“Our moms and female caregivers are the foundations of our households, and our community, really” says Kelly McGowan, creator of the new Women Empowered to End Disparities in Obesity (WEDO) program. “If that foundation is cracked because mom doesn’t sleep, mom doesn’t eat right, mom doesn’t take that time for herself, what is that going to do to the rest of things?”
WEDO was designed to make sure mothers and female caregivers in North County get the care and support they need, since they provide so much support to everyone else. Working out of the Emerson YMCA in Ferguson, the WEDO program provides fitness classes, cooking classes, and self-care sessions – all geared towards moms. The program is funded through Missouri Foundation for Health as part of the Healthy Schools Healthy Communities initiative, the end goal of which is to decrease childhood obesity rates by 5 percent within the next five years.
“We’re making some traction,” McGowan said. WEDO began in December, and since then she’s “done about two to three focus groups with moms, and that helped shape some of the events and things that I have going on.”
The amount of time the moms spent talking about their frustration with the school system, McGowan said, surprised her. They told her about their experiences with “coming up to the school, popping in to say hey or checking in on what’s going on with your child, and not being greeted with positivity.” The moms in the focus groups also “want to increase the variety of businesses that exist. Because there are a lot of corner stores, a lot of liquor stores, a lot of fast-food places, but someone said, you know, can we get a Trader Joe’s in our community or something?”
“Moms are stressed out all the time, so listening to them say that, and knowing my information, I wanted to make sure that stress was dealt with.” – Kelly McGowan
Food access in areas classified as “food deserts” is one of the key points of McGowan’s program. They have been able to partner with St. Louis MetroMarket – a Metro bus retrofitted as a produce stand – to create the first MetroMarket stop in North County. The MetroMarket will now be at the Dellwood Recreation Center every Friday until mid-October from 3-6 p.m., giving Dellwood area residents access to fresh fruits and vegetables. MetroMarket also participates in the Double Up Food Bucks program, which means EBT dollars spent on fresh fruits and vegetables at MetroMarket count for double their value.
WEDO also tackles other aspects of health aside from providing access to healthy food.
“Studies have shown that stress is a huge, huge factor in people’s health,” said McGowan. “And moms are stressed out all the time, so listening to them say that, and knowing my information, I wanted to make sure that stress was dealt with.” So, she works on stress management and time management for moms, as well as self-care workshops.
At a WEDO self-care workshop at the Emerson YMCA on June 24, yoga instructor Jamie Austin led six moms from the North County area in yoga, then through an obstacle course. Afterwards, when they went inside to talk through self-care, the moms expressed exhaustion with the lack of time they have for themselves.
“Self-care is knowing when to slow down,” said Austin.
“How?” asked Shaun, a mother of five who attended the workshop. “Out of the past few months, this [the self-care workshop] is the only time I’ve had to myself!”
The exercise tips and breath work done in the self-care workshop were important, but just as important was the re-affirmation that even for mothers, who spend so much time taking care of others, it is important to take care of yourself.
“Like, I’m done rescuing people,” said Tanya, another workshop participant. “Time to rescue me!”
The strain the mothers feel is emblematic of problems that McGowan sees in the North County area as a whole.
“These communities, they are hurting. The socio-political climate out here is rough,” McGowan said.
“And the more and more I talk to folks, there’s a sense of hopelessness. People may think ‘this is just, like, a health thing, she’s just doing cooking classes, how is that really going to help anything in the grand scheme of things?’ But I think that if people are able to be healthier, or have access to things that make them healthier, they’re going to be better, holistically.”
McGowan is bringing skills back to St. Louis that she learned from her work at Harlem Children’s Zone, a nonprofit in Harlem, New York dedicated to improving youth health. She realized that health programs that only targeted kids weren’t enough.
“It’s great to have these programs in after-school, but the greater community, the broader community has to facilitate those healthy behaviors,” she said.
“You have to deal with the parents, because the kids, they’re not independent. They don’t have jobs to buy the food. You gotta work with what’s going on at home.”
Therefore, most classes offered through WEDO are parent-child collaborative classes – cooking classes, or exercise groups, that both mothers and their children can attend.
McGowan hopes to get more moms involved in the WEDO program in the coming months. “I think making sure that our moms are good, period, means their families are going to grow and thrive,” she said.
“Giving them access to those fresh foods, giving them access to be able to safely take a walk somewhere, or do something with their families, and not having to worry about some craziness. Giving them that safe space. And that is what is lacking.”
