Dialoguing for Life

Though the halls of Holiday Inn Midtown may have been decked with seasonal cheer, many of those milling about its lobbies had something entirely different on their minds: suicide prevention.

The First Nations and Inuit Suicide Prevention Association of Quebec (FNISPAQ) kicked off their seventh annual pre-conference for frontline workers and those in related fields on November 28. Three days later the actual conference began on December 1. The conference was geared both towards those in the healing profession and those who have suffered at the hands of suicide.

“Every year there is a feeling that this conference grows up more and it grows up in many different ways. I guess that more and more the participants know why they are coming here and why they have come back,” said Normand D’Aragon, director of the FNISPAQ.

Though attendance was down from previous years, this was to be expected amidst the H1N1 flu pandemic, particularly with the impact it has had on Canadian Indigenous communities. Despite this, D’Aragon said that he and his colleagues were stunned at how powerful the 2009 edition ended up being.

The theme to this year’s FNISPAQ conference centered on children, grandchildren and future generations of First Nations and Inuit communities. D’Aragon pointed out that this year’s poster, an image of an Elder, a small child and geese, designed by Waskaganish artist Tim Whiskeychan, illustrated this beautifully.

According to D’Aragon, one of the biggest accomplishments this year was the formation of a provisory committee to eventually form a special circle for residential school survivors. The impact that residential school has had on its survivors and the generations that have come after them was a particular focus at this year’s event.

D’Aragon also said that the youth component was very strong this year and if it hadn’t been for the excessive cost of coming to the event and the pandemic, the youth contingency might have been twice the size.

The Dialogue for Life conference is particularly unique for several reasons, one being that it allows those who have experienced suicide to vent and heal.

Many frontline workers and those in related fields, such as police or healthcare workers, can go to this event not just to retrain but to seek out personal solace.

“In order to stay healthy, the workers need to free themselves — physically, spiritually and mentally — from everything they have touched from the people who they are helping,” said D’Aragon.

For both the workers in the field and survivors of suicide, getting out of their communities and expressing their burdens in a forum where they have privacy and are surrounded by the likeminded has its benefits.

“I am enjoying meeting a lot of new people and knowing that we are all in the same boat and that we have the same experiences and problems in our communities. We are trying to come together as a team and work on programs to help the youth and adults,” said Johnny Shecapio of Mistissini who is the interim Planning and Programming Officer at the Cree Health Board and Social Services of James Bay.

Shecapio came to present at the pre-conference and then stuck around for the actual conference. He and his department put on a presentation as part of the Suicide Assist training for those working in suicide prevention and frontline work.

Since many of those who came to the event did so because of the trauma they had experienced in their lives, resources were made available to those who were really suffering as a result of reliving trauma within the conference’s sessions.

Mike Standup, a traditional healer from Kahnawake, was one of the resources made available to the participants. Standup said he was booked back-to-back throughout the entire conference.

“I am currently working very much with people who seem to be in desperate need these days. Also, there is a thirst for what it is I have to share with people, traditional healing and also a bit of my personal story which goes along with it too. After all, no healers worth their salt have not walked in the same shoes as their clients therefore I have to walk my talk and not just be a talker and thinker,” Standup said.

Standup, who also has a private practice, said he is no stranger to suicide professionally as it is also a subject matter that he deals with on a daily basis working at the Montreal Native Women’s Shelter.

At the conference he said he was helping many of those whose family members had either committed or attempted suicide on the post-traumatic stress they had suffered as a result of the incident(s).

“Many family members are still reliving the horror story without moving on with their lives. I teach about the meanings and feelings and the issues behind suicide in order to come to a clearer understanding of what drives a person to such actions and the intense pain and body motion that takes over when that occurs. Part of my work is to help survivors and family members to let go of what is going on currently and how to move past that,” said Standup.

Helping the youth express their emotions throughout the conference, Jeska Slater, who grew up on Vancouver but is originally from Fisher River First Nation, brought her own style of esteem enhancing art therapy to the conference.

Slater, who runs Young Artist Warriors out of the Inter Tribal Youth Centre in Montreal, originally developed the program out west while working with at-risk and homeless youth. In the program she either paints large-scale portraits of the youth or facilitates workshops where the youths paint portraits to help encourage self and cultural esteem.

Though Slater has carried out this program in different communities across Canada, her inspiration for the project came when she was living on Haida Gwaii in northern B.C.

“I am Métis, my mother is Cree from Fisher River Nation. I started to wonder about how cultural trauma is transmitted from generation to generation. My grandmother went to residential school and this really affected my mom and her siblings,” said Slater.

Once she began the painting project with the youth in Haida Gwaii, Slater said that she noticed a remarkable transition within some of the youth so she carried on the project elsewhere.

Her work was on display at the conference and drew crowds throughout the event. The portraits that the many youths who participated in the workshops were also on display towards the end of the event.

More info on Slater’s her unique project can be found at youngartistwarriors.blogspot.com/

The youth at the Dialogue for Life conference were not just taking part in the workshops, some of them were actually part of the presentation.

Mickey Decarlo had traveled to the conference with 12 youths from Wemindji to present a workshop on the Three Rs of Suicide.

“The three Rs of suicide prevention are recognize, respond and refer. We teach people those simple tools about the signs and symptoms and then we made a short DVD movie that we showed in the workshop,” said Decarlo

According to Decarlo, this project is a multi-part collaboration between the youth coordinator, the youth centre, the school, the collaborative education program and the wellness centere where Decarlo works.

The program came about when  coordinator Thomas Mark made an agreement with various organizations in Wemindji to make it a suicide-safe community. From there they developed their own suicide-assist program that is now taught in the high school in grades 8-11. The program has been running in the community for over three years.

According to Decarlo, though there has not been a suicide in Wemindji in recent years, what is common is risky behaviour amongst the youth which is why this program is necessary.

Decarlo said that in the past they had been hearing from youth who had friends disclosing suicidal intentions to each other. Though these kids wanted to say something to the authority figures who could have helped them, they felt they couldn’t out of loyalty to their friends.

“They would tell their friends about how they were feeling and so a lot of the youth were carrying around that burden. Through the three Rs, the youth learn how to not carry around that secret, how to get help for their friends and how they are not their responsibility. For youth, friendship and loyalty is very important but this is not being disloyal or breaking a friendship code to get them help,” said Decarlo.

Decarlo said that the conference was a wonderful experience for the Cree youth from Wemendji, and though they were shy, they still wanted to help other people who were there.

During the conference individuals from different walks of life presented various aspects of suicide prevention trainings.

Derek Barnaby, a professional counselor from the Listiguj Mi’kmaq First Nation on the east coast of Quebec, taught part of the suicide-assist training in a First Nations and Inuit context.

“We teach about the visual signs and invitations that people show before they attempt suicide. We also do a promotion of life and awareness of cultural identity so that there is less impact from people committing suicide,” said Barnaby.

Barnaby said that his particular program was not designed for personal healing but for intervention work that individuals could take back to their communities.

“Physical signs could be statements and the statements could be things like: my family would be better off without me. An invitation could be someone who has played hockey all of his life starts giving away all of his hockey equipment,” said Barnaby.

What is different from the kind of trainings that were being delivered at the conference according to Barnaby in terms of an Indigenous context was that Western philosophy points towards sending an individual for counseling with a psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker.

“We use a lot of our ceremonies, like the Black Lodge ceremony, Sun dances, healing circles or talking circles to really promote our sense of belonging. We have done it in the past where we have brought dancers and songs in,” said Barnaby, explaining some of his work at the conference.

The Dialogue for Life event also brought out some of the more unlikely presenters such as Correctional Services of Canada (CSC).

Chantal Chartrand, an Aboriginal recruiter for CSC, said she was there to promote jobs at the conference because it was an Aboriginal event and that part of CSC’s current strategy is to recruit Aboriginal workers for the prison system.

She was also on hand to inform the public about some of the programs now available for Aboriginals within the corrections system.

According to Chartrand, Aboriginals represent 17% of the offenders in Canada. Though Canada’s First Nations and Inuit represent about 4% of the general public, they comprise about 17% of the prison population with some institutions having an 85% Aboriginal population.

“Statistically, there are three key factors for Aboriginal peoples in terms of rehabilitation. They are participation in spiritual activities within the institution, participation in programs, preferably delivered by other Aboriginal people and support from family and community. This is why we want more Aboriginal people to work with us in helping their brothers and sisters to reintegrate into society in a safe manner,” said Chartrand.

Despite an ongoing flu pandemic and the high cost of going to this event, the 2009 Dialogue for Life Suicide Prevention conference went off without a hitch. If you or someone you know is affected by a loved one’s suicide and wish to attend next year more information can be found at: www.dialogue-pour-la-vie.com