Nestled in the lap of the Himalayas, Nepal is a culturally diverse and vibrant nation. For centuries, the festivals of Nepal have celebrated goddesses such as Lakshmi, Durga, and Kali. Thousands of people take to the streets of Kathmandu to pay reverence to the Living Goddess Kumari, who is believed to be the incarnation of the Goddess Taleju Bhawani.
Women’s empowerment is spoken about loudly. Women’s Day is celebrated with posters, panels, hashtags, and campaigns. Thousands of NGOs and INGOs run programs. Government policies are written, budgets are allocated, and promises are repeated. Beauty pageants echo promises of change. Social media is flooded with HD photos and loud slogans.
And yet, a teenage girl walked into my OPD, hiding her period from her family for two years. Not because she did not understand the physiology of menstruation, but because she understood the social psychology behind it. She entered my OPD as many teenagers do—quietly, trying to disappear behind her mother. Her mother spoke quickly, worry filling her voice: “Doctor, she is already fifteen. She still hasn’t had her first period. Something must be wrong.”
The girl kept her eyes fixed on the floor. Her silence spoke before she did. I asked routine questions. She hesitated every time, her voice barely audible. This was not embarrassing. This was fear.
I gently asked her mother to wait outside for a few minutes. The door closed.
When a Girl Fears Her First Truth: The Silent Crisis of Chhaupadi in Nepal
After a long pause, she whispered, “I have been menstruating… for two years.” She looked up at me with wide eyes brimming with tears and said something no child should ever have to say.
“Please don’t tell my mother. If she knows, I will be sent outside the house, and I am scared to sleep alone.”
At that moment, my OPD room felt too small to hold her truth.
Chhaupadi is a deeply rooted tradition in Nepal that is as old as the mountains surrounding it. In this practice, menstruating girls and women are deemed “impure” or “untouchable” and are restricted from entering kitchens, temples, and religious events. They are banished from their homes and isolated in a small makeshift hut called a chhau-goth—without protection, without safety, and without dignity.
Such is its persistence that even in 2025, in a country that proudly boasts of gender equality and worships female deities, a 15-year-old girl is hiding a natural biological process—not out of shame, but out of fear for her safety.
We say Nepal has progressed. We celebrate women leaders, women ministers, and women achievers. However, inside many homes, nothing has changed.
The truth stands stark naked.
In our country, girls are still shunned during menstruation. They are still forced to sleep outside, to eat alone, and to whisper about menstruation as if it were a crime. This is not a single girl’s story. This is the story of countless daughters, mothers, and grandmothers—women who suffered silently and passed the torch of pain forward as “tradition.”
With the monsoon approaching once again, I cannot help but feel a sense of unease. The memory of the tragic deaths of two young girls linked to Chhaupadi during last year’s rainy season remains difficult to forget. As the heavy rains return, so does the fear that similar preventable tragedies may occur again because of a harmful practice that continues to threaten the safety and dignity of girls and women.
Where Are We Failing?
Is it policy?
No, there are many.
Is it a budget?
No, we spend a lot.
Is it a lack of organizations?
No, we have plenty.
Then where are we lagging?
We are busy showing our work instead of doing what is needed.
We invest more in banners than in conversations.
More in speeches than in listening.
More in visibility than in trust.
Laws change faster than mindsets.
A poster cannot undo generations of fear.
Schools may teach reproductive health, but homes still teach shame.
What Do We Actually Need?
Not louder programs.
But deeper engagement.
We need people who will sit with communities and speak—not once, but a thousand times over—until trust grows. People who can explain, listen, repeat, and stay. Because without trust, effort is wasted.
Menstruation is not a curse. It is not a reason to exile a girl from her home.
Please Don’t Tell My Mother: A Fifteen-Year-Old’s Fear and Nepal’s Failure
Somewhere between policies written in Kathmandu and beliefs practiced in villages, we must step in—health workers, teachers, parents, and neighbors.
Her words still echo in my ears: “Please don’t tell my mother.”
That sentence carries the weight of our collective failure.
A girl should never have to choose between honesty and safety. She should never have to hide her own body’s truth. She should never have to fear the very people meant to protect her.
Until every girl in every corner of Nepal can openly say, “I have my period,” without fear of isolation or punishment, we cannot claim progress.
I speak about this not as an observer, but as someone who grew up in the same community. I know how these beliefs are formed, protected, and enforced. This superstition is not fragile. It is reinforced daily—inside homes, by family members, in the name of tradition and safety.
Breaking it is not a matter of one campaign or one awareness week. It is harder than stone because it is passed quietly from one generation to the next and defended as culture. That is why focusing only on children will never be enough. Children may learn science at school, but fear is taught at home.
Real change requires confronting families, not just educating girls. It requires sustained engagement with parents, grandparents, and community leaders again and again until trust replaces fear.
Without this, policies remain paperwork, budgets remain numbers, and programs remain photographs.
And girls like her will continue to whisper truths they should be able to speak aloud.
Dr. Anjila Kunwar is a medical doctor working in Achham, Nepal.
