As a 17-year-old junior earning my Stars & Stripes award, my heart has always been drawn to helping young women and families in need of care and support. The Stars & Stripes award is the American Heritage Girls’ highest scout award and entails a project leaving a significant impact on the community and requires more than 100 service hours.
I am delighted to say that I have been blessed with the amazing opportunity to impact women and children in downtown Columbus through the renovation of the Women’s Care Center’s bathroom.
This is not any ordinary bathroom — around 2,300 women alone visit the Broad Street location (with a total of 9,435 women coming between this and its sister center 10 minutes away) every year, with over 3,250 pregnancy tests taken.
This is the place where women experience one of the most life-changing moments of their lives. This is where women come to console themselves, to take a minute to pause and to rejoice at the life within them. Often, women bring along some of their families, and the bathroom becomes a place of support.
Over the next three months, my project will replace the vanity, tiling and baby-changing station, install air conditioning, and repaint and furnish the room. With a fundraising goal of $5,500, my project aims to create a warm, restful place at no cost to the Care Center.
I am here to ask for your generosity in helping fund this significant difference in so many women’s lives. Any amount is truly, sincerely appreciated. You can donate through my GoFundMe at https://gofund.me/0a07f50c.
For a tax-refundable donation, you can donate through the Women’s Care Center at the Broad Street location. Simply go to https://supportwomenscarecenter.org/donate/, pick Columbus, Ohio, and at the next page check the box saying “make this donation in someone’s honor or memory.” In the box labeled “Honoree Full Name,” write “for Annelise Perez’s bathroom renovation.”
If you are not able to monetarily donate, I ask for your prayers throughout the next several months as renovations get underway, that the grace of the Lord may guide me in all my decisions and work, and that through this He may bless the countless women and families who will walk through this door in the future. God bless you!!