Mental Health & Wellness Retreat for Refugee Women

SITTI is an impact-driven lifestyle brand. We provide conscious consumers with all-natural products to maintain a sense of tradition in their daily lives.
 
And we’re committed to the self-reliance of refugee and displaced communities. We keep this commitment  through long-term employment opportunities and skill development training, empowered by an inclusive global economy.
 
We are raising $20,000 USD to create all-inclusive mental health and wellness programming + a retreat experience for refugee women in Jordan. And we’re starting with our team of refugee women artisans at SITTI.

With the funds that we raise from this campaign, we will:

• Provide FREE mental health and wellness programming access for 20 women, including a 2-night stay at a safe and accessible location in the serene Jordan countryside, 1:1 psychosocial support counseling sessions, group counseling sessions and workshops, nutritious meals, and activity-related materials and supplies (i.e. yoga mats, journaling materials/stationary)

• Hire licensed wellness practitioners locally at a fair pay rate, including a certified psychosocial support counselor and movement instructor certified in yoga, pilates and holistic health teachings

• Program impact monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning (MEAL) costs in the form of multimedia documentation, post-program evaluation surveys, and reporting analysis.

• 2023 Mental Health and Wellness Initiative program design, based on in-depth feedback and needs analysis from retreat program and professional guidance from licensed practitioners in the field of mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS). 

Women present the highest rates of recorded Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in today’s global refugee community. At the same time there is a severe shortage of mental health professionals in Jordan - a leading host country of refugees in the Middle East Region where over 3 million refugees reside.

Access to mental health support is further limited by the stigma that exists around mental illness, and can deter women from seeking mental health and psychosocial support services.

The COVID-19 pandemic was a tipping point for refugee women’s mental health. Our team members in Jordan’s Jerash camp experienced compounding pressures to support their families as the only income-earners for their households. On top of that, they suffered tremendous losses of family and friends to the COVID-19 virus and other illnesses.  

Awareness around the importance of mental health and psychosocial support is vital and can combat stigma against mental illness, while supporting greater demand for access to these services for refugee women.

By creating access to these services in a safe and supportive environment, we are improving the immediate mental health of the refugee women on our team, while also fostering greater awareness and programmatic development around the importance of mental health services in the long term.

The COVID-19 pandemic was a catalyst for SITTI to take a more holistic, evidence-based approach to the needs of our community and team members.

We’ve always prioritized income generation and dignified work opportunities. However, through adoption of the Refugee Self-Reliance Index (SRI) Survey as a key impact measurement tool, we gained more comprehensive insight into the challenges faced by our team members’ households.

Survey data revealed that women employed through our community-based partnerships were acting as the sole income-earners for their households during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, and on average were the primary income earners for their families before and during the pandemic. The survey also found that female-headed and single-income households experienced disproportionate stress from their male counterparts. Additional interviews conducted with team members confirmed high levels of stress and anxiety in female-headed households where the woman was the sole income earner.

We piloted the Women’s Health & Wellness Retreat program in 2021 as the first program within our SITTI Health & Wellness Initiative to:

• Provide a safe space where the women could speak one-on-one and in groups with a psychosocial support counselor specializing in marginalized communities and the unique traumas they experience

• Open up new experiences in guided meditation and yoga classes, teaching the women how simple breath work and movement can be effective and healthy ways to alleviate symptoms such as stress, anxiety and depression as they relate to their unique experiences

• Create valuable, accessible take-aways for the women to put into practice beyond the retreat space and in their daily lives.

We are raising $20,000 USD to create all-inclusive mental health and wellness programming + a retreat experience for refugee women in Jordan. And we’re starting with our team of refugee women artisans at SITTI.

• Provide FREE mental health and wellness programming access for 20 women, including a 2-night stay at a safe and accessible location in the serene Jordan countryside, 1:1 psychosocial support counseling sessions, group counseling sessions and workshops, nutritious meals, and activity-related materials and supplies (i.e. yoga mats, journaling materials/stationary)

• Hire licensed wellness practitioners locally at a fair pay rate, including a certified psychosocial support counselor and movement instructor certified in yoga, pilates and holistic health teachings

• Program impact monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning (MEAL) costs in the form of multimedia documentation, post-program evaluation surveys, and reporting analysis.

• 2023 Mental Health and Wellness Initiative program design, based on in-depth feedback and needs analysis from retreat program and professional guidance from licensed practitioners in the field of mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS). 

Thank you for caring about and investing in the mental health and wellness of refugee women with SITTI.

Your contribution demonstrates the power of our global community. It means everything to us that you’re supporting us to create a safe space that refugee women deserve for their healing, learning, and growth. Our initiative to promote the mental health and wellness of refugee women cannot succeed without YOU.

We are a founding team of passionate and determined women, with personal and professional lived experiences navigating broken systems where mental health for women and marginalized communities is put last, or not considered at all.
 
We also have several decades of experience working with refugee communities to create sustainable programming opportunities and initiatives, and have spent the past 7 years bootstrapping our social enterprise.
 
When we came together in 2014, we created SITTI to put refugee women’s dignity and self-reliance at the center of our brand’s mission and products. Women’s mental health and well-being are key to achieving self-reliance for them, their families and their communities.

You can learn more about us HERE.

Sitti is a proud recipient of: