“Poverty creates indirect issues in the relationship with the baby,” announces Samra Seddik. Stress, anxiety about the future, for these refugee women, isolated, sometimes homeless. Driven by this observation and moved by the situations of women she encountered through her work, she first created a Facebook page, then an association, Un petit bagage d'amour, to provide these women with the essentials to ease the arrival of their baby and its first months.
Hygiene products, milk, baby food, clothing, mainly donated by individuals, are processed through the association's premises in the Saint-Sulpice neighborhood of Paris.
"We also have quite a few companies that help us by providing products directly or giving us vouchers to acquire them,” explains Samra Seddik.
In 2016, at the time of the association's creation, about 6 bags were distributed per month. Today, there are around 250 monthly in Paris, with about fifteen branches across France.
"The women we support say that we really take this problem off their hands, while they have so many others to manage,” shares Samra Seddik. “So it’s true that the feedback is always very touching. They send us updates about the babies, the births, photos with the clothes we gave them. We have volunteers who keep in touch, who have become attached to certain families, following them for birthdays, Christmas celebrations… It’s truly moving everything that happens here.”
