Aboriginal community seeks outside help during suicide prevention week
Aboriginal community seeks outside help during suicide prevention week
The Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) is reaching for outside help with its long-standing youth suicide crisis.
As part of the annual youth suicide awareness and prevention week, September 18-23, NAN is teamed up with Voices for Children, a Toronto non-profit organization aimed at promoting the well-being of young people.
The week was about telling the general public NAN is ready to work with outside organizations focused on youth, as well as telling struggling young people it's OK to ask for help, said Catherine Cheechoo, co-ordinator for the Decade for Youth Council.
In June, Voices for Children helped the council pen a report on suicide from a youth perspective and set up meetings between the NAN group, mental health groups in Toronto and a B.C. researcher who studies Aboriginal youth suicide.
NAN is looking for new ways to meet the suicide challenge by looking at outside sources and voices, Cheechoo said.
In the last 20 years, 341 Aboriginal youth in NAN communities have taken their own lives, said Grand Chief Stan Beardy.
There were 25 youth suicides in 2005 – almost double the national average, according to NAN.
And already this year, 19 more youth have killed themselves.
Beardy said the reasons for the trend are numerous.
They include poverty, substance abuse, lack of infrastructure in communities and negative role modelling from parents and community members, he said.
As well, the legacy of residential schools – children taken from their homes and not seeing parenting skills or healthy relationships in action – plays a part, he added.
``Youth suicide is a big problem and it will take a lot of effort to address it,'' Beardy said. ``We'll need outside support to deal with the issue.''
Coming to terms with the suicide situation internally as a community has been an evolution, said RoseAnne Archibald, NAN deputy chief.
She added the Aboriginal community is ready to reach out beyond itself.
What happens within the Aboriginal community has an effect on northern Ontario at large, and vice versa, she said.
``I think it's incumbent upon all of us to help each other.''
NAN has healthy-living programs aimed at boys and girls, and wants to create a trust fund that will support ongoing programs for youth, said Archibald.
``It's really important for us as leaders to empower young people,'' she said.
While various meetings and roundtable discussions during the week were limited to participants, a public memorial service for youth lost to suicide took take place as well.
The plan was to have people who've been touched by suicide each let go one of 100 or so yellow, helium-filled balloons, said Cheechoo.
Blessed with a family
Our home is filled with music, dance and laughter. We are involved with skiing, skating, tobogganing, horse back riding, swimming and attending Pow Wows. These are a few of the fun activities that are a part of our everyday life, since we have fostered and adopted.
That’s not to say there are not challenges, but to be honest there is a true balance between the challenges and the rewards of raising and adopting children.
Now let’s introduce ourselves and our family. We are professional musicians, Gloria Desjarlais is my better half, and she is a Metis woman from the Ojibwa Nation. Gloria was raised in the Metis town of St. Laurent Manitoba. Gloria through her upbringing has learned and lived with fiddling music and jigging as she comes from a very Metis musically enriched family. Gloria was also taught the traditions of her family such as traditional home cooked meals, making bannock, growing a garden, picking the fruits grown in the bushes. Gloria loves to teach the children the ways of the Metis and also the skills she learned from her ancestors.
My name is Glen Neale, although I am a non-Native person, (English actually), our family lives and learns as one. Our acceptance and practice of Native culture within our family has only enriched my life and the lives of our children. We have been a part of Aboriginal culture for many years and continue to be more and more involved with the Elders in our own community as well as in the children’s communities. We are in the process of arranging visits to our childrens’ reserves. Once there we will visit family members.
Gloria and I, after our birth children were grown adults, began to foster. The children we fostered became such a part of our family and our lives that when the children could not return to parents or family we began our adoption journey. We are now raising our second family and cannot comprehend what life would be like without our children.
Speaking of the children, we adopted two girls Chappy and Mokie, but we haven’t stopped there. We have also applied to adopt a third little girl; we are applying for private guardianship of a boy and continue to foster two children.
We live in a small community outside of Calgary where our children learn and experience their culture, enjoy the outdoors, animals and caring for each other as a family.
For us, we believe life is good, adoption has enhanced our lives. God has blessed us with our family.
If you are interested in adopting a Native or Metis child, please call, Calgary and Area Child and Family Services, Native Services Multi Service Team at (403) 297-3840. (Financial help is available).