Girl who attempted suicide to avoid forced marriage now dreams of becoming a nurse
Faith Chepengat does bead work in Chepararia, Pokot South, on April 8, 2026. Faith evaded child marriage by a whisker after she ran away. She wants to pursue nursing at university to help survivors of FGM.
What you need to know:
- After surviving a suicide attempt at 12, one girl now fights to reclaim her future through school and ambition.
- A childhood nearly stolen by forced marriage becomes a powerful story of survival, resilience, and hope through education.
The men drinking traditional beer that evening in Kacheliba had no idea that the 12-year-old girl whose fate they were deciding had already made up her mind. Faith Chepengat was going to take her own life.
When we meet her, she is busy making beads, hoping to sell them and raise money for her upkeep. Nothing about her suggests what she has been through, but once she starts talking, her troubled past comes to the fore.
Faith hails from Kacheliba, and she recalls vividly the evening she decided to end her life to escape a forced marriage to an elderly man. She was 12, and the negotiations for her marriage had culminated in a drinking spree of traditional beer, a sign, she knew, that her fate had been sealed.
"With the celebrations marked by the drinking of traditional beer by the men, I knew that my fate had been sealed and that I would be married off immediately. Since I could not imagine myself being married off at such a tender age, I decided that I had to do something to prevent this from happening. I decided to take my life," she tells Nation.
She went to a nearby shopping centre, bought a pesticide used to kill ticks in livestock, returned home, and swallowed it. "I later became unconscious. When I gained consciousness, I realised I was in hospital. I learnt that I had been rescued by relatives who rushed me to the hospital," she says.
What followed was a brush with death. She developed complications that saw her admitted to a hospital in Kapenguria, more than 200 kilometres away. She has always been grateful to the doctors and nurses who fought to save her life, and she vowed then that she would one day become one of them, to help girls and women in her community who still face the challenges of FGM and the reproductive health complications that come with undergoing the cut.
"I was impressed by the doctors and nurses who treated me until I got well. I desired to one day become like them. Where I come from, hospitals are very far, and I want to use my training to help my community," she tells Nation.
After her recuperation, Faith ran away to avoid being married off. A good Samaritan took her to a shelter in Chepararia, Pokot South, where she was enrolled back in school. She sat her Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) and performed well, earning her a place at Uhuru Girls in Lodwar, Turkana County, in 2022. She sat her KCSE last year and scored an impressive B Plain.
With that result, her journey towards a career in medicine is firmly on course. She is set to join a university in September to pursue a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. The challenge now is money. Faith has had no contact with her parents for 10 years and doubts whether her father will agree to fund her education.
"I have not gone back home for the last 10 years and have not spoken to my parents all this time. I doubt if my father will agree to fund my education, as I defied him and refused to get married as he wanted. I am, however, optimistic that I will get assistance from the Higher Education Board," she says.
Sh3,000 monthly savings
To prepare for university, she is making and selling beads, setting aside what she can from the profits. In a good month, she manages to save about Sh3,000 — an amount she says is far too little to cover a university education. She is calling on well-wishers to help her pay school fees and realise her dream of becoming a nurse.
All her younger sisters have since been married off after being subjected to FGM. Though she has not set foot at home in 10 years, Faith is hopeful that she will one day return and make peace with her family. "When I am done with my university studies, I want to go back home and help my parents and siblings. They are going through a very difficult life, which I would like to ease. I will be in a position to do so," she says.
Faith's advice to her community is to shun outdated cultural practices like FGM and child marriage and instead embrace girls' education. "Because of education and being in school, I currently do not have a child. I am sure I would perhaps by now be having about five children," she adds.
Despite the financial hurdles standing between her and her dream, Faith is certain that her future will be bright.
