I’ve been told about my family’s history and told I should remember it, so I do. This is how we start.
In the beginning… we were here, we were here from time immemorial, from before colonization, before Canada and before the treaties. We come from people who were autonomous and independent. We had our own creation story, our own history, our own math and science. We hand our own medicines and medical practices. We educated ourselves. We took care of ourselves. We knew our history, our laws, and practiced our culture freely. As time continued we experienced changes and made contact with new cultures and new ideas. We considered ourselves equal to these people. They did not consider us their equal and sought to exploit us.
We found the changes that were occurring were faster than we expected, and we were asked to enter into agreements to share the land. So we entered into ceremony, prayed, and asked for guidance towards this end. In 1876, we were guided and therefore agreed to enter into a sacred treaty. This was done to benefit the people. We thought that because we we had entered into an agreement through Sacred Ceremony, that they would honour the sacredness and truth of the treaty. We thought they would follow through on their word to help us.
We did not agree to give up our independence, nor did we agree to give up who we were, our laws, our traditions, and our ways of being. We did not think they would continue to steal from us, not only taking all the land we agreed to share but also eventually our children. We did not think we would lose our autonomy, nor did we think we would be forced to give up our culture, language, and traditions to fit into another nations society. Their society.
So our family history is always told with the prefaced context of what happens next. This is the story of our family and its journey to now. It’s about how history has impacted us as best as I can tell. It’s about our relatives and who we come from. It’s the story of us.
The lake it calls me home. Waves breaking softly upon its shore. The birds singing in the trees near by. The warmth of the sun in the sky. The lake it calls me home.
The lake it calls me home, feeling peaceful in silence I sit. Meditating on the waves as they hit the shore; sounds all around of the water as it sings. Life is what the lake brings. The lake it calls me home.
The lake it calls me home, peaceful upon its shore; the birds and the animals that it brings. The lake is calling me home. Sunlight glistening brings me close to the peace and hope. Quiet as the lake sings. The lake is calling me home.
I am a survivor – yes, a survivor of history, a survivor of residential school. Though I did not attend, I was never the less there. I survived it. I was there, I was there before I was born.
This is not ancient history, a story, it is real and it is my history.
I survived the hurt, the anger, the fear – the tears – the sorrow – the betrayal of trust. A child’s trust, the loss of that innocence.
I survived. I survived the wicked behaviour called “discipline”. I survived the shame, humiliation, self-hatred and the loss. “You are nothing, you dirty Indian”
I survived the losses.
The loss of language, culture, history and pride.
THE LOSS, THE LOSS, THE LOSS!!!
The loss of safety, security, and the loss of family, for generations.
How can this be? How did I survive, you ask???
I did, I survived….
I am a survivor of my fathers pain and my Mosom’s shame. I am a survivor of the betrayal, two generations of “education”.
Yes, I did not go to residential school but my family did. My family was sentenced there. The terms were carried out over several generations, sentencing that carried a legacy, holding us, stealing life from us, slowing us, paining us.
It taught my family not just reading and writing. It taught shame, self-hatred and created the need to forget.
It taught my Mosom Self-loathing, it raised him up in foreign ways. It told him “remember your place” “say your prayers, you’ll go to hell” and it created shame, shame, shame.
It taught my father to forget. The only direction to turn – ANYTHING to help you forget. But it was not gone. It never leaves, it was ALWAYS there. It is always there.
It is there in the fear and the tears and the sorrow. It is there in the behaviours, the promises and the inter-generational sorrow. The trauma that still holds.
Yet I have survived. I walked into that building, feeling the fear, struggling to make myself go inside. I cried. I cried for those children who never left, whether that was through experience or death. I cried so that I could be free. I survived.
I will not let the former shame claim another generation. “I will be okay, we are okay” “TAPWE” this generation grows strong because I survived. My father and my Mosom lived and I am here in spite of the fear. I am a survivor of residential schools.
I close my eyes and I feel the softness of the earth under my feet. My moccasins touching the soul of where my ancestors walked before me.
I breath in and listen to the quiet of the forest all around me. It’s quiet but noisy at the same time. I gear the birds and animals around me. I feel the peace and connection that my ancestors felt before me.
I open my eye and I see the beauty of this land. I see the clear water, I see the treas grown tall. I see the birds flying and the moose walking. I see the plants for healingand medicines and I know where I belong.
I feel the connection, so strong. I pray to my ancestors to ask Creator to help me and guide me. I pray that others see the beauty and blessing of our ancestors who walked this land. I pray so others may see their reflection and the beauty of the natural world.
In the morning the sun shines and reminds me I’ve been blessed to have another day. I greet you with a morning kiss and remember, I am blessed to spend another day with you. I breath in joy, happiness and hope and go about my day.
In the evening I express gratitude. I sit and reflect on how much I love you. I’m grateful to still be here. I’m grateful that I gain a new life everyday overcoming fear and remembering that you are with me too. I am grateful for every day experiences and blessings.
Hope is powerful when you have it. So many experiences can diminish the hope that you have and it can be difficult to find it again. Being diagnosed with cancer can devastate your hope. It can be like having a candle and trying to keep it lit in a storm. You never know whats happening and you are never actually prepared for whats going to happen.
Recently I have had many people close to me diagnosed with cancer. It sometimes feels like it’s all around me and as if it’s so common. It feels like we all need hope in action. We can only do what we can to build hope in ourselves and in others.
There are so many thing to learn when you get diagnosed with cancer. It’s hard to figure it all out. There’s lots of information out there. It’s also difficult to know how accurate all that information is. Every time I hear about someone I know being diagnosed with cancer I feel my shock over again. Then I think about all the experiences they will be going through and I pray that they have a good outcome.
I walked in Ovarian Cancer Canada’s walk of hope. They say “Hope for change, hope for awareness and hope a cure.” This year will be my third year walking in it. I prefer to do a virtual, local walk instead of the large walk in Edmonton. I can walk with my friends and family. It makes me feel hopeful. The first year I walked I was still receiving chemotherapy. I could not walk very far. I set a goal for my second year, to walk at least 5 kms. I was able to do that. This year, I hope to walk at least the 5 kms again and perhaps further.
Walk of Hope 2021
I’m walking because I was diagnosed with stage 3B ovarian cancer on April 1, 2020. I was told I’m in remission on September 28th, 2020. It’s been an experience and a difficult journey. I thought that somehow being in remission would mean that I was better. That all the fears I struggled with would soon be gone. That’s not the reality. I have lingering affects from the chemo. I struggled to remove myself from the idea of having cancer.
I guess I’m kind of still living with cancer. I’m still receiving treatment because I have a BRAC1 gene mutation. This means that I’m at higher risk for recurrence or getting breast cancer. I’m currently taking a parp inhibitor, which to my understanding is a form of targeted therapy to prevent recurrence. Research shows its very effective.
Recently I started seeing information about living with and living beyond cancer. I guess living with cancer would be the diagnosis and the treatments. Living beyond cancer would be be after all your treatments are finished and seeing yourself as thriver not just a survivor. I plan to live beyond cancer.
There is a great sadness within the people. This sadness is deep inside and though one may be happy there is still and unexplained sadness that over takes them. It is somehow diagnosed in the western world as depression but I think it is more than that. It is grief. This grief is profoundly deep. The wounds cut like a knife, it is a peoples grief.
This grief transcends time and experience. It is unknowingly passed down through the generations. We see it in the young people today. It is expressed through anger, gangs and violence. The young people have suffered a loss but are so unfamiliar with traditions that they do not know what they grieve for.
We do not provide tools to the young people because many of us do not know that we too are grieving. Grief in its classical description points to a profound and significant loss in ones life.
This loss is a loss of culture but is also more that cultural experiences. It is a profound loss of spirituality. It is the connection to spirit, to the Creator. This profound form of alienation has created a separation of the spiritual self from the physical self. It has caused the separation from the ability to grieve and recover. Elders tell you to pray. This is the first step in reconnection with self in the spiritual aspect.
It has been said by many different people of many different belief systems that prayer is a powerful thing. That connection to the Creator allows you to begin your journey home.
When you pray you begin to adopt a feeling/attitude of respect. This is because you know you are praying to someone who is greater than you. You acknowledge that you are unable to change things on your own and you know that you need the assistance of a being greater that you. The grandmothers and the grandfathers in that spiritual sense would be angels, beings that connect you to the Creator.
When you ask for help and guidance you begin to change how you react. Your respect in prayer translates to your life. You begin to show respect to others as well as yourself. This respect further translates to respect for the earth, who is likened to a mother because she provides for all her children, human and animal. Once this aspect of respect is received and learned the grieving process is started. Healing begins ad you are open to other lessons.
The sadness begins to lift. As you start your journey towards healing you begin to realize that the Creator has provided these experiences to you for a reason. You begin to realize that in every experience there is a lesson. It is simply finding it. Humility, thankfulness, love, compassion, all these experiences are then brought forward. The profound sadness that once touched your life, the sadness that you couldn’t explain, lifts. It sounds easier that it actually is because there are other processes involved too. There is forgiveness and letting go. This does not mean that you forget, it simply means that you treat others, who may have done wrong to you, with respect and love.
If you continue to hold anger and hate or unforgiveness in your heart it will continue to eat away at your spirit. Your spirit/soul will suffer. You will believe that only bad things happen and that there is no love for you. The Creator loves all the children, the Creator forgives mistakes and wrongs. If you approach this life you have been given with love then situations will become easier to deal with.
First is respect second is love, you cannot have love without also having respect. With love and forgiveness comes compassion. When someone deliberately tries to hurt you, you are able to recognize that their soul/spirit is in pain. Their pain is as profound as yours once was. Therefore you treat them with respect, love and compassion. They will see that you have a new perspective and are able to treat them in a way that is right and honest.
Your honesty may not be appreciated, depending on the depth of their pain. They maybe able to appreciate that you do not want anything, that you are not trying to manipulate the, that you are really and truly respecting them or they may not. Do not allow this to discourage you. Your living in truth. This truth is for your peace and balance and harmony not theirs. Your forgiveness is not conditional, it is for your own peace of mind. Bringing peace to yourself is a way to bring forgiveness to yourself as well as forgiveness to others.
The sadness may never be gone. In truth it may always be with you but it becomes a different kind of sadness. It is a sadness that you watch others still struggling with their pain. Pain is very powerful. It can rule a persons life for many years without them even realizing it. Out of pain violence is manifested, the pain of hurt, fear and anger. They feed the pain by allowing hate and anger to consume them. They numb their pain by self-medicating through addictions be it drugs or alcohol or lifestyles, they really don’t want to live.
To release the pain in their life you muse confront it with love and respect. These experiences have brought you to this place. It is up to you to choose where you will journey next. The Creator has given us freedom of choice. You can choose love or you can choose hate.
Freedom from the pain is through the acknowledgement of the loss. It is understanding your grief. Your loss is your experience, you can own it, listen to the truth of your loss. Speak to it, this sometimes means sharing your grief with others, sometimes it is through self-reflection ad meditation. It is your journey and only you can decide where to go.
We remember when we used to walk free to gather medicines, hunt for food, have our ceremonies and raise our families.
We remember.
We remember when we were asked to share the places where we walked free as a nation, where our ancestors walked before.
We remember.
We remember when freedom was taken, and we were confined.
We remember.
We remember when our children were taken and we had to have permission to visit them.
We remember.
We remember when after we were confined we needed permission to pick berries, gather medicines, hunt for food and practice traditions.
We remember.
We remember these things, we know how it impacts us. We remember. Now it’s time you learn our history, our losses and acknowledge your gain. We remember, you should too.
Etikwe, I suppose. I’m not sure why this word popped into my mind, I suppose there are lots of reasons for it.
I think about how many different times I’ve heard this word in my life. Etikwe, I suppose it’s a lot.
Etikwe, it means I suppose or maybe just suppose. Awina etikwe, I don’t know who or maybe I wonder who depending on the context. I suppose I should talk pîskiskwêw to my dad about it.
I suppose I’m supposed to use it more. I guess I need to use the words in Cree as they pop into my mind.
Etikwe it is to remind me that there are words that I know and that I need to learn more.
So that I can pê-pîkiskwêw Ekosi, that’s all my thoughts for now, etikwe
Sakaw Iskwew 