Child brides share heartbreaking stories - 2017 expects 12,000 brides as young as 6-years-old

Every seven seconds in 2017, a girl under the age of 15 will be forced into marriage.

Experts believe a child bride will be married off to significantly older men every few seconds in 2017.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Girls not Brides predicts 28 girls under the age of 18-years-old are married off every minute of every day.

Child marriages are fueled by gender inequality, poverty, ancient traditions and the lack of security, with most child brides never finishing school and many dying during childbirth.

According to Girls not Brides, 1.2 billion girls will be forced into marriage by 2050.

Daily Mail reported several heartbreaking stories of child brides, some of whom were forced to flee their abusive husbands.

UK aid workers discovered a 6-yera-old "bride" who was sold into marriage to a man over 40-years her senior. The dowry being a goat.

Meanwhile, an 8-year-old child was forced to marry a man five times her age. She died of internal bleeding after her wedding night.

Syrian Sahar was 13-years-old when she married a 20-year-old man in Lebanon. She became pregnant the following year.

"The wedding day, I was imagining it would be a great day but it wasn't," she told Save the Children, another child advocacy group.

"It was all misery. It was full of sadness. Many girls who get married at a young age get illnesses and suffer from bleeding. I am a child raising a child."

The age gap between Sahar and her husband is significantly smaller than the previous girls, and she was older when she married. She claims to be happy with her husband but believes girls should wait until they are 20 to marry.

Marriage and raising a child stole her own childhood, leading her to warn other young girls and her own younger sister to live their lives a bit more before marrying.

Kirsty McNeill, Save the Children's Director of Policy and Campaigns announced over 12,000 girls will be forced to marry this year, explaining, "That's one girl getting married every seven seconds when they're still a child."

She continued, explaining the girls will "lose their childhood, their innocence, and sometimes their lives. They are stripped of their opportunity to learn, thrive and be healthy. This kind of discrimination against girls is not only unfair, it's deadly. They are regularly subject to violence - both physical and sexual - and are neglected by their families and communities."

McNeill reported child brides are not developed enough to give birth, which is the second largest cause of death for adolescent girls.

Several groups have been attempting to stop child marriages but are fighting an uphill battle against countries that refuse to give women rights.

"We have to recognise that child marriage is often a deep-seated social convention and often the key to change can be religious leaders or women's groups," McNeill explained. "These cultural leaders recognise that child marriage is a threat to girls' futures and are working to challenge and change these harmful attitudes and practices."

Sadly, several countries marry off girls in an attempt to keep them obedient, to bear more children and to keep them from the temptation of losing their purity before marriage.

Groups such as Girls not Brides and Save the Children have been offering poor families money to keep them from selling their girls at a young age. With the financial assistance, families are more likely to keep their daughters in school for longer periods of time.

McNeil explained: "As we usher in 2017 with hopeful new year's resolutions, Save the Children is pursuing the dreams of the 15 million girls who will become child brides next year. There is still a mountain to climb until we reach a world in which girls will have the same opportunities as boys.

"Twice as many girls as boys never start an education. Schools also routinely expel girls because they are married or pregnant. But we're working to ensure girls stay put in the exam halls instead of being pushed up the wedding aisle - at least until they're old enough to choose a husband."

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