Meet the Team: Hawwa Abdella
October 03, 2025
Hawwa is an educator at Hamlin’s Harar Fistula Hospital. As a former fistula patient, she knows how vital education is to women’s healing and to the rebuilding of their lives. Literacy and learning opened a new chapter in her life after obstetric fistula, transforming her despair into hope.
"Once a patient myself, I now dedicate my life to supporting others. I understand their trauma and walk beside them as they rebuild their confidence. I encourage women to rediscover their purpose and believe in a better future. Thanks to Hamlin Fistula Ethiopia, many of us can begin again." - Hawwa, educator and former fistula patient
Hawwa comes from West Hararghe in Ethiopia’s Oromia Region. Soon after she got married, she became pregnant, but her first pregnancy ended in a preventable tragedy: obstetric fistula.
After three days of labor at home, her in-laws took her to a health center. The staff mistakenly told her it wasn’t time to deliver, and she was sent home. She eventually gave birth to a stillborn baby and sustained an obstetric fistula. She recalls, '“I was unable to control my bladder and bowels and partially paralysed. I couldn’t move my legs which was both physically and emotionally devastating. Living with fistula was isolating and humiliating. The fear of leaking in public filled me with shame and I avoided people, believing I was unworthy of love or companionship.'
I felt trapped in my own body, unable to care for myself or participate in daily life.
- Hawwa, educator and former fistula patient
Suffering tragedy
My husband abandoned me and remarried, compounding my feelings of rejection and despair. I had lost my health, my baby and the person I thought would stand beside me. I felt purposeless, as if my life had lost all meaning.”
Hawwa learned about Hamlin Fistula Ethiopia from a former patient. To reach the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital, she had to sell her goats, the last remnant of her marriage.
Hawwa’s first surgery in 2008 was unsuccessful due to complications. She returned in 2009 for further procedures, ultimately requiring diversion surgery. Hawwa then moved to Desta Mender, Hamlin’s rehabilitation and rehabilitation center for women needing longer-term care. She received counseling, literacy and numeracy classes and vocational training. She learnt animal husbandry, studied Amharic and improved her reading.
Finding her place at Hamlin's Harar Fistula Hospital
Literacy is not only about reading and writing — it is also about dignity, empowerment and opportunity. The education she received at Desta Mender set Hawwa on a new path. She was chosen to become an educator for other patients at Hamlin’s Harar Fistula Hospital. Hawwa is now a first year Accounting student, studying for her diploma.
"Today, I live a happy life and remain committed to helping women with obstetric fistula and other birth-related injuries. Fistula patients often face isolation and shame but at Hamlin’s Harar Fistula Hospital, we are more than colleagues — we are family." - Hawwa, educator and former fistula
Catherine Hamlin Fistula Foundation acknowledges the Traditional Owners and Elders past, present and emerging throughout Australia and the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the Traditional Owners of the land and waterways on which our Australian office is situated. We acknowledge the many ethnic groups in Ethiopia and their ancestral and cultural connection to the land where our work is undertaken.