your family update
You Backed them and things began to change
Rujanthen mahalingam
Donor
When we met Vijayamalar, her story reflected years of loss, struggle, and quiet endurance. Vijayamalar is 45 years old and was widowed when her husband died during the war, leaving her alone to care for their four children. Since then, life has been a daily battle for survival. She works whenever she can as a wage laborer, earning just enough to provide food for her family, with no security or certainty about the next day.
In the hope of stability, Vijayamalar remarried, but her second husband also struggles to find regular work. The burden of poverty forced her to make a painful decision—sending her 18-year-old son to work so he could help support the family. She spoke with deep guilt and sadness about this choice, knowing her son should be focusing on his future instead of carrying adult responsibilities at such a young age. Yet, with no stable income and rising daily expenses, she felt she had no other option.
Despite these hardships, Vijayamalar continues to fight for her children’s wellbeing. Her greatest hope is to find a sustainable livelihood that would allow her family to live with dignity, keep her children in education, and build a future free from constant uncertainty. With the right support, she believes her family can move beyond survival and begin to thrive.
I, received livelihood assistance from Palmera, which supported me in starting a dairy business. Through this support, I was able to purchase a cow, which has become a sustainable source of income for my family. This has helped us access nutritious food, and I also earn income by selling milk.
With this income, I am able to meet my daughter’s education expenses. Alongside dairy farming, I continue to support my family by cultivating fruits and vegetables and through poultry farming.
I also regularly increase my savings through Palmera’s Village Savings Group using the income I earn.
Palmera Savings group is a place for women to come together to learn financial literacy, save and use their collective savings to revolve loans for urgent needs and to improve their businesses. A key part of these groups is for women to share their personal challenges and their shared collective challenges as women and in these safe spaces, women have seen so much value. In addition to this, we focus on food security working through these groups to ensure each family understand how to produce diverse foods and have the technical capacities and the motivation to cultivate. In most of the homes when we arrive, they are not cultivating a home garden.
In the future, I plan to take a loan to purchase another crossbred Cow and further strengthen my livelihood.
Once women are engaged in groups and households are food secure, we introduce their first livelihood, supporting a pathway to earn a living income that is suited to their skills and local market demand. This includes technical training and an initial grant, but most importantly, sustained accompaniment and encouragement.
Many women discontinue their businesses not because of a lack of ability, but because the mindset shift required is profound, something that can be difficult to fully appreciate in Western contexts. Through the women’s bank, ongoing capital needs are met via group revolving funds, alongside continued encouragement to build confidence and persistence over time.
I sincerely thank Palmera for providing this livelihood assistance to my family. I also express my heartfelt gratitude to Rujanthen Mahalingam for making this support possible.
Thank you.
Yours sincerely,
Vijayamalar
Our work continues with Sunthari. While she may appear able to stand on her own two feet, lasting change takes time. We will walk alongside her for one more year before letting go of her hand and it is this continued accompaniment that makes all the difference. This is possible because of you. Thank you.
