Dear Shannon, You’re 16 and I’m writing to you to give you a heads up. There is a rough few years ahead. Being different is nothing to be ashamed of, but unfortunately, you will learn this the hard way. Soon you will be mocked, taunted, pushed, and shoved. A feeling of dread hangs over you
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Having time off from school is usually amazing! But over the past few summers, we’ve missed out on so much, we’re thirsty for new opportunities to meet new people, try new things, and celebrate who we are as young women. How about you? For the third year, The Shona Project is offering the girls of
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Here at Shona, we are all about representing girls, women, and non-binary people from all backgrounds, but we especially love when we get to meet someone who is stepping outside of what the world considers “the norm”. So today we would like to introduce you to Caroline! Caroline is a HGV Technician who completed her
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Our friends at Active*Consent recently launched a new resource so we can all learn about consent, and the team wrote an article, just for our Shona Community, to fill us in! So read on, every day is a learning day!.. Consent culture is becoming a fast reality in Ireland, and to help develop it even
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Oh.. are we not supposed to go there? Would you prefer we hadn’t brought it up? Aunt Flo, shark week, red ribbon, things, yolks, crimson wave, time of the month, women’s trouble, flowers, the painters. Here is a helpful list of about 1,000 alternative words you can use. Because it’s a well-known fact that if you
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Put me in any room with any group of girls and I’ll always be the weird one. I just don’t fit in. My parents are very religious, and that has had a huge effect on molding me as a person. I didn’t have a phone until I turned 14 and that was just so they
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I’ve felt different from other people for as long as I can remember. As a little girl, I had some quirks: I didn’t really play with other kids a lot, I much preferred the company of myself or my twin sister. I was quiet and clumsy, and I was always away with the fairies. I
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(TW: Disordered eating) The year my parents separated was the year my whole world completely crashed and to say my mental health suffered was an understatement. I went from being a severely athletic young girl who loved her body and everything that she was, to a complete hermit who hated any sort of interaction with
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We are super excited to say that our very own Steph is back doing a little bit of writing for us (whoop whoop!) Some of you may know her from her series of weekly “Ask Steph” articles she wrote a while back for Shona, and some may know her from her counselling and psychotherapy work
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“Turning Red” is a heart-warming coming-of-age movie from Pixar Animation. It follows the story of Mei, a 13-year-old Chinese-Canadian girl who (inconveniently!) transforms into a giant red panda whenever she experiences strong emotions. Throughout the course of the film, we see Mei navigate the difficulties of growing up and balancing her parent’s wishes for her
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We always say that our website is for you, our Shona community. It is a safe space for you to share your story, so no girl feels alone. This is exactly what Kat has done today. Just have a read… Dear 18 Year Old Kat, Everything got better. You’ll discover many things in your final
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Us girls are divils for judging each other. Instead of embracing our differences, we constantly compete to be the prettiest, the smartest, the most popular, the most athletic, the skinniest. When we look in the mirror, we always look at our faults, and therefore, looking for faults in others makes us feel better about ourselves.
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We are delighted to invite you and your school to take part in our Shona Safe Bathrooms Challenge. We’d also love to share your free stencil pack with you in the hopes that it helps you to turn your corridors and bathrooms into more positive spaces for your students. Please just pop us an email
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Here’s the thing. Us girls spend many years changing and growing, moving from one group to another and identifying more with some at different stages because we like to hang out with those who are similar to us. Our personalities change over time, and we will go through phases where our friendships are just plain
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Exams are stressful and study is boring. Fact. Most of us would rather trim the lawn with a nail scissors than study. If we’re honest, we are inclined to lock ourselves in a room for two hours organising our sock drawer or thinking about what our death row meal would be, and then clapping ourselves on
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Hello everyone, my name is Mikaela, I am 22 years old and from County Wexford. I am a Shona Ambassador and a healthcare assistant in a southeastern acute hospital. I joined the Shona team in January 2020 and I absolutely love the sense of community that the Shona Project brings. The support I have received
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Trichotillomania (TTM), otherwise known as Trich, is a disorder where people pull out their hair, one strand at a time, from their scalp, eyelashes, eyebrows or other parts of the body. It can be very traumatic for sufferers. Today, Shannon shared her own experience with us, teaching us more about the condition… ** Before reading
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IT’S INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY!!! IWD is a worldwide day in which we celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. Celebrated since 1911, today is really special as it doesn’t belong to any one country, organisation, charity or political group. It’s a day for all of us. IWD is always a very busy day
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