
of July 2005, the battering I received from my husband and
his people were so much that I couldn’t endure any longer.
So in pains and tears, I brought out my diary and wrote down
that an NGO that will take care of childless couples was born
that day. And this is how Lorie Charles Foundation was initiated
and registered”.
Not only women affair
She noted that the foundation was opened to take care of couples
that have problem of childlessness and not for women only.
“I said couples because I don’t want people to
see it as only women affair because in my own case, I was
running helter-skelter all on my own and that was why, I didn’t
make an effective achievement. Although, I became pregnant
on several occasions but each time I took in, I always have
this infection and at the course of treating it, I always
lost the pregnancy. Had it been my husband always followed
me to hospital, if the problem was from him, he would have
been treated and our problem would be solved. But, you know,
because he didn’t care. Childlessness is seen as women’s
problem in our society, what we will do to solve the problem.
While I roamed the streets in search of solution, he didn’t
bother. And so, with this NGO I want to correct that wrong
impression by encouraging men to see these problems as husband
and wife problem. At times, their wives will be going from
one hospital to another without knowing their husband(s) are
habouring the problem”.
Objectives
As she told Staturday Sun the main objective of Lorie Charles
Foundation is to give succor to childless couples and to discourage
divorce in marriage. On how she intend to carry out this objectives,
she simply said that she has doctors and counselors who are
working with her to see the dream come through. “Well,
when I started this foundation, I thought of having doctors
because I am not a doctor. I am just a linguist by training.
I went to one of the doctors that treated me during the period
I had problem in my marriage. He is a gynecologist who has
practice for eighteen years.
He obliged to my request and now we are working together because
he knows what women are passing through because of childlessness.
So, what we are doing is counseling these couples on what
to do because some of them have minor problem and don’t
know what to do. So we counsel them on what to do. Also, we
do Assisted Reproductive Treatment (ART), if necessary and
this treatment is a high tech treatment and very costly. In
a situation where the couple involved cannot afford the cost,
what we do is to campaign for fund and arrange it for them.
Asked about the effectiveness of the ART, the in-house doctor,
Dr. Kester Nwadiani, said that it is very effective and has
no side effect as many people thinks. “ It very effective
and has no side effect, though it is God that gives child.
But a quite number of cases of infertility are due to many
factors which the couples involved need to be counseled on
and if they take the counseling very serious their problem
will be solved. But, in a situation where the problem is complex,
maybe the infertility is unexplained tube factor or poor quality
of the man’s semen and so on. Assisted Reproductive
Treatment can be used and this, I tell you, is effective and
has no side effect. I repeat this because many people believe
that it has side effect and is against God’s injunction.
But the truth is that it is God who gave human beings this
knowledge. No matter how had we think about other ways to
solve this problem of childlessness, the ART will not have
occured in our mind”.
The name, Lorie Charles
According to her, her foundation’s name was coined from
her name, Florence and her father’s name Charles. She
chosed her father’s name because of the role he plaid
in her marriage. “My father believe so much in marriage
that he advised me not to leave my husband’s home no
matter the condition. And so, despite all the maltreatment
from my husband and his people, I still remained in my marital
home because my father’s words lingered in my mind but
when they finally chased me out, I had no option than to accept
it. So, I used my father’s name because one of the organization’s
objective is to discourage divorce in marriages through its
activities because I also believe in marriage”.
Challenges
The challenges confronting her are of two folds–finance
and human factor. “Let me say that the challenges are
in two aspect, the financial aspect and the human aspect.
The difficulty from human aspect is the behave that ART has
negative side effect and is against God. People has imbibed
this believe so much that it takes time to convince them to
come for the treatment as an alternative. Technology has come
to ease a lot of difficulties in human life and this include
ART. So, we want people to come forth and forget this their
beliefs.
“For now, we are using our own money to run the organization.
We task ourselves and go from place to place, person to soliciting
for fund. So, we are begging the government, organizations
and companies to assist us to fight this problem.
“Some people are really try in funding the organization
but we still need the help of kind-hearted Nigerians. I thank
especially, the Chairman Amuwo-Odofin Local government, Lagos,
for his assistance.
Target
In the next ten years, she wants to see herself as a mother
one thousand babies. She also wants to set up branches in
every state of the federation.
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