This is a fundraiser to help Bella receive gender-affirming care, and all proceeds will go to support this goal.

Bella came to the United Kingdom from Afghanistan in 2021 via a UK Government program to help evacuate at-risk LGBTQ+ Afghans. She’s been working and living in the UK since arrival, becoming a member of her community and trying to navigate her transition. However, trans health care is effectively impossible to receive on the NHS: wait times are measured in decades and in many cases NHS Trusts do not have a single practitioner who can provide trans medicine.

Bella’s goal is to fund gender confirmation surgery via a private clinic. With the help of friends, she hopes to achieve this goal as soon as possible. As friends of hers, we’ve set up this fundraiser in order to publicise her story and to document how the funds are spent. If the targets are met, we’ll post updates to let you know how the process is going.

We hope to provide good news via this site, and we greatly appreciate your willingness to help. Thank you so much.

Bella’s Words

“I have left behind a path full of thorns, and who says that stepping on thorns does not hurt? The world does not offer kindness to some people; for some, pain is their portion…

But there is always hope, even in hell. Hope in humanity. Hope for awareness. Hope for beauty. Perhaps that is why I chose the name ‘Bella’—because beauty will one day save the world.

The dark times have begun, now we must stand together more, with more empathy, compassion, light, and love. We will survive and shine with greater strength, brighter than the sun.”