MOVEMENT AS MEDICINE - ONLINE IN A NEW WAY

MOVEMENT AS MEDICINE – ONLINE IN A NEW WAY

At the present time, all The Storydancer Project's self-care programs are conducted on Zoom online. 

Mid March 2020, India went on lockdown for Covid. Zuleikha, The Storydancer Project (TSP) founder and director had to get out fast. The door actually closed behind her. Like so many organizations who do so much good in the world, the onslaught of the world pandemic had a sudden impact on The Storydancer Project. Covid-19 had come to Delhi, where we work in partnerships with two major organizations, Hope Project and CanSupport. Delhi is so crowded that there is very little space for social distancing. To date Delhi, India - 179,000 confirmed COVID cases. 

At home in New Mexico, Zuleikha and Team TSP is faced with quarantine. We are not able to physically reach out to the people we serve. Our school programs in New Mexico Navajo Nation are stopped. We cannot meet with our Navajo Facilitators for our mothers program, Strengthening Hearts and Minds. To date New Mexico Navajo Nation - 10,254 confirmed COVID cases.

In all crises, there is an opportunity for a new beginning… a new way. Along with the world, we are working through ZOOM. Zuleikha is doing Self-Care sessions with CanSupport Home Care Teams, doctors, nurses and counselors. She has convened two sessions with colleague, Cynda Rushton, PhD Nursing Professor at Johns Hopkins, for nurses on the frontline of the pandemic. We have been having meetings with our teams in Navajo Nation, and created online seminars. More is planned for India partners.

OUR STORY

For the past 17 years, TSP has worked in marginalized communities, where everyday there are major life challenges. We are familiar with the struggle to maintain hope and Self-Care in the midst of suffering to those challenged by historical trauma, domestic abuse, depression and chronic disease. Working in the midst of violence, extreme poverty, homelessness, trafficking, limited opportunities and gender equality, we train facilitators in this joyful work. TSP programs have traveled from schools and health centers in India to refugees of the Tsunami and orphanages in Sri Lanka; transformative Self-Care programs that uplift women, children and families in peace programs in the Palestinian West Bank, and Bengal trafficking centers.  TSP has worked with abuse and battered family services, in hospitals and health centers with nurses, and doctors, with teachers, in one-room classrooms and on the streets.

OUR PARTNERS

In New Mexico Navajo Nation, TSP has created programs for children in the Gallup-McKinley & San Juan County public schools (over 2000 children per year), and programs for new mothers facing depression in partnership with Northwest New Mexico Firstborn. The mothers’ program focuses on traditional women’s ways, developing new patterns of family communication, along with restorative exercises for body and mind, while sharing practices that bring healing after trauma and chronic stress. In Navajo Nation maternal depression is severe and has a profound effect on children and family members.

In Delhi India, TSP brings its Self-Care programs to Nizamuddin Basti, situated in the slums. We have 7 trained TSP Facilitators in the Hope Project, and have developed an ever-increasing mobile outreach with Muslim girls and families in the vast, impoverished “villages” northeast of Delhi (from 70,000 - 300,000 people in each community).

We partner with CanSupport, the largest home based palliative cancer care in Northern India. Being sensitive to the patients’ pain, mobility and emotional well-being, TSP trained counselors to learn to use TSP holistic approach to palliative care in their visits to patients and families living with the stress of cancer. Zuleikha/TSP has created a stress relief relaxation therapy program that is serving thousands of patients and their families. CanSupport is about to do a research project based in this program

Together with New Light Director, Urmi Basu, Zuleikha has created Kalpataru, in Kolkata, India, a program in Self-Care for trafficked women and tribal women who have been witch hunted in the outer tribal areas of Jharkhand.

FUNDING AND WHAT WE NEED

Zuleikha and TSP have created original programs that bring Self-Care through transformative revitalizing exercises. This work is creative and community based. It brings joy and inspiration into areas in the world where girls, women and families live in great depression. We have trained numerous facilitators who depend on us, and we need your help!

As TSP adapts its programs to the people it serves, the pandemic has allowed us to find new online ways of operating and reaching out to those we serve. However, the funding for our programs has become limited and our TSP Team has been working hours without pay. TSP needs your support for program facilitation, online trainings and the costs of administration.  

GIVE, YOUR SUPPORT IS SO IMPORTANT