Saara Ndeshuumbwa Lucas, a student teacher at the International University of Management (IUM)’s Ongwediva Campus, has turned her personal health struggles into a message of hope with the release of her debut non-fiction novella, ‘The Girl Red Diary – It’s Just Red, You Are Still You’.
What began as a private diary to help her navigate pain and emotional struggles has grown into a book aimed at helping Namibian girls and women who feel alone and suffer in silence.
“Well, I started writing this book as a healing memoir, it was just something I was writing to keep for myself so that my future self and kids would read it. It just started as a diary I would open every morning to write in about how tired I am, how a nurse shouted at me and belittled my pain, how a doctor hugged me and made me feel seen,” said Lucas.
However, as she continued writing, Lucas began to realise how her experiences could help others facing similar challenges.
Lucas said she asked herself what if another girl was experiencing the same pain and whether her writing could help put that girl back together.
“So, with the question in my mind, I decided to not just write this book for myself but to put it out there to help girls and women in the same predicament to find their spark again,” she said.
The book draws on Lucas’ lived experiences with health challenges that began during her teenage years. She endured prolonged menstruation and hormonal imbalances before eventually being diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS).
These challenges affected her education, social life and confidence, forcing her to miss opportunities that many young people take for granted.
“It carries the opportunities I missed just because I could not show up, the days I watched others going to classes while I sat home because I was not comfortable sitting in class and having to leave my shame on the chairs, but most importantly, it has the pages of what kept me going,” she said.
The book’s title is also deeply personal. Lucas said she didn’t deliberately choose the name, but felt it reflected her daily reality.
She recalled waking up to blood-stained bedsheets and pyjamas, experiences that inspired her to name her diary ‘The Girl Red Diary’.
Lucas spent 12 months completing the manuscript, describing the writing process as therapeutic rather than difficult.
“Every morning, I completed a page, I gradually felt like someone was reminding me how strong and brave I am, so even if there were challenges, I might have given them a blind eye because I was too focused on healing,” she said.
Throughout the process, Lucas said her mother and siblings encouraged her to keep writing, reminding her that her story could open doors for others.
Although sharing deeply personal experiences wasn’t easy, she believes publishing her story was necessary to break the silence around women’s health challenges.
“Writing about a lived experience is a different thing which requires so much courage, it’s not that easy for one to put their pain and vulnerability on pages for the world to read, but I took the courage to put this out,” she said.
Lucas hopes to see a Namibia where schoolgirls do not have to choose between their dignity and education, and where women no longer suffer in silence because of health conditions that are often misunderstood. Her debut book is available for N$250. She can be reached on Instagram at @ndeshuumbwa and on Facebook at Saara N Lucas. -newsroom@nepc.com.na
The post She wrote to heal, now she writes to help others appeared first on New Era.