Charlotte Wagenaar & Michael Schroeren

We both became aware of the issue of period poverty on a trip to Africa. In addition, I (Charlotte) already knew from my time in competitive sports what it's like to suffer from one's period and so one thing led to another and we decided: It cannot be that menstruating people in the 21st century still suffer from their periods in any way. Neither through period poverty and the bleeding itself, nor through the “days before the days” and the premenstrual syndrome or stopping the pill...

The more we delved into the topic, the more we were horrified at how many women and menstruators have to face unrealistic performance expectations month after month because they are not as capable as men in every phase of their cycle... We found out that over 70 % of all women experience significant losses in quality of life due to their period.

Above all, we were struck by the disadvantages that arise in poorer countries, especially for menstruating women and girls - simply because they menstruate. In Africa and India, periods are even more stigmatized than in Germany and girls are not allowed or unable to attend school. Often only because there are no hygiene products such as sanitary pads or tampons available. Due to period poverty, educational opportunities in these countries for young women and menstruators are far lower than those of men of the same age.

All of these topics gripped us. We celebrated the new strong image of women, empowerment and the removal of taboos around periods. But we also noticed that we need to go one step further. We need to enable women to actually celebrate their periods! We wanted to enable menstruators to fully enjoy every day of their lives, every part of their cycle and their femininity. Without crying cramps before your period or binge eating, abdominal pain, back pain, migraines, skin blemishes, depression, irritability, loss of libido, etc.

I, Charlotte, am in the last few months of my medical studies and have exchanged a lot with gynecologists and combed through a number of studies on the topic (around 60 of which are also linked on our website ) in order to create an evidence-based, 100% no-bullshit recipe. We also differ from all other providers in that we are not taken continuously but only 10 days per cycle and a depot function for vital substances is used. This also makes us comparatively inexpensive, because our common goal has always been to make our product accessible to as many menstruators as possible, because a pain-free, happy period should not be a privilege!

I am very enthusiastic about integrative and holistic medicine and our 2nd founder Michael studied medicine for 4 years, but then switched to business administration. Our passions are equality, sustainability (here too, our packaging is unique and we are very proud of being plastic-free etc.), empowerment and positivity and private nature, sport, and family. Social commitment with our aid organization against period poverty is extremely important to us and we founded and run chammi with all our heart!

Feminism is...

... the "radical" assumption that we are all equally valuable ;)

Charlotte's feminist role model is...

... her mother

Our favorite book is...

... Period Power by Maisie Hill

The best empowerment song is...

... Run the world - by Beyoncé

...what else would be worth celebrating? (than the epicenter of love, lust & life?)

More about chammi: https://www.chammi.eu