Choose life, love life, honour life

Since I joined Wawatay Native Communications Society nearly a year ago, I have attended two events related to suicide awareness and prevention.
As a naïve, newbie reporter, I covered the Wapekeka Survivors of Suicide Conference in August 2009. The second event was the Emergency Summit on the Suicide Crisis held in May by the Mushkegowuk Council.
Like many Aboriginals, my life has been impacted by the suicide of a person close to me.
I first heard the term suicide in the mid-1970s when I was about eight or nine years old.
That is when my cousin had chosen to end his life by hanging himself.
When I attended the Wapekeka SOS conference, memories of his funeral came flooding back to me. During the candlelight vigil, participants lit a candle in remembrance of a loved one.
I tried desperately to maintain the thick skin that my professors said I ought to develop as a journalist, but the humanness in me was unable to control the raw emotion that coursed through my body.
I put down my camera and recording equipment and instead grabbed a candle. Tears poured down my face as I let out years of oppressed grief. I mourned for Stanley.
As I go along in my work covering suicide prevention events, I feel sadness when I witness so many people walking around with their grief.
I want to reach out and offer comfort. It is the nurturing side of me to feel these emotions.
Like the leadership of our communities, I wonder what can be done to prevent another suicide.
I wonder what can be done to give our young people hope for the future and to want to carry on with life.
I sense that our young people are in need of a greater connection with Gezhi-Mnidoo or the Great Spirit; whether it comes from a traditional or Christian belief system.
Prior to the colonization of our people, there were several rites of passage to affirm the place of youth within the community.
There were vision quests to determine what the young person’s calling in life would be.
There were strawberry fasts to celebrate a young woman’s passage into adulthood when her moon time first began.
There were celebrations of a successful first hunt for young men.
I am thankful there are families out there that still continue with these rites of passage and celebrations for young people.
I also think about how the intergenerational affects from the residential school era have caused the loss of parenting skills.
The colonialist government in the mid-1800s understood the breakdown of a proud nation could begin by breaking down the family unit by apprehending the children.
Thousands of children for more than 100 years were forced to attend residential school.
Without the close connection to family, those children suffered immense trauma.
Those children needed to be shown warm displays of affection and to be comforted.
Today, it continues to be difficult for many parents to show their children the warmth of love, but that can change. It is an immediate action that can be done at this moment.
Self-healing can begin to bring a brighter future filled with hope to our children and youth.
Ask your child how her day went. Take some time to listen. Take some time to pray together. Take some time to give your child a hug, and to say ‘I love you.’
Let us show them how valuable they are to our families and communities.
Today, I am thankful during the past eight weeks, there have been no more reports of suicides in the Mushkegowuk territory.
Let’s all give our young people a reason to choose life, love life and to honour life.