My name's Kam and I am a friend of Raga Woods, formerly known as Tessa Fothergill. In 1969 she found herself as a lone parent and fending for herself on the streets of London with her kids in tow. She set up 'Gingerbread' to specifically find other women like her, to find support and shelter when none was forthcoming from the state. It gradually formed into a national charity that helped thousands of lone parents and their children. In 2007 it merged with the National Council for One Parent Families and the new body took the name Gingerbread. See www.gingerbread.org.uk.
Raga, now 72, wants to find the women who first joined her in those very early days of Gingerbread. She wants to bring together women who were helped and who helped each other and who are now 'elders' with grown children. Raga wants to reconnect with all of these families and hear their stories. She wants to reconnect with the mums in particular, and start a new movement which brings together elder women, for according to Raga it is the elder women who are the ones who can heal our fractured world.
"...in order to do that, we must heal ourselves."
If any of this rings a bell, please do get in touch!
Rags has made a short video where she explains the origins of Gingerbread and what she'd like to do now. See it here:
Thanks for reading this.