Heidi Breeze-Harris is the co-founder and executive director of One by One, a nonprofit organization committed to ending obstetric fistula in the developing world. She is also a graduate of Landmark Education’s Self-Expression and Leadership Program.

She had the idea of starting a non-profit organization when she first heard about fistula. At the time, she was two months pregnant, very ill, and had just completed the Landmark Advanced Course. She reluctantly started the Self-Expression and Leadership program, and in order to keep her schedule and workload from being too insane, she decided to combine her nonprofit aspirations with her project in the program.

Now, four years later, with a national and international nonprofit to show for it, Breeze-Harris is certain that the Self-Expression and Leadership Program pushed her to achieve higher goals and broader ownership of the fistula cause than she ever could have imagined.

Two million women in the developing world are suffering from obstetric fistula, a debilitating childbirth injury that was virtually eliminated in the U.S. by 1895. One of the hallmarks of this injury is that it goes largely undiscussed and women who suffer do so in isolation. A fistula is a hole in the body where it does not belong. In the case of obstetric fistula the hole is caused by an obstructed labor that can last as long as 5 days. This traumatic labor most often results in the death of the baby and the mother is left with the fistula or hole between her bladder and the outside world, through which she will leak urine and sometimes feces uncontrollably for the rest of her life, unless she is treated.

These unfortunate women who have lost their children now often have a mattress and clothes soaked with urine and waste. They smell. Often these women try not to drink so the liquid will stop coming. They are often told the labor was somehow her fault. Often they have nerve damage in their legs, making it difficult to walk. Very often they cannot work. Without treatment they cannot bear children–They are usually discarded by their husbands and these women live in shame and isolation. To say that fistula robs them of their dignity is a gentle way a saying it robs them of living their lives.

And yet as horrifying as fistula is, it is treatable and preventable. Fistula is an injury, not a disease. It is treatable. Where the Waldorf Astoria Hotel now stands in New York City was the site of the last fistula hospital in the United States. Fistula is a memory in the Unitez States; Breeze-Harris is committed that it be a memory everywhere.

She notes that it takes just $300 to permanently treat fistula. In 2005 she and her co-founder Katya Matanovich launched One by One to help make fistula a memory in the world and to empower people.

“Each of us, as individuals, have the power to change this global health issue,” she says. “Each of us, one by one, can completely transform a woman’s life and in turn the life of her community–And each of us can do it in a direct simple way. ”

In working to find ways to involve everyone they met in ending fistula, they created the idea of ‘giving circles,’ where one person gives $30 and asks 9 friends, family or co-workers to do the same, thus creating a circle of ten people who together raise $300 or the equivalent of care for one woman.

Giving circles started small but are now carried out by people all over the world. This past November, Ms. Leslie Garland, a current Self-Expression and Leadership Program  participant, heard about One by One’s giving circles from her friend Jessica and decided to make them her Self-Expression and Leadership project! she hosted two circles herself and is in the process of mentoring new circle leaders. Garland says that the process of enrolling her friends and neighbors to not only learn about fistula but to also give funds has been a real challenge and a real gift.

Many people all over the world have taken on giving circles. A Canadian giving circle leader, Ms. Ellie Hagey wrote an article about her inspiring experience leading a giving circle, saying:

“With the help of some friends we planned a Saturday brunch. I sent out invitaions and talked about what I had learned to whoever would listen. I wondered ‘Would women catch the vision of this and want to help? Would we be able to raise the $300?’ I needn’t have worried. The day of the brunch, women began arriving at my home and they placed their donations in a little basket I brought back from Africa. We enjoyed breakfast together in my garden; then went inside to view the documentary and share our response on what we had seen. Many were moved to tears to see how our ’sisters around the globe’ had suffered giving birth. I read the poem ‘Still I Rise by Maya Angelou to honor the courage of these women who suffer so much but still go on. A friend brought her bleeding heart seedlings for each woman. We were told it would bloom next year, symbolizing hope and new life for the women who will benefit from our day together.”

There have been incredible results in the world from all this giving. Since its inception, One by One has raised over $300,000, from thousands of people $30 at a time. The money goes in grants to community groups and medical organizations which directly treat fistula sufferers. To start a giving circle, get involved some other way, or learn more about One by One, visit their website.