Lynn resident provides necessary items to young women in need

SWAMPSCOTT – When Lynn resident Kathleen Bissonnette visited orphanages in Eastern Europe six years ago, she was taken aback by the lengths some of the girls and women went to find or create a product many American women take for granted – feminine hygiene products.”I really think it’s a thing that you don’t think about,” Bissonnette said. ” ? How can you not have that fundamental item?”So she started a nonprofit, 1 For You, 1 For Her, which collects feminine hygiene products and distributes them to women around the world.View a photo gallery.Lately, her globally oriented nonprofit has taken her closer to home when she provided for dozens of homeless students who attend South High in Worcester. And Thursday evening, her nonprofit’s business came to her backyard when the Lynn Area Chamber of Commerce held a Women in Networking event and wine tasting at Red Rock Bistro in Swampscott.The local connection, she said, is great for her nonprofit.”This started a world away, and now it’s in my west yard in Worcester, and my hope really is that ? if there are girls struggling with the same situation in Lynn, that maybe through this event and raising this awareness about this issue, they’ll be identified and we can give to them,” she said Thursday at the event.Around her, about 25 women – and some men – dropped off stapled brown paper bags filled with hygiene products and sipped wine while networking with Bissonnette and other Chamber members.Kristin McGregor, who works at the Life Care Center of the North Shore in Lynn, was chatting with friends from the Life Care Center and other businesses around town.”We thought it was a good cause,” she said of why they came to the event.Jan Reardon of East Boston Savings Bank nodded, adding that 1 For You, 1 For Her fills a need she hadn’t previously thought was one.”When you think about people who are homeless, there are certain things you know that are a necessity,” she said, listing off basic living requirements like food and shelter. ” ? We just take (toiletries) for granted because whatever we need we buy, and you never think other people don’t have the wherewithal to buy it.”Bissonnette said many of her donations have come from organizations and people in Massachusetts – everything from a golf course on Cape Cod to a Mormon church in Lexington – but she’s happy her nonprofit is now expanding to provide for people in the state.She said she was surprised at the reaction girls from South High in Worcester after she donated items to the school’s food pantry, which provides for the many homeless students there.”The girls came in and they saw the sanitary napkins on the table and they reacted as if it was gold that was put on the table, and they said, ‘It’s about time,'” she said, paraphrasing the school’s principal.Thursday’s product drive for Bissonnette, who is also a learning and development specialist at a school in Watertown and a business developer for a behavioral-health start up software company, was the idea of Abby Grant, the director of the Chamber’s Women in Networking branch.Grant said she is happy to combine networking and women with a nonprofit that caters to women.”What a pleasure it is for me to connect with someone locally who’s doing something globally and locally,” Grant said at the fundraiser. “And she’s collecting products for girls.”To donate, to 1 For You, 1 For Her, visit 1foryou1forher.org for send an email [email protected] Parcher can be reached at [email protected].