"AFRICAN women have been suffering in silence for decades. Every human has a limit of endurance, and once they hit that, they come here."
Lucy Njomo, 57, sits in her tiny office in Bensham Lane, Thornton Heath, where she has been providing support for women affected by female genital mutilation (FGM) since 2008.
Despite the practice – which involves the total or partial removal of external female genitalia – being outlawed in the UK in 1985, Ms Njomo has scores of women of all ages come through her door at the African Youth Development Association (AYDA).
"I first became aware of it when I was running parent groups and we were talking about different cultures within our communities," she told the Advertiser.
"The subject of naming ceremonies came up (where children are officially named seven days after they are born) and someone asked about when the group thought the best time to circumcise daughters was."
FGM is performed on girls from one week to 18 years old. Ms Njomo began seeing older women in their 60s but gradually, through word of mouth, younger women heard they could come to AYDA for support.
However, the organisation is on its last legs, as it struggles to find new sources of funding, and now faces having to vacate its offices.
"If that happens, I will never turn off my phone," said Ms Njomo. "It is something I am very passionate about; much of it makes me very sad.
"Only in October, a woman died in childbirth. Her sister came in and was very upset. I asked her how she died and she admitted it was because of FGM. The doctor's wouldn't open her up [C-section] and she was going into labour and they tried to get her to hospital in a taxi in time but of course, the baby couldn't come out. Both the mother and the baby died."
Around 35 per cent of girls subject to FGM die, either soon after or from the long-term effects.
Ms Njomo has also helped a number of teenage girls who have called her in secret, telling her they are scared their families will force FGM on them.
"There is often a lot of pressure from the grandparents and the fathers, they think no one will marry the girls unless they have it done to them," she continued.
"I've had girls here in their 20s who had FGM done to them only a few years ago and they feel like their parents have cursed them.
"It makes me so sad – they are right at the point where they can make something of their life, and this destroys all your confidence and feeling of being a woman."
Ms Njomo said most girls are taken back to the country where their grandparents live but some go through FGM in the UK.
"People are very aware the level of trouble they could get into so it is so, so secret," she said.
"There are still people who know how to do it, it happens within the
Within the middle-aged women who visit, Ms Njomo is seeing an alarming level of domestic violence.
"It often leads to that," she said. "If women have had FGM, they can feel no sexual pleasure. They never want any attention from their husbands who can react badly to that.
"Some even feel they are raped by their husbands but of course, if they told their family or community that they would be laughed at."
Ms Njomo said she was beginning to see some parts of different communities who still practice FGM stand up against it.
She said: "I have some mothers who come in and say they will take their children to see their grandparents 'over their dead body'.
"When they get the strength to say this and do this, I feel very proud that some of what we are doing has helped.
"Hardly anyone comes to me to tell me about FGM directly, it takes a lot of time and trust and they really don't have anywhere else to go. It's such a taboo subject."
Christina Sonde, 22, who volunteers for AYDA, said a girl she knew had been taken abroad without knowing what was going to happen to her.
"She was greeted by her family and there was a big celebration, she had no idea," she said.
"Now she says she will never get married, never have children, so they will never have to go through what happened to her."
