In this edition of Pillow Talk by Pour Les Femmes, Robin Wright speaks with Heather Ibrahim-Leathers, the founder of Global Fund for Widows, a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering widows and female heads of households to overcome poverty through skills-based training, job creation, and micro-finance.

Robin talks with Heather about how the trajectory of Heather’s own life can be traced back to the widowhood of her grandmother who, when her husband died unexpectedly, was a young mother with four children living in Alexandria, Egypt. Left with nothing by her husband’s family, Eugine Awadalla became part of the story of the cycle of poverty that widowhood often perpetuates on women in many traditional hierarchical societies.

According to UN Women, the world is not on track to achieving gender equality by 2030 which is a goal world leaders have set as part of the Sustainable Development Goals agenda. In many countries, women who face the additional challenge of widowhood must also overcome long-standing cultural practices and lack of legal standing around inheritance, discrimination, and even violence. So not only is eradicating discrimination around widowhood critical to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals it is central to securing the rights of women more broadly.

The goal of the Global Fund for Widows is to raise awareness at the national and international level around the plight of widows so that widowhood itself is recognized as the drain on society that it is. In addition, GFW supports programs in many countries that help widows achieve financial stability, and self-sufficiency, and helps these women become leaders in their communities.