Fighting For Our Lives:
First Nations Suicide Interventions

Beginning of a New Day Hosanna Waa ksis to akii
B.S.W., University of Calgaiy, 1987

Thesis Submitted In Partial Fulfillment Of
The Requirements For The Degree Of
Master Of Social Work

The University Of Northern British Columbia
November 29, 2007

© Beginning of a New Day Hosanna Waa ksis to akii, 2007

1*1

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ii
APPROVAL

Ill

ABSTRACT
In rural northwest British Columbia, Canada, the truth
speaking stories of five First Nations Warriors were collected
through purposive sampling to answer three pre-determined
research questions. Through their truth speaking, intrapersonal and inter-personal data and themes were gathered on
the nature of driven to suicide, successful suicide interventions,
and serendipitous and sacred spiritual life events that helped
the Warriors, in fighting for their lives. An Indianized research
method, similar to phenomenology's thematic analysis, was
created by drawing upon Blackfoot and Sioux cultures as well
as referencing Elders from both Red and White Nations. Lastly,
a suicide prevention/ intervention pamphlet was developed and
given back to the Warriors as a gift to their People, who are still
fighting for their lives....

TABLE OF CONTENTS

APPROVAL
ABSTRACT
TABLE O F C O N T E N T S
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
DEDICTATION
PREFACE
O P E N I N G PRAYER

ii
iii
iv
vi
viii
ix
xiii

C H A P T E R O N E : Introduction
Searching for a cure: Purpose
Focus: Research questions
The cry of an Eagle, " O u r People are dying":
Significance and timeliness of this research
Equality and co-existence through Indianized research:
Conceptual framework and design
Stones: Definitions
Summary

8
12
16

C H A P T E R T W O : Literature Review
O u r understanding of suicide: Introduction
When she heard the news, she cried out in anguish: Why?
They died along the way: Statistics
The nature of driven to suicide
Summary

18
19
38
44
55

C H A P T E R T H R E E : Methodology
In our hearts and souls: Introduction
Indianized research
The Elders' blessings
'.
Calling on the Warriors: Purposive sampling
Gathering our Warriors' truth speaking stories: Data collection
Scraping the hides: Data analysis
Step 1: Understanding and learning from individual truths:
Intra-participant analysis
Step 2: Understanding and bring together a collective truth:
Inter-participant analysis
Step 3: Petroglyph: understanding the themes
Step 4: T h e Warriors' blessings: Degree of accuracy

1
4
5

60
65
73
74
76
80
80
81
86
86

V

Traditional beadwork: Quality of workmanship
Within the sacred circle: Ethics
Limitations to the study
De-limitations to the study

88
100
103
104

C H A P T E R FOUR: Significant Findings
Reasons for dying:
Preparing for death
T h e moment that divided death from life
Reaching out for help
The helpers and their give away
Shocked into awareness: T h e startling reality of suicide
Reasons for living
The healing journey and growth
Summary

106
108
109
111
113
117
119
120
130

C H A P T E R FIVE: Conclusion
Fighting for our lives: Introduction
Key findings
Significance of the
findings
T h e exceptions
Implications for practice: First Nation suicide interventions
Implications for further research
Summary

134
136
138
141
142
150
153

REFERENCES

156

APPENDICES
Appendix A: U N B C Research Ethics Board Approval
Appendix B: Participant's information package:
Research project information letter:
Informed consent form:
List of research questions:
List of counseling services:
Appendix C: Language
Appendix D : Inclusion:
Appendix E: It is not doing resilience: It is about being Indian
Appendix F: O u r Elders
Appendix G: Life in Indian residential school: O u r Holy
Woman's truth speaking
Appendix H: Suicide prevention/ intervention pamphlet prototype
C L O S I N G PRAYER

167
168
168
171
172
172
173
175
176
178
180
187
189

VI

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to honour our Holy Woman, who h a s inspired,
encouraged, and helped so many of u s along the way.... Many
times throughout her life, she h a s fought her own personal
battles against driven to suicide by fighting for her life. I would
like to thank our Holy Woman for not killing herself even when
she wanted to; her dedication to our Sacred Father, our Sacred
Mother, our sacred Sun Dance way of life, and our People has
been powerful. Her lived definition of driven to suicide has been
honoured in this research project....
I would like to thank the five Warriors who also fought for
their lives and won... without you, your truth speaking stories
would have never been heard. Thank you.
Lastly, I would like to thank my Thesis Committee members:
Dr. Glen Schmidt, chairperson for my committee. Thank you
for your many years of challenging high standards of excellence,
teachings, persistent help, and editing... Thank you to Gerard
Bellefeuille...who taught me that I no longer have to explain or
justify my research as an Indian... "just do it". And, I would
also like to thank Paul Michel who demanded a lean and

vii

powerful thesis by asking.... "why not?" Thank you to all for
your sincere hearts, wisdom of experiences, guidance, and
courage....

via

DEDICATION
I would like to dedicate this thesis to all my loved ones who
were the miracles of my life by being the most important People
in my whole wide worlds. To my mom, first adoption, you
taught me how to make things sparkle and how to sing in
harmony with you. To my dad, second adoption, you taught me
the toughest teachings in the whole wide world and how to fight
my demons so I could be proud of myself by walking and
talking, in a good way. To my rodeo dad, foster dad after Indian
Residential School, you taught me how to be happy and alive
again and how to live me and my life to the fullest for me. To
my big brother Burtie, my favorite foster brother, even though
you had already outgrown rodeo while I thrived on it, you still
took the time to coach me and pull my bull rope for me. And....
you never gave u p scrapping with me either. To all my sons
who were my reasons for living; Chris, Casey, Lee, Carl, Eric,
and my Jamie Girl....
To all my People who are still fighting for their lives....
I tarn ma to ta tsi sinaan;
May you walk in peace until we meet again....

ix

PREFACE
I have intentionally written the following thesis in a new
format that expresses my academic work within my traditional
responsibilities to my People. The following thesis h a s been
written as if I a m standing and speaking at my bundle opening
ceremony before my Elders and Peers of the Horn Society of the
Blood Nation. As Horn Society members, we are responsible for
keeping our traditional laws, sacred bundles, and ceremonies
alive for the safety and well being of our People. Back home,
some of our children 1 are still dying from driven to suicide.
Thus, it was important for all of u s if I did research and found
answers in a language, method, ethics, and cultural context
that we know and understand. By using our own cultural ways
of doing things and understanding life, I was able to discover
findings that will be useable and meaningful to us, as Red
Nations.
To avoid academic shunning 2 , terminology h a s been
translated into cultural terms that are used in our everyday way
of life and homes. For example, at our Warrior Piercing Sun
1

As traditional Leaders, we refer to our People as our Children.

2

For further information please refer to appendix C and appendix D

X

Dance, our arbour h a s a red flag in the East to represent the
Red Nations of the world. A yellow flag stands in the south to
represent the Yellow Nations of the world. A black (Sioux) or
dark blue (Blackfoot) flag will be seen in the west. It stands to
represent all the Black Nations of the world. Lastly, in the
North, you will see the white flag standing; it represents the
White Nations of the world. In this thesis, the term Red Nations
is used instead of newer terms such as First Nations,
Indigenous, Native, or Aboriginal.
Also, within this thesis, the term "Indian" 3 has been
intentionally used out of honour and respect for my self, my
Elders, and my Peers. For many of us, we are now old. We
were born in times when we were called Indians. For many of
us, we were hated for being Indian. In residential school, some
of the staff tried to beat the Indian out of us. But, we
intentionally refused to give u p being Indian because being
Indian is about who we are not what we are. Today, back home
on the reserve, many of u s are still very proud to be "Indian"

3

"Indian is an anglicized version of Indios. Indios means with God. I call myself
Indian because it means 'I am with God" (Long Standing Bear Chief, 1992).

xi

because being and remaining Indian in spite of all the beatings,
poverty, shame, and hate... We definitely know that we are not
"fair-weather" Indians. For many of us, we stand like an
oohkatok, like a rock, (Frantz & Russell, 1995), for being Indian
is still one of the toughest assimilation and genocide wars we
have had to fight throughout our whole entire lives and... we are
still proud of ourselves for not giving in and not giving up.
In this thesis, you will also read the term "our People" which
is our way of understanding that we belong to each other like a
very large extended family; as a Nation. We see ourselves like
the individual leaves on our Sacred Sun Dance Tree; our Sacred
Tree of Life. As individuals, we belong to each other as a
Nation. The term "Warrior" is also used throughout this thesis
to represent individuals who have fought against driven to
suicide and have won. Lastly, for many people when they hear
about our traditional story telling, they assume that our
"stories" are fictional and entertaining like fairy tales. For better
cross cultural understanding and accuracy, I have used the
words "truth speaking" rather than storytelling. For further
explanation on how and why this thesis was Indianized to better

xii

represent my academic research within my cultural way of
thinking, doing, understanding, and being, please refer to
Chapter Three's methodology as well as Appendix C, Appendix
D, Appendix E, and Appendix F.

xui

OPENING PRAYER

Atsimoikan

A prayer

Ayo Apistotoki

O Creator

Ispomokinnaan

Help us

Nahkayistsiyisinnaan

Grant us the wisdom to listen to you

Nahkaikimotsiyisinnaan

To be kind to one another

Nahkayikakimahsinnaan

To try hard

Nahkokamotohsinnaan

To walk the sacred road

Nahkawatoyiitaksinnaan

To hold sacred all of Creation

Ohtokinnaan Apistotoki

Purest Creator

Kimmis kokosiks

Have pity on your children

Iksikimmatapsiya

We are in need

Kaamotaani

Grant us safety

Niistawatsimaani

Help u s to raise our families

Naa piio'sini

So that we may live long lives

Ho

Amen

1
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Searching for a cure: Purpose
In January, 1993, at -40 C, a band council police officer
found six Innu teens in an unheated shed. The kids were
high on the gasoline they had been sniffing and were
shrieking that they wanted to die (Taylor, 1995).
The purpose of this research project was to look for a
practical cure for driven to suicide in our Red Nations. As
Leaders and Warriors of our Red Nations, many of u s want to
eliminate driven to suicide from our lives, our families, and our
communities. The core of this research project is about a
specific type of suicide. In our Nations, there are many types of
suicide such as suicide due to schizophrenia, or suicide due to
a terminal illness or suicide due to a broken spirit filled with
worthlessness, meaninglessness, purposelessness, emptiness,
hopelessness, and powerlessness. For many of us, driven to
suicide is only a symptom of the unbearable, un-escapable, unresolvable, never ending anguish in which somebody or
something has driven u s to die rather than allowing u s to live.

2

Suicide is about the impact of hate and violence and our
human breaking point; when the pain and fear of dying is less
than the pain and fear of living. For many of us, our reasons
for living were destroyed and replaced with their reasons for
dying. For many of us, suicide is about achieving permanent
pain relief from unbearable, un-resolvable, un-escapable, never
ending human anguish; we just can't take them and their hate
any longer. From her Christian Indian Residential School
experiences, our Holy Woman defines driven to suicide to occur
when a person is driven to suicide by one or more violent people
in his/her life.
For the five Red Nation Warriors, who were interviewed for
this research project, their driven to suicide was a symptom of:
lateral violence; emotional, cultural, life skill, and economic
poverty; permanent, unbearable life-destroying tragedies; and
un-escapable, inter-generational violence due to assimilation
and addictions. Through their truth speaking story telling, the
Warriors shared what events led u p to their last suicide
attempt, what they did on their own, and what serendipitous
and sacred spiritual life events occurred that assisted them in

3

fighting for their lives. The truth, wisdom, and teachings from
these Warrior's is the meat 4 of this thesis.
From a traditional and common sense point of view, a thesis
sitting on university library selves in cities far away from our
People would not be very helpful to our People. Thus, the
information from this thesis was used to develop a suicide
prevention/ intervention pamphlet prototype (appendix H). This
suicide prevention/intervention pamphlet prototype was given
back to the Warriors, as a gift. It was proposed that this suicide
pamphlet prototype will be individually culturalized and
tweaked by the Warriors to fit their own specific cultures,
Peoples', and communities' needs. In turn, the specific
pamphlets will be openly shared amongst their People who are
still fighting for their lives.
Through this research project, it is also hoped that this
project will bring honour, worth, love, strength, meaning, depth,
purpose, shared commitment, and answers to our fellow Red
Nations' People who are still fighting for their lives. Lastly, we
also hope that the findings and/or the Indianized research

4

Back home, meat and broth served with fried bread and laughter is an enjoyable
meal that is commonly served after our sacred ceremonies.

4

methodology will help further our communities and Nations in
re-claiming our truths, our cultures, our identities, our hearts,
our souls, our spirits, our backbones, and our strengths as we
continue to look for a cure for driven to suicide.

Focus: Research questions
In many of our traditional Red Nations' cultures, it is seen as
being very rude to ask questions. Traditionally, we are to listen
to what the speaker wants to share with us, at that moment in
time. This non-use of questions is one of our traditional
expressions of respect through non-interference that supports
freedom of speech; we are not to use questions to control the
direction and/or outcome of a person's sharing. Out of
traditional honour and respect, I did not want to ask about the
nature of the Warriors' suicides. However, every Warrior
opened his/her truth speaking by sharing his/her suicide
journey first before h e / s h e went on to answer the three predetermined research questions. As a result of our Warriors
sincere and courageous sharing the depth and meaning of their
suicide journeys, we have received a better understanding
about the nature of driven to suicide.

5

After the Warriors shared their personal truths of the events
that led u p to their driven to suicides, they went on to answer
the three research questions. The three questions that were
used in each of the Warrior's interviews were:
1. What did you intentionally do that helped you in winning
your battles against driven to suicide, in order for you to
be alive today?
2. What events occurred, in your life, that were of significant
help to you in your battles against driven to suicide?
3. What did you intentionally do to make your life worth
living?

The cry of an Eagle 5 , "Our People are dying": Significance
and timeliness of this research
Since the 1960s, suicide h a s become an ever increasing and
very painful part of our reality in many of our Red Nations'
People's lives, families, and communities (Gosek, 2002;

5

The Cry of the Eagle symbolizes the war cry of our Great War Chiefs w h o
fought in the unbearable anguish of knowing that the battles that they would
fight were the same battles that they would never win. They did not focus on
fighting against their enemies; they focused on fighting for their People. T h e
cry of the Eagle is also the cry of unbearable anguish of breaking free. As we
break free of our Sun Dance piercings in our everyday daily lives, we cry to our
Sacred Parents' to thank them for being there fighting for and with us.

6
Kirmayer, 1994; Ross & Davis, 1986; Strickland, 1997; Weir,
2001). After decades of cultural assimilation and genocide, the
first wave of researchers began addressing our Indian suicide
problem by collecting statistics to determine who, where, when,
how, and to what extent suicide has destroyed our lives (Malchy
& Enns, 1997; Taylor, 1995). The second decade of research
started to look for answers as to why we continue to be some of
the most suicide plagued People, in the world (Hunter & Harvey,
2002; Kirmayer, 1994). There have been many White Nation
theories used to explain our suicides (Chandler & Lalonde,
1998; Crofoot, 2002; Davenport & Davenport, 1987; Gosek,
2002; Travis, 1990). However, it was not until 1995, when the
Royal Commission on Aboriginal People (RCAP, 1995)
determined that the majority of our suicides are a reflection of
the impact that the colonizers, their cultural assimilation and
genocide, and their Christian Indian Residential Schools and
government Industrial Schools have had on our People, our
Nations, our families, and our cultures (Duran & Duran, 1995;
Ferry, 2000; Hunter & Harvey, 2002; Kirmayer, 1994; Kirmayer,
Brass, & Tait, 2000; Taylor, 1995).

7

The next decade of research started to focus on what was
wrong inside of us, as Indians, to commit suicide (Chandler &
Lalonde, 1998; Ferry, 2000; Strickland, 1997; Walker, 1999).
This wave of research left u s feeling blamed because we had not
successfully assimilated into their foreign mainstream culture
that frequently and intentionally continued to lock u s out
(Kirmayer, Brass & Tait, 2000; RCAP, 1995). The most recent
decade of suicide research wanted to know "why" some of our
Nations did not have any suicides while other Nations had up to
800 times the national average (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998).
This last wave of research is also searching for a cure to our
suicides; what we need in our communities as well as what we
need in our lives, families, and in our own identities to become
more suicide proof (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998; Crofoot, 2002;
Ferry, 2000; Pole, 2003). As researchers, we are beginning to
discover that we need to live and heal using our own traditional
cultures (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998; Gosek, 2002; Kirmayer,
Simpson & Cargo, 2003; McCormick, 1998; Morrissette,
McKenzie & Morrissette, 1993; Weaver, 1999, 2002). We are
also discovering that suicide prevention and intervention
programs that are designed in foreign urban White Nation

mainstream culture and communities do not seem to work well
in rural, remote, and isolated Red Nations' communities
(McKenize & Morrissette, 2003; Paproski, 1997; Weaver, 2002).

Equality and co-existence through Indianized research:
Conceptual framework and design
Thou shalt keep the feasts, learn the dances, respect the
taboos, and observe the customs of your tribe, if you
would be a good member of the community and profit by
its strength. For these things are the wisdom of the
Ancients and of your fathers in the long age (Seton &
Seton, 1963).
As an academic thesis, this thesis may be experienced as
abnormal for it has been designed, implemented, and written in
and for two very distinct and different groups of Nations. It is
not out of defiance for my White Nation's mainstream Canadian
culture but out of love for me, my Red Nations' People, and my
Indian cultures that I wrote this research proposal in my Indian
way by Indianizing non-native research. One of the ways that I
have Indianized this research was when I intentionally kept my
Red Nations material clearly separate from my White Nations

9
material. I did not want to smear everything into one bland
colour nor did I want to create a dichotomy or pit one side
against the other. I kept them separated so their distinct and
unique beauty will show through like a bouquet of mixed
flowers. They are all beautiful in their own separate, unique
individuality. Meanwhile, my favorite ones are the red ones.
Tuhiwai Smith (1999 p. 26) in her book Decolonizing
Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples explains the
importance for and as Indigenous People in telling and writing
our own history and doing our own research.
Every issue h a s been approached by indigenous peoples
with a view to rewriting and rerighting our positions in
history. Indigenous peoples want to tell our own stories,
write our own versions, in our own ways, for our own
purposes. It is not simply about giving an oral account or
a genealogical naming of the land and the events which
raged over it, but a very powerful need to give testimony
to and restore a spirit, to bring back into existence a
world fragmented and dying.
From my written and oral academic worlds, I have drawn
upon many Elders including Shneidman's (1999; 2005) written

10
journal articles that define suicide as resulting from unbearable
psychological pain. Meanwhile, from my Red Nations cultures, I
have drawn upon our Holy Woman and her truth speaking, her
oral story, which h a s inspired this research project. From my
Red Nations, truth speaking, our oral storytelling was our most
common way of passing down our historical truth from one
generation to the next. Our truth speaking storytelling was a
very serious matter.
There is a formality to testimonies and a notion that truth
is being revealed "under oath'. Indigenous testimonies are
a way of talking about an extremely painful event or series
of events. The formality of testimony provides a structure
within which events can be related and feelings
expressed. A testimony is also a form through which the
voice of a 'witness* is accorded space and protection
(Tuhiwai Smith, 1999, p. 144).
One of the many ways that this thesis was Indianized was by
using our Holy Woman as a consultant for this research project.
Prior to this research project, our Holy Woman inspired me
when she spoke about and taught me the meaning of driven to
suicide. I learnt about driven to suicide when she shared her

11

personal truth about her life at a Christian Indian Residential
School. I have used our Holy Woman's definition of driven to
suicide as if our Holy Woman's oral truth had already been
published as a documented case study, in a scholarly journal.
Unfortunately, to date she h a s not been published. However,
the related portion of her life story can be found in appendix G
which explains how she came to personally experience and t h u s
operationally define driven to suicide.
As an Indian researcher, whether I listen with my heart and
soul to one of my Elders speak their truths or read a journal
article with my eyes is not significant to me. The most critical
factor in selecting and referencing research material from both
groups of Nations is the presence of the truth, independent of
what form it comes in. Thus, by documenting our Holy
Woman's oral truth on paper, I was able to use and reference
her oral truth, her wisdom, and life experiences as equal in
quality as if it was published as a scholarly journal article.
By documenting, using, and referencing our Holy Woman's
truth speaking, her beauty, existence, and wisdom is no longer
invisible and unknown in our written on paper academic
research world. I have referenced our Holy Woman's oral truth

12
because it is a real life experience of Shneidman's (1999)
defined unbearable psychological pain. By referencing our Holy
Woman's oral truth as well as Shneidman's research findings, I
have been able to reference Elders of both my Red Nations and
White Nations' cultures so that both groups of Nations could coexist throughout this thesis.
Co-existence of my cultures is normal for me; it is my multicultural way of being and living life. As a half-breed Indian, coexistence is very important to me. All of my cultures are
important to me. The co-existence of two very distinct and
sometimes opposing Nations can be extremely confusing at
times. But,.... sometimes it is as simple as having red and
white blood cells, all at the same time. For further details
regarding how this research project was Indianized please refer
to Chapter Three.
Stones: Definitions
Definitions are like stones; they give u s structure and
s t r e n g t h j u s t like t h e s t r e n g t h we create by coming together a s

one through the sharing of understandings. Like stones and

13
Elders 6 , definitions are also slow to change. The following
definitions will be used to bring consistency, structure,
strength, and common ground, to this research project, through
shared understanding.
Bad medicine or witchcraft curse: This real world
phenomena is commonly found in many Red Nations' cultures
and communities while being almost a non-existent concept in
White Nation medical, scientific, and academic worlds.
However, this phenomenon is noted in the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (American Psychiatric
Association, 2000, p. 902) under the definition of rootwork.
A set of cultural interpretations that ascribe illness to
hexing, witchcraft, sorcery, or the evil influence of
another person. Symptoms may include generalized
anxiety, and gastrointestinal complaints (e.g. nausea,
vomiting, diarrhea, weakness, dizziness, the fear of being
poisoned, and sometimes fear of being killed ("voodoo
death"). "Roots", "spells", or "hexes" can be "put" or

6

As Elders, we share a sense of humour by laughing at ourselves because we are
as slow to change as our parents and grandparents were when as teens we jived
to rock and roll music. Today, we fuss over the "noise" that our grandchildren
are listening to on their I pods

14
placed on other persons, causing a variety of emotional
and psychological problems. The "hexed" person may
even fear death until the "root" has been "taken off
(eliminated), usually through the work of a "root doctor"
(a healer in this tradition), who can also be called on to
bewitch an enemy.
Culture:7 Culture is the whole complex of relationships,
knowledge, languages, social institutions, beliefs, values, and
ethical rules that bind a people together and give the collective
and its individual members a sense of who they are and where
they belong (RCAP, 1999, p.25).
Driven to suicide: When a person is, thinks, feels, or believes
that h e / s h e h a s been driven to suicidal thoughts, feelings,
urges, and/or attempts by one or more violent people in his/her
life. For further explanation see Chapter Two.
Indian:8 "Indian is an anglicized version of Indios. Indios
means with God. I call myself Indian because it means 1 am
with God'" (Long Standing Bear Chief, 1992).
7

"Culture is a White Nation concept that does not exist in our First Nations'
languages. Our "culture" is who we are". Marie Battiste, Indigenous Graduate
Student Symposium keynote address, UBC, March 2004.

8

Over time, my ancestors began to call themselves Indian. Today, back home on
reserve, many of us still call ourselves, "Indians". For many of us, it is not the

15
Suicide: "the act or an instance of killing oneself intentionally
(Hanks, 1979).
Red Nations: 9 Red Nations is defined to "include Indians with
or without treaty status, Metis People, and people with multiple
origins that included aboriginal heritage" (Malchy & Enns,
1997).
Warrior: "a person engaged in, experienced in, or devoted to
war" (Hanks, 1979). "One who stands u p for who and what
h e / s h e believes to be "right" and stands against who and what
h e / s h e believe to be "wrong"". (Waa ksis to akii, 1997).
"We" and "our": In our traditional Indian way of being, we
correctly use the words "we" and "our" rather than "I" and "my".
As Indians, we have an ability to share a piece of our spirit with
our loved ones and we may also have a piece of our loved one's
spirit within our own body. When we share a piece of our spirit
with a loved one, we will be able to internally sense or spirit feel
how that loved one is feeling and/or what h e / s h e is doing.
Even before telephones were invented, we would know how each

word but the honour or hate that lies behind the spoken word that will either
bring honour or hurt filled shame to us.
9

T o link u p with existing White Nations research, I used Statistics Canada's
standardized definition that Malchy & Enns, used in their 1997 research.

16
other was feeling or what we were doing without direct verbal
communications. This is our Indian way of being spirit
connected to one another.

Summary
The purpose of this research project was to search for a
practical cure that will decrease a n d / o r eliminate driven to
suicide in our Red Nations Peoples' lives. This research project
was inspired by our Holy Woman who was driven to suicide. As
a little girl, she tried to hang herself while locked u p in a
Christian Indian Residential School. Suicide was the only
escape for her from the inhuman and extreme sexual abuse,
humiliation, beatings, and torture that she could not longer
endure. A traditional oral truth speaking approach was used
to collect real life experiences from five Red Nations Warriors.
All of the Warriors had successfully fought for their lives against
driven to suicide and have won. Through their truth speaking,
we learnt directly from the Warriors what led u p to their suicide
attempts, what they had actually done for themselves, and what
events occurred in their lives that helped them win in their
battles against driven to suicide. Lastly, due to non-translatable

17
cultural differences, an Indianized method of research was
developed for this project so the research methodology would be
a better fit for the participating Warriors, listening audience,
and the primary investigator. It is also hoped that the research
findings and the resulting suicide prevention/ intervention
pamphlet prototype will be useful to all of our People who are
still fighting for their lives.

18
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW

Our understanding of suicide: Introduction
Suicide is very raw and very real to all of us; it is when
our lives are made so unbearably painful that we can't live
them any more. We were made to be so worthless, so
hopeless, so powerless, so meaningless, and so empty... to
the point that we just didn't have the strength to tolerate or
suffer any longer.
(Holy Woman; Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor. Winter 2003 -2004: interviewed
in her home.)
Today, in my Indian cultures and communities, suicide is
not seen as an individual's problem. It is our belief that we are
all connected to one another and "the hurt of one is the hurt of
all" (Bopp, Bopp, Brown, & Lane, 1984). Thus, we see suicide
in our communities as a symptom of much bigger problems
than just an individual's biochemical imbalance in his/her

brain due to depression 10 , distorted thoughts (Ellis & Newman,
1996), or unbearable psychological pain (Shneidman, 1999).
When a suicide occurs in our Indian communities, the shock,
fear, pain, confusion, and shame rings throughout our whole
community like the after shock waves of an earthquake. In
silence, we reflect on our failures, as extended family members,
to the victim. We see their suicide as our personal failure as
well. We have failed in our traditional family responsibilities; we
are supposed to be there for each other. In silence, we may also
reflect on our own personal secret suicidal thoughts, past
attempts, and possibly even present day thoughts, plans,
a n d / o r urges.

When she heard the news, she cried out in anguish: Why?
When we look for a logical reason to go on and there isn't
one. ...We go on anyways because going on is about who
we are as Indians, as individuals, and as a Nation....
(Holy Woman; Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim; suicide survivor. Winter 2003 -2004: interviewed
in her home.)
For further information see Canadian Mental Health Association (n.d.).
Depression. Retrieved July 28,2006 from http://www.cmha.ca/
bins/content_page.asp?cid=3-

20

In 1995, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples'
reported that "suicide was rare before contact with European
people" (RCAP, 1995, p. 10). "In the past, those few suicides
that occurred were primarily acts of the old and the ill. Their
deaths were acts of self-sacrifice, sparing others that burden of
extra care" (RCAP, 1995, p. 10). One such example from my
Blackfoot culture is the oral legend told to me by the great,
great, granddaughter of Chief Many Grey Horses.
Many Grey Horses was a Great War Chief who had lived a
good life. He was a man of great honour and worth. He
had fought hard to protect his People. He was a good
hunter so his People would never go hungry and he shared
his wealth of his many gray horses with the old ones so
they no longer had to carry their belongings on their dogs'
backs. Out of love for his People, Chief Many Grey Horses
decided that it was his time to die. As a great father11

and

great warriorfor his People, he did notfear death nor did
he want to burden his People with his care. One day as
his People were breaking up camp to move, he had his sitsChiefs were referred to as the Father of their People.

21
beside-him wife12 turn the skins of his teepee inside out13.
When his People noticed; they cried for they knew that
their loved one would be gone soon. They would deeply
miss him but they also understood why it was wrong for a
Chief to be a burden to his own People. Before leaving, the
People gathered many stones to build a protective circle
around his teepee where the covering was staked to the
ground14. When they came to say goodbye, they also
brought gifts of food and tobacco for the Chief to enjoy on
his journey home to the Sand Hills15.
Today, in Blackfoot territory of southern Alberta, one can
still find the teepee rings belonging to some of our great
Fathers, who have gone on before us 1 6 .

Historically, Blackfoot warriors had several wives. For further information on
marriage and the types of wives see Grinnell (1962).
13

When an Elder had the skins of his/her teepee turned inside out it symbolized
that h e / s h e was going to stay back to die while his/her People were to travel
on to their next hunting camp.

14

The People would build a protective circle of stones around the teepee so the
prairie wolves would not get into the teepee to eat the Elder's body before or
after his/her death (Fraser, 1959, p.4).

15

It is a Blackfoot tradition that the only time that w e say "goodbye" is when the
person we are visiting or ourselves is dying. All the rest of the time, we will say
phrases such as have a safe trip home, see you later, or until we meet again.

16

For further archaeological information about teepee rings and death lodges
see Bryan (1991).

22

In GrinneU's (1962) writing of my Blackfoot history, there
was also another type of suicide that was quite common. This
type of suicide was the result of forced, arranged marriages
when "young women had very little or no say in the matter"
(Grinnell, 1962 p.216).
Her father's will was law and if she refused she [would] be
beaten or even killed by him if she did not do as she was
ordered. As a consequence to this severity, suicide was
quiet common among the Blackfoot girls. A girl ordered
to marry a man whom she did not like would often watch
her chance, and go out in the brush and hang herself.
The girl who could not marry the man she wanted to was
likely to do the same thing (Grinnell, 1962, p. 216).
Today, we no longer have forced marriages but suicide
continues to be a very pain-filled part of our lives. "The Elders
believe that suicide rates have greatly increased [since] the
1960s when alcohol was legalized to First Nations People"
(Gosek, 2002). They also believed that "having our religious
ceremonies outlawed, having our ways of supporting ourselves,
having our languages, and cultures forbidden, and having our
children taken from u s for forced attendance in residential

23

schools were the leading causes for the increase in alcoholism
and suicides" ( Gosek, 2002).
Seventy-five percent of our children were taken from our
homes and put into residential schools. For u s that were
able to survived, we were returned back to our
communities permanently damaged; never to be the same
again. We did not belong in the white man's world and we
no longer fit in within our own homes, communities, and
culture. We couldn't speak to our grandparents any more
and we didn't even know the way of the land any more
(Fournier & Crey, 1997).
Akiwenzie-Damm and Sutherland wrote in 1988 the
following statements; "while outright extemiination was
considered inhumane by the churches and government of the
day, they believed that Indians could be civilized"; "Historians
suggested that discipline was more harsh at residential schools
than at their counterparts"; "There was a great deal of physical
abuse"; and "These methods included isolation cells, severe
floggings, whippings, and public humiliation" ( Miller, 1991
cited in Akiwenzie-Damm & Sutherland, 1998);

24

Routine stories of bad food, cold dormitories, head
shaving upon admission to schools and issuing of
uniforms were reported by residential school students.
Sometimes, it seemed that punishment and mistreatment
might more accurately be called torture as we now
understand it. For example: sticking needles in the
tongues of children who spoke their native languages
must be considered excessive and cruel. Reports of
beatings inflicted on children who attempted to r u n away
were considered excessive even at the time by school
inspectors and non-native neighbors"; "The essence of
genocide was a powerful intent to destroy a group out of
existence. In many ways this intention was achieved.
Scores of First Nations children died from disease while in
the care of residential schools; others were emotionally
and spiritually destroyed by the harsh discipline and
living conditions. Confinement, humiliation, lack of
privacy, physical, sexual, and psychological abuses
resulted in dislocation, loss of pride and self-respect, and
loss of identity within the family, community, and
nations" " It is widely believed that those who attended

25

residential schools lost their ability to parent, and their
identity as Aboriginal People"; "The attitude among those
who put together the schooling program was essentially
that the Indian people were to be eliminated (Miller, 1991
cited in Akiwenzie-Damm & Sutherland, 1998)
Suicides also existed in many residential schools,
In 1920, nine boys had attempted suicide by eating water
hemlock. One had died. In 1930, two boys had "died
after ten days of sickness, of which the doctor could not
find the symptoms." It was "only after they had passed
away that the other boys told that they had seen them
with HEMLOCK in their hands. In this period, in J u n e
1981, at Muscowequam Residential School, "five or six
girls between the ages of 8 and 10 years had tied socks
and towels together and tried to hang themselves. Earlier
that year, a fifteen-year-old at the school had been
successful in her attempt (Milloy, 1999, p.288).
Those of u s who survived residential school and the foster
care and adoption systems of the 60s scoop, grew u p to become
parents of our own children even though we were permanently
damaged by many people. For many of us, we still carried our

26

suicides within the core of our being. As parents, we were
unable to raise our own children in our own love, traditional
languages, values, beliefs, and ways (Gosek, 2002; Haig-Brown,
1988; Secwepemc Cultural Education Society, 2000). For many
of us, we were unable to love our own children. In order to
survive the inhumane cruelty, racism, and hate that we were
forced to go through, many of u s had to mentally and
emotionally shut down in order to survive.
I learnt that in order to survive, I would stop thinking.
When I stopped thinking about all the painful abuse that
they were doing to me then I could also stop feeling.

That

was the way I learnt how to emotionally shut down. I
remember refusing to think and feel anymore and that was
when I became dead inside.
(Holy Woman; Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor. Winter 2003-2004: interviewed in
her home.)
As a result, we were not able to emotionally be there for our
own children. Our Indian hearts and souls, our love and
strength that we were to have for each other had been hated
and beaten out of us. In Christian residential schools, we were

27

taught to hate ourselves and each other because we were
Indians.
As a little one, I wished my dad would have told me in
words, that he loved me.... but he never did. He would
never tell me with words that he loved me. He would work
hard as his way of showing me that he loved me. But, he
would never say the words, "I love you". That is what they
did to him in residential school
(Elder; second generation Residential School Survivor.
Winter 2002-2003: interviewed in Terrace, B.C..)
Due to our Christian Indian Residential School childhoods
and upbringing, our children became lost because, as their
parents, we were lost first. We had been taken so far away from
who we were meant to be, our authentic selves, our true and
traditional cultures, 17 and our Indian identities that for many of
us, we could never find our way back home (Fournier & Crey,
1997; Gosek, 2002; Haig-Brown, 1988; Secwepemc Cultural

17

"Culture is the whole complex of relationships, knowledge, languages, social
institutions, beliefs, values, and ethical rules that bind a people together and
give the collective and its individual members a sense of w h o they are and
where they belong. It is usually rooted in a particular place, a past and present
homeland" (RCAP, 1995, p . 25)

28

Education Society, 2000). For others, many of our own People
died along the way....
Elders of both the Red and White Nations (researchers)
believe that cultural assimilation and its intergenerational
impact is the best explanation as to why suicide rates are so
high in many Red Nation communities (Akiwenzie-Damm &
Sutherland, 1998; Duran& Duran, 1995; Fournier & Crey,
1997; Gosek, 2002; Haig-Brown, 1988; Health Canada, 1992;
Kirmayer, 1994; Milloy, 1999; Paproski, 1997; RCAP, 1995;
Robinson & Bird Quinney, 1985).
After extensive consultation and study, the
commissioners of the Royal Commission of Aboriginal
People (1995) concluded that high rates of suicide and
self injury among Aboriginal People are the result of a
complex mix of social, cultural, economic, and
psychological dislocations that flow from the past into the
present (RCAP, 1995, p.2).
Prior to 1995, Canada's Royal Commission on Aboriginal
People went to many of our Red Nations' communities to listen
to our Peoples' voices. Our Elders and Leaders spoke of high
suicide rates being directly related to the results of cultural

29
assimilation and genocide that are reflected in today's
assimilation and genocide symptoms;
sexual abuse, family violence, alcohol and drug abuse,
solvent abuse, satanic practice, deterioration of family
structures, lack of proper leadership et cetera.... are only
the symptoms of a bigger and more devastating cycle of
oppression and depravation.... first initiated with colonial
contact in 1492.... We must stop the immoral behaviors
caused by oppression (RCAP, 1995, p. 19).
RCAP (1995) went on to listen to the voices of our traditional
and contemporary Healers 18 . Our Healers spoke about the life
history and family history factors that have led to suicide.
These factors included;
chronic family instability or disrupted relationships; a
family history of mental health problems, including
suicide attempts, alcoholism or depression in parents or
caregivers; experience of physical or sexual abuse;
substance abuse; history of interpersonal conflict; recent
extreme interpersonal conflict or the loss of a major

18

The cultural translation for a traditional healer is equivalent to a general
practitioner or specialist.

30

relationship; and prolonged or unresolved grief
(RCAP,1995, p.22).
RCAP (1995) also listened to the voices of our youth. Our
youth believed that the factors that drive them to suicide
include; "racism, loss of culture, physical and mental abuse,
family discord, feeling of boredom, loneliness and
powerlessness" (RCAP, 1995, p.8).
In the 1990s, large amounts of research were done to
uncover why suicide is so common in various Red Nations while
non-existing in others. Researchers focused on other
contributing factors such as "seasonal variations [of suicide]
with increased rates in the fall and in the spring in North
American" (Kirmayer, 1994). Besides seasonal factors, it h a s
been discovered that "isolating and seclusion of criminals in
custody puts them at considerable risk for suicide" (Bonner,
1992 cited in Kirmayer, 1994). There are also higher suicide
risks for "first and second degree relatives of suicide victims"
(Kirmayer, 1994). "While impulsivity contributes to the risk of
suicide attempts, there is evidence that withdrawal,
hypersensitivity, and behavioral inhibition are more common
pre-morbid personality traits than impulsivity in completed

31
suicides" (Hoberman & Garfinkal, 1988 and Shafi, Carrigan,
Whittinghill & Derrick, 1985 cited in Kirmayer, 1994). Cultural
assimilation conditions of "third world poverty levels, poorly
constructed and overcrowded housing conditions, and unfit
drinking water are also seen as contributing environmental
factors to our high suicide rates" (Taylor, 1995). This is coupled
with other assimilation symptoms of "unemployment rates as
high as 96% and third generation solvent abuse that involves
u p to 80% of our young people in various communities" (Taylor,
1995).
The Elders from within their White Nation cultures
generated theories to explain why suicide existed in their own
communities. Of all the theories that have ever been written to
explain why suicide exists, Emile Durkheim is the most cited of
all White Nation Elders. In 1897, Durkheim worked on defining
three distinct types of suicide for his People. In his classic
book, "Suicide; a study of Sociology"19, Durkheim defined three
major types of suicide. The first type of suicide was called
"egoistic suicide" (Davenport & Davenport, 1987). Durkheim
believed that the person was suffering from "excessive
19

For further information see Durkheim, (1970).

32

individualism and this occurred when the person detaches
himself from society and lived according to his own personal set
of'rules of conduct"' (Davenport & Davenport, 1987). Thus, "he
lived and died according to his own rules rather than
continuing to obey society's rules and expectations of valuing
life and continuation" (Davenport & Davenport, 1987).
Durkheim went on to define the second type of suicide which
he called "altruistic suicide" (Davenport & Davenport, 1987).
"Altruistic suicide is completely opposite to egoistic suicide in
that the person has an inadequate amount of individualism"
(Davenport & Davenport, 1987). Durkheim believed that
"society was always watching its members under constant
collective supervision" (Davenport & Davenport, 1987). Under
constant collective supervision, the person was unable "to set
up an environment of his own in the shelter of which he may
develop his own nature and form a physiognomy that is his
exclusively" (Davenport & Davenport, 1987).
Durkheim's last type of suicide is called "anomic suicide"
(Davenport & Davenport, 1987). Durkheim believed that
"suicide increases during periods of social change regardless
whether the change is positive or negative" (Davenport &

33

Davenport, 1987). "Whenever serious readjustments take place
in the social order, whether or not due to sudden growth or to
an unexpected catastrophe, men are more inclined to selfdestruction" (Davenport & Davenport, 1987).
In 1990, researcher Travis wanted to see which White Nation
theory best explained suicides in our Red Nation and White
Nation communities. Travis applied Durkheim's "social
disorganization" theory and Halbwacks' "social isolation" theory
to 400 suicides that were committed in Alaska between 1959 1973. Durkheim hypothesized that suicides were the result of a
person's individual psychological make u p and the impact that
society had or didn't have on that person. Whereas, Halbwachs
hypothesized that a person's suicide was based on his/her own
personal social psychological conditions and their level of
awareness. Halbwachs believed that a person's "change in
consciousness was sufficient" to drive them to suicide.
Detached from one group by a sudden disturbance, you
are incapable, or at least you believe yourself incapable,
of ever finding any support in another, or anything to
take the place of what you have lost. When one becomes
lost to society thus, one most often loses his principle

34

reason for living. Halbwachs emphasizes the efficacy of
internal sentiments, like anguish and terror, which have
no obvious basis in the external world and which arouses
feelings of solitude that seem without remedy. This
anguish leads to social isolation as Halbwachs explains.
When a man is not in accord with the others on what he
takes most to heart, and when their representations of
beings and things no longer clearly coincides with his
own on any point of interest to him, he is clearly isolated
in their midst, not so much because he does not
understand them at all as because they do not agree with
him... Thus psychopathic states produce the same effect
as other causes of suicide. There is nothing that a
thought formed by society is less capable of standing up
to than a social void. This state of anguish and terror is
alone what matters. There is nowhere beyond it to go
when one wishes to explain suicide (Travis, 1990).
After statistical analysis, Travis (1990) discovered that
Halbwacks' "social isolation" theory explained the pre-death
conditions in 42% of the suicides while Durkheim's "social
disorganization" theory explained the pre-death condition in

35

33% of the suicides. But, for statistical significance, these two
theories could only explain one third to less than one-half of the
suicides, at any given time.
Another White Nation Elder, who has studied suicide for
many decades, is Edwin Shneidman. Shneidman (2005) argues
that "suicide and depression are not synonymous". He also
believes that "suicide is not best understood as a disturbance in
the genes or the brain; rather it is essentially a perturbation in
the mind" (Shneidman, 2005). "The essence of suicide is pain"
(Shneidman, 2005).
Psychological pain is not the same as somatic or physical
pain. It is how you feel as a person; how you feel in your
mind or heart. It refers to how much you hurt as a
h u m a n being. It is mental suffering; inner torment. It is
called psychache (pronounced sik-ak) Psychache refers
to h u r t or misery. It is the pain of shame, or guilt, or
grief, or humiliation or hopelessness or loneliness or
sadness or anguish. It is how you feel inside. It is an
ache in the mind (Shneidman, 2005).
Shneidman (1999) had explained earlier that the basic
formula for suicide is "Elevated psychache plus constricted

36
perceptions of life's options plus thanatophilic thoughts
(preference for being dead over being alive) equals suicide".
"Psychache is the elevated psychological pain caused by
frustrated psychological needs created by destructive
(catadynic) life events" (Shneidman, 1999). Shneidman (1999)
also provided suggestions and tools for healing such as; the use
of his "Psychological Pain Assessment Scale", and for therapists
to "look for assets and strengths" in the patients. For suicide
victims to heal, Shneidman (1999) recommended that therapists
needed to identify
characteristics and features of the inner life that have
kept that person alive and that are life promoting and lifesustaining, especially items in the past that permitted the
person to endure the unendurable and to tolerate the
intolerable for that is what not committing suicide
involves (Shneidman, 1999).
Lastly, Shneidman suggested therapists also looked for "clues
that are precursors [to] committing suicide in the future"
(Shneidman, 1999).
One research project that is reflective of Shneidman's
psychache concept (1999) was conducted by Paproski, in 1997.

37

She Interviewed five women from five different Red Nations for
her thesis titled "Healing Experiences of British Columbia First
Nations Women; Moving begond Suicidal Ideation and
Intentions". Who or what drove these women to suicide when
they were children or when they were teens? All these women
either thought about or attempted suicide due to commonly
shared pain-filled experiences:
-

significant separation from family a n d / o r community

-

victims of emotional and physical abuse

-

made to feel rejected or worthless because of how they
were treated by new caregivers or guardians

-

did not feel understood

-

felt controlled by others

-

experienced isolation

As Red Nations' People who have and/or are suffering from
personal and environmental factors that drive u s to suicide, we
are not alone. Many of u s have died along the way....

38

They died along the way: Statistics
If I had fully died when I hung myself, they would have
never known my name.... I would have just become
another number thrown into another pile.
(Holy Woman, Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor. Winter of 2003-2004: interviewed
in her home.)
According to RCAP (1995) findings, the effects of
colonization, cultural genocide, and assimilation are the leading
causes of suicides within the Red Nations' of Canada. But
Canada does not stand alone. At a world level, high Red Nation
suicide statistics in Canada are similar in comparison to fellow
Original Nations who have also been colonized by the British
Empire. Fellow victims of British Empire colonization include
the Original Nations of Australia, New Zealand, and the United
States. The Original Nations of these British Empire-made
countries share very similar histories and suffer similar impact
that British colonization and cultural genocide h a s had on the
Red Nations in Canada (Hunter & Harvey, 2002). Today,
Original Nations continue to suffer higher suicide rates than the
British Empire's People. These high suicide rates are symptoms

39
that reflect the "impact of the breakdown of cultural structures
and historical processes associated with colonization" (Hunter &
Harvey, 2002).
In the United States, suicide rates for Red Nations males
between the ages of 15 - 25 years old have grown from 4.1 to
12.1 deaths in a village of 100,000 20 between 1958 and 1982
(Hunter & Harvey, 2002). In New Zealand, the Maoris' suicide
rates for their men aged 15-24 was 49 deaths in a village of
100,000 in 1989 (Hunter & Harvey, 2002). While in Australia,
suicide rates have remained constant over the last century at
20.6 deaths in a village of 100,000 for men while women
suffered from suicides at the rate of 5.5 deaths in a village of
100,000 (Hunter & Harvey, 2002).
Since the 1970s, suicide rates have increased throughout
the world. When we compare Canada to the rest of the world,
Canada still has some of the highest suicide rates, in the world.
In a five year period from 1986 to 2001, a total of 52,500
Canadians had committed suicide (Weir, 2001). As a result,
1

I have indianrzed a common statistical term of x per 100,000 to be written as x
deaths in a village of 100,000. This term is more meaningful by representing
our interconnected lives. I have also developed this measurement of a
theoretical village of 100,000 to help people understand that suicide does not
occur in isolation; it occurs in our villages.

40

20% more Canadians have died from suicide t h a n all the
Canadians who died fighting in World War II (Weir, 2001). It
was also in 1970, when Canada's total population suicide rate
surpassed the United States' rate (Weir, 2001). In 1999, while
Canada's non-Native suicide rate was 14 deaths in a village of
100,000 people (Canadian Press Newswire, 1999) our Red
Nations' youth suffered suicide death rates as high as 500 - 800
times the national average (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998). By
comparing Canada's Red Nation's suicide rates to the rest of the
world, we begin to see that Canada still continues to have some
of the highest suicide rates in the world.
Within the boundaries of Canada, between 1988 and 1994,
Red Nations' People who were living off-reserve suffered an
average suicide rate of 31.8 deaths in a village of 100,000 while
on-reserve communities suffered with a rate of 52.9 deaths in a
village of 100,000 (Malchy & Enns, 1997). Canada's Red
Nations' women were 7.5 times more likely to commit suicide
than non-Native females (Strickland, 1997). Canada's highest
suicide rates were found in the Innu People of Davis Inlet 21 .

The history of my Blackfoot and Siouxgreat grandparents appears to have
repeated itself in the Innu People. ... The Innu People of Davis Inlet had been
forcibly moved from their traditional hunting grounds and away from their

They were said to be "the most suicide ridden People in the
world" at a rate of 178 deaths in their village of 100,000
community members (Ferry, 2000). In a 1999 Canadian health
study, the Inuit people were struggling with 79 deaths in their
village of 100,000 while the rest of non-Native Canada was at 14
deaths in their village of 100,000 (Canadian Press Newswire,
1999).
At a provincial level, in British Columbia, the BC Coroners
Service's First Nations Deaths in BC 1999 to 2003 - Coroners
Cases report (Office of the Chief Coroner of British Columbia;
OCCBC, 2004) stated that in 2003 there were 30 known status
Red Nation suicides. This represents 16.95% of all suicides in
British Columbia. Of these suicides the following methods were
used: 57% hanging, 23% firearms, 7% falls 3 % carbon
monoxide poisoning, 10% alcohol/ drugs/ other poisoning, 0%
stabbing or incised injury and 0% drowning (OCCBC, 2004).
We must remember that suicide statistics only represent
the tip of the iceberg. Below the surface are all the suicide

source of life, caribou, to make r o o m for economic development. The
government sanctioned forced move destroyed their means of living, feeding,
and supporting themselves, as well as their way of life. As displaced People and
without the caribou, they have n o t been able to re-claim their strength and wavs
of life.

42

thoughts, urges, plans and/or attempts, as well as the high
number of accidental deaths that in reality were actual suicides
that have gone unreported. In RCAP's (1995, p. 17) special
report on suicide, it was estimated that 25% of all Red Nations
accidental deaths in Canada may actually be completed
suicides. What is also left out of government suicide statistics
are all the Metis and non-treaty status Red Nations' People who
have committed suicide. They are not counted because the
victim was not registered under the Canadian government's
sanctioned treaty or status card number system.
Below the surface of completed suicide statistics is the
reality of suicide attempts. It has been estimated that for every
completed suicide there have been 100 suicide attempts (Link,
1998). However, in Ross and Davis' (1986) three year study, of
a Red Nation community in northern Manitoba, the community
had a suicide rate of 77 deaths in their village of 100,000
community members. Young men in the community, who were
of the ages of 20 to 24, had a suicide attempt rate of 241
attempts in their village of 100,000 (Ross & Davis, 1986).
Meanwhile, the young women, in the same community, who
were between the ages of 15 to 19 years of age, who used drug

43

overdose as their means of suicide, had a suicide attempt rate
of 7,722 attempts in their village of 100,000 (Ross & Davis,
1986). During this same time, Canada's non-Native suicide rate
was at 14.0 deaths in their village of 100,000 (Ross & Davis,
1986) with an estimated suicide attempt rate of 1,400 in Ross
and Davis' studied Red Nations village of 100,000 when using
Links' (1998) estimated 100:1 ratio.
Lastly, to understand the deadly methods that our fellow
Red Nations People have used to commit suicide, Malchy and
Enns (1997) conducted research in Manitoba from 1988 to
1994. In their research, they discovered that our fellow Red
Nation People used; hanging and asphyxiation 52.0%, firearms
26.0%, drug overdose 15.0%, while carbon monoxide poisoning
occurred only 0.9% in all the reported suicides. This
phenomenon differs from how non-Native Canadian People
committed suicide in their communities. Their suicide rates
showed that they used: firearms 32.9%, hanging or
asphyxiation 24.3%, carbon monoxide poisoning 15.7% and
drug overdose 15.7% (Malchy & Enns, 1997).
It felt like I was standing on a piece of ice that was drifting
down the river. I was floating between two very different

cultures while not belonging to or being claimed by any one
of them. Meanwhile, the ice is slowly melting away.
Standing alone, Ifelt that everything and everyone that
gave me strength, worth, love, and meaning no longer
existed.... whereas, suicide was still there haunting me...
(Half-breed University student. Winter 2003-2004;
interviewed in Prince George, B.C..)
The nature of driven to suicide
This research project takes a critical look at one of our
shame filled secrets that still exists in many of our Red Nations'
families and communities. For many of us, we are shocked,
frightened, hurt, and ashamed of the suicides in our
communities. It means that we have failed to be there for our
own People 22 . In our Nations, there are many different types of
suicide. This research project only focuses on one type; driven
to suicide.
Driven to suicide can be found in many of our People's lives.
For example, our Holy Woman shares her soul-felt belief that
she was driven to suicide as a little girl. She shares her story
with u s as a victim of a Christian, Indian Residential School; a
22

It is a common traditional law that we are to "be there" for our people.

45

story of the brutality and racial hate that drove her to suicide.
She shares her story so that we can understand why she
believes that driven to suicide still exists (see appendix G).
Our Holy Woman defined driven to suicide for u s while
looking back over her residential school experiences and her life
long experiences of racial hate. Our Holy Woman explains....
I define driven to suicide is when a person believes that
they are being driven to suicide by one or more violent people in
their lives.
Our Holy Woman's definition of driven to suicide with its lack
of options or escape and its unbearable pain links u p with
Shneidman's (1999) definition. Shneidman (1999) believes that
"Suicide occurs when a person is no longer able to endure the
unendurable and able to tolerate the intolerable". More
specifically, Shneidman (1999) defined the basic formula for
suicide as "Elevated psychache plus constricted perceptions of
life's options plus thanatophilic thoughts (preference for being
dead over being alive) equals suicide. Psychache is the elevated
psychological pain caused by frustrated psychological needs
created by destructive (catadynic) life events". Shneidman talks
about unbearable pain but does not clarify who or where that

46
unbearable pain conies from. However, our Holy Woman has
taken one step further by taking the ambivalence out of
Shneidman's definition.
Our Holy Woman identifies that her unbearable pain came
from the priest, a supervisor, and staff of the Christian Indian
Residential School that she was forced to attend (see appendix
G). By being exact and to the point as to "who did what to her
under what conditions and to what extent" 23 , our Holy Woman
h a s defined the reality of driven to suicide in many of our lives.
For our Holy Woman, Shneidman's (1999) "constricted
perception of life's options" was not just a perception; it was
reality for many of our Red Nations' children. The true and
actual reality was that there was no escape for her from the
Christian, Indian Residential School she attended. There were
also no other "options" apart from continuing to be raped,
tortured, hated, and humiliated on a daily basis or die mentally,
emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, and eventually....
physically. The "destructive life events" (Shneidman, 1999) in
our Holy Woman's life were individual educated, religious, White

23

Dr. Rick Grinnell, (1987) Social Work Research Course Lecture, University of
Calgary.

47

Nation People acting under their federal government sanctioned
laws rather than any acts of God such as drought, flood,
earthquakes, or hurricanes. For our Holy Woman, the
"destructive life events" (Shneidman, 1999) were the specific
White Nation People in her life who ran the Christian, Indian
Residential School; the ones who hated, raped, tortured,
humiliated, and beat her on a daily basis until they had broken
her will to live and drove her to her suicide attempts.
Our Holy Woman was driven to two suicide attempts and
survived one actual hanging before she was 6 years old. Today,
the silent reality of driven to suicide also exists in our domestic
violence.
I watched my uncle, he was a middle aged dry drunk.

He

ended up marrying an alcoholic woman. Right after the
wedding reception, he started in on her, demanding

that

"his" "wife" give up her drinking for him. He wanted to
measure his worth by how much he could get his brand
new wife to suffer, sacrifice, and change for him. He
couldn't accept herfor who she was and help her out;
instead he demanded that she change for him. The more
that he harassed her about her drinking, the more he drove

48

her to drink. The more that she drank to escape him, the
more infuriated he became. The more infuriated he
became, the more he demanded her to pay attention to him
and take good care of him, and fulfill his wants and needs;
not hers. It was like hejust wouldn't allow her to exist for
who she was. And, he was always demanding that she
had to need him more than the bottle. Hejust
leave her alone. ... even after her arm was

couldn't

amputated

when she used a shotgun to kill herself in herfirst suicide
attempt, he refused to psychologically leave her alone. He
just wouldn't leave her alone. He was so obsessed in
emotionally tearing her apart because she was not doing
what he needed her to do for him. It was like he had to
destroy herfor who she was so that he could re-build her
into the person that he needed her to be so she would take
good care of him. I don't understand why hejust didn't do
it himself? He had been cooking and cleaning for himself
for decades, why didn't he just do it himself?...
....in his eyes, she would never be perfect and her best
would never be good enough for him. He kept destroying
her until there was nothing left to destroy.

Eventually,

she

49
was able to escape his never-ending obsession of ripping
her apart and destroying her. Hejust couldn't leave her
alone. He just couldn't let her go. He just had to destroy
her and re-build her into the person that she wasn't able to
be. But, she wasjinally

able to escape him when she

successfully completed her second suicide attempt.
.... J think my Auntie died Boxing Day not because she
wanted to die but because she needed to live. My Auntie
needed to live but in order to live she had to escape from
her husband and there was only one way out for her and
that was to die because he just wouldn't leave her alone.
Some of the relatives on the white side of the family tell me
that she is going to burn in hell because she had committed
suicide. From my point of view, she didn't kill herself; he
did. He had destroyed her a long time ago....
(Suicide survivor. Summer 2005: interviewed in her
home.)
While being critical of her own peers' lack of leadership, our
Holy Woman also believes that mainstream society is another
reason for driven to suicides, in our young people today.

50

We hide behind half opened curtains while we stand back
and watched for years while we gossip amongst

ourselves.

We gossip about the awful beatings and the drinking and
the violence that is going on in our communities. For many
of us, we stand back and watch the perpetrators drive our
young people to suicide and... we didn't even know how to
stop them. Our young people are being driven to their
deaths.

Today, the drug dealers are like predators and

parasites.

They are feeding off our youth and our single

mothers and our unemployed young men and they are
killing them. They are driving them to their deaths
of the poverty, and the worthlessness,
hopelessness,

because

and the

and the emptiness, and the hurt, and the

lack of direction and leadership. And when they dangle
their drinking, and their drugs, and their sex money, and
all the glitz and glamour of the fast lye of their cities in
front of our children's noses, our children leave to go die in
their cities.. As Elders, we have to stop them from
destroying our children. They are destroying our children's
traditional reasons for living. Our people are dying off just

51

like when they killed us with their alcohol and small pox,
but now it is cocaine, crystal meth, and aids.
(Holy Woman, Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor. Winter 2003-2004: interviewed
in her own home.)
On a larger scale, at a Nation to Nation level, driven to
suicide is about how our traditional Indian way of life was
suddenly destroyed by the dominating colonizers.
In addition, the Department had the power to make and
enforce regulations under the acts [Indian Acts of 1876
and 1880 and the Indian Advancement Act of 1884]
affecting all aspects of public and private life in
communities. Aboriginal traditions, ritual life, social and
political organization, or economic practices could be
proscribed as obstacles to Christianity and civilization or
could be declared by Parliament, as in the case of the
potlatch and s u n dance, criminal behaviors (Milloy, 1999,
p.21).
Our ways of life were replaced with the colonizer's foreign way of
existing on reservations while starving on food rations in poorly
constructed government housing, without our children.

This

52

sudden social upheaval was the result of colonizers taking our
traditional territories and our sources of life, such as the
Buffalo, away from us. For my Blackfoot People, life would never
be the same again....
The Buffalo were gone. The buffalo truly had been their
staff of life. It had given meat for food, skin for lodges
and clothing, bones for tools, horns for ladles, the
paunch for containers, teeth for necklaces, hair for
stuffing saddle pads, and the hoof for rattles. Even the
tail had been used to sprinkle water on hot stones for the
sweat lodge. The buffalo was the very foundation of their
existence. It was at the heart of their religion, their
mythology, their daily lives, their annual migrations, their
food, and their shelter. The old people in particular could
not understand where the millions of buffalo had gone.
They knew the animal had been a gift of the Sun spirit,
so they assumed that the Bloods had offended him and
that the Great Spirit had opened a hole in the earth and
driven all his animals into it. For many years, after the
tragic winter of 1880 -81, the older Indians waited and
prayed for the buffalo to return (Dempsey, 1995 p. 132).

53

Through out all of Canada, the original way of life and being
for all Red Nations was destroyed...
According to Canada's first Prime Minister, Sir J o h n A.
MacDonald, the nation, too, dreamed of discharging its
benevolent duty. A national goal, he informed
Parliament, was "to do away with the tribal system and
assimilate the Indian people in all respects with their
inhabitants of the Dominion, as speedy as they are fit to
change (Milloy, 1999 p.6.)
When the colonizers took away our great grandparents
freedoms, rights, honour and worth, traditional territories, ways
of life, and sources of life... it appears that the colonizers also
wanted to feel good and morally right about what they were
doing to our ancestors...
Let u s have Christianity and civilization among the Indian
tribes; let us have a wise and paternal Government....
Doing its utmost to help and elevate the Indian
population.... And Canada will be enabled to feel, that in
a truly patriotic spirit our country had done its duty by
the red men (Milloy, 1999, p.6).

54

Unfortunately, what was civilizing for the colonizing White
Nation was barbaric for our ancestors of all Red Nations.

The

external pressures of the British colonizers civilizing and
dominating society were so great on our Red Nations that many
of u s died along the way....
In residential school, I remember lying in a pool of my own
blood. I had been beaten to a pulp. It was a "white rabbit
beating". I was called a "white rabbit" because I was a
half breed Indian kid. I was hated by the white staff for
being Indian and I was hated by my own people because I
had something of value that they wanted but couldn't
have; white looking skin. I was beaten so badly that I
couldn't even move to get up off the floor. I was just lying
in my own blood and I was thinking to myself. I decided to
quitfighting for my life. I didn't want to die; I wanted to
live but Ijust couldn't take their hate anymore. I quit
fighting to stay alive; I didn't care anymore...
(Elder; Indian Residential School Survivor. Winter 20042005: interviewed in her own home.)

55

Summary
For about 18 months, I would go into my doctor telling him
about the pain that I was in. I was going through a lot of
racial hate at work.... Ijust couldn't seem to get away from
it... One day, I went into see him. By that time I was so...
weak that all I could say to my doctor was two words....
'afraid'.... 'suicide'... And he missed it...after 18 months
he missed it... (Suicide victim. Early Spring 2006:
interviewed in Terrace, B.C.)
By combining the above statistics, we can develop a
theoretical profile of a high risk suicide victim in Canada. That
person, who is currently suffering with the highest levels of
psychological pain which may eventually drive him to suicide
(Shneidman, 1999), will statistically be a young Red Nation
man, who is between the ages of 15-24 years (Malchy & Enns,
1997). He would statistically live and die on reserve in a remote
northern community (Malchy & Enns, 1997). Statistically, he
would come from a reserve that is already plagued with suicides
and accidental deaths (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998). He may
have been triggered to commit suicide by a deadly combination
of a recent relationship breakup and heavy drinking (Malchy &

56
Enns, 1997). But, he h a s also been suffering from unbearable
psychological pain for years (Shneidman, 1999).
In his family, there is a high probability that he has suffered
from one or more of the following symptoms of colonial genocide
and assimilation; "sexual abuse, family violence, alcohol and
drug abuse, solvent abuse, satanic practices, deterioration of
family structure, or lack of proper leadership" RCAP (1995). In
his community, there may also be the reality of colonization in
the form of "third world level poverty, overcrowded housing,
unfit drinking water, extremely high levels of unemployment,
and third generation solvent abuse" (Taylor, 1995). Prior to his
death, he probably did not know how to speak his own
traditional language, have a sense of identity and pride from his
traditional culture, a n d / o r know his traditional ways of living
off the land (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998). His mom a n d / o r dad
a n d / o r grandparents would have probably been victims of
residential school a n d / o r he may have been a victim in and of
the foster care and/or adoption systems (RCAP, 1995).
As an individual, he probably had less than a grade twelve
high school education and about a 90% chance of living on
welfare due to the reality that there are no jobs on his reserve

57

(Taylor, 1995). Within his own being, he would probably be
suffering from "racism, loss of culture, physical and mental
abuse, family discord, feelings of boredom, loneliness, and
powerlessness" (RCAP, 1995). With all the historical cultural
genocide and assimilation odds stacked against him, while
struggling with his everyday poverty of resources and
opportunities and maybe even struggling with his own
addictions, he probably didn't have much to look forward to, in
his future (Chandler & Lalonde, 1998). His future may have
been as bleak a s his extended family and/or community
members who have already committed suicide or died an early
death, in an accident (Kirmayer, 1994). Even though his
psychological pain and social isolation may have been
unbearable for years (Shneidman, 1999; Travis, 1990;
Hoberman & Garfinkal, 1988; Shaft, Carrigan, WhittinghiU &
Derrick, 1985 cited in Kirmayer, 1994) he may have made no
prior attempts before successfully killing himself due to the
lethal means he used. Statistically, he would have used
hanging, a firearm to shoot himself, or a drug overdose while
under the influence of alcohol (OCCBC, 2004). Unfortunately,
statistics show u s that he would not die alone. He would not be

58
the only one in his family a n d / o r community to die of suicide
when attempts rates soar as high as 241 men in his village of
100,000 (Ross & Davis, 1986). He would also not be the only
one; the young women in his community also fight to die
through their 7,722 attempts per 100,000 (Ross & Davis, 1986).
Fortunately, due to the slow death that pills bring to us, the
majority of his community sisters will be able to survive their
drug overdoses (Ross & Davis, 1986).
What statistics do not tell u s is....his name and what he
loved to do that would make him feel happy and alive... We will
never hear his voice and see his smile ever again... We will also
not know what he was born to do and what he would have been
working and living at his full potential; who he was meant to be
according to the Creator. Statistics also never tells us that on
an individual level every suicide victim has his or her own
unspoken truth speaking story....
The following research project is just a small pebble tossed
into an ocean of chaos, destruction, pain, and despair. As well,
many of our People do not have access to mainstream formal
mental health services to help u s in our battles against driven to
suicide (Schmidt, 2000). Thus, I went to listen to my fellow Red

59

Nation Warriors to find out what they personally did that helped
them in fighting for their lives....

60
CHAPTER THREE
METHODOLOGY
In our hearts and souls: Introduction
They stole from me all my reasons for living in exchange for
all their reasons for dying.
(Holy Woman, Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor. Winter 2003-2004: interviewed in
her home.)
As a Hereditary Chief, it hurts my heart every time I phone
back home, to the reserve, and I hear that another one of our
People has died from suicide. Unlike my White Nation research,
back home, our suicide statistics are not faceless or nameless.
We still remember who they once were, whose family they
belonged to, where they lived, where they died, how they died,
and... their suicides still hurt our hearts. If I was a traditional
scientific White Nation researcher, I would be expected to be
void of all emotional interests and personal agendas in order to
do good, detached, scientific research (Morse & Field, 1995,
p. 15). However, as a Hereditary Chief for my People, I suffer in
the sorrow of my People while driven to suicide continues to
haunt our communities.

61
At times, I wish I was void of all the emotional pain that cuts
into my heart and soul every time I hear that another one of my
People h a s died from driven to suicide. It cuts deep into my
heart and soul because driven to suicide continues to be an
enemy to all our Red and White Nations and People. Driven to
suicide is a common and familiar enemy to all of us; it wastes
our People's lives. It destroys our families and friendships. It
scars our communities and ... it leaves its survivors with a
lifetime of pain, shame, and permanent physical damage.
Today, many of us continue to suffer the pain, shame, and
permanent physical damage from our own driven to suicides.
Alone our bests were not good enough to fight for our lives, we
needed help....
It also hurts my heart and soul to think about...what type of
communities are we living in when we can't even save our own
People from the hate and violence that surrounds u s and drives
us to suicide?.... Our traditional law teaches u s that we are to
be there for our own People, but we are not. Who and what is
getting in our way? What are we doing wrong?

62
We should have been therefor her when she asked us for our
help (Elder; Healing Center's Board of Directors member.
Summer 2006: Blood Reserve, Alberta.).
If I was a traditional scientific White Nation researcher, I
would be expected to be neutral with no biases or personal
agendas. However, as a Hereditary Chief, this research project
is just one piece of my many personal commitments and
traditional duties to my People; it is also my battle too. In spite
of my traditional responsibilities and commitments to fight for
myself and my People's lives, as a Chief I have also spent a life
time being trained to put my own personal wants, needs,
agendas, and biases to the back of the stove. My People come
first. As a Chief, I have been trained to be strong enough to
search for, fight for, and find the truth.
Respect the wisdom of the people in council. Once you
give an idea to a council or a meeting it no longer belongs
to you. It belongs to the People. Respect demands that
you listen intently to the ideas of others in council and
that you do not insist that your ideas prevail. Indeed you
should freely support the ideas of others if they are true

63
and good, even if those ideas are quite different from the
ones you have contributed. The clash of ideas brings
forth the spark of truth. Once a council had decided
something in unity, respect demands that no one speak
secretly against what has been decided. If the council
has made an error, that error will become apparent to
everyone in its own time (Bopp, et el, 1984, p. 78).
For this research project, I have found truth in five Warriors'
personal lives. Their truths are their personal battle stories of
what they have done to fight for their lives against driven to
suicide.
From my White Nation's teachings, I have learnt that this act
of collecting Warriors' real life experiences is called qualitative
research. Qualitative research occurs when we collect personal
lived experiences from a small number of people who are living
in their natural environment while using least intrusive ways 24
(Morse & Field, 1995 p. 10). There are various types of
qualitative research. The type that is most reflective of my

Least intrusive way is a common traditional way of being. Least intrusive way
is also found in qualitative research when the researcher collects life experiences
in their natural state without applying any artificial limitations or experimental
controls to the experiences.

64
Indianized research method is called phenomenology.
Phenomenology was defined by Van Manen in 1990 (cited in
Morse & Field, 1995, p.22) as, "research that seeks to
understand the lived experience of individuals and their
intention within their life world'".
Traditionally, listening to our Warriors truth speaking was
part of our sacred Sun Dance. Each story is shared separately
and it stands alone to be honoured, respected, and learned
from. Traditionally, we never do comparison and contrast
analysis; we are taught to accept things 'as is'. We also did not
group together all our Warrior's truth speaking to analyze
common themes. That would be so dishonouring.
Traditionally, everyone, independent of age, h a s a right to stand
out from the crowd when h e / s h e has done a notably brave,
ethical, compassionate, or charitable feat. We are to give credit
where credit is due.... However, using phenomenological style
of research, this research project takes learning from the
Warriors' oral truth speaking one step further. In this
Indianized version of phenomenological research, we gather all
the Warriors' truth speaking stories together to discover if there
are any common themes as well as any one-of-a-kind unique

65
suicide intervention strategies. This gathering to find common
themes is called "thematic analysis" (Morse & Field, 1995,
p. 135).

Indianized research
"If the shoe doesn't Jit, we don't have to wear it any more"...
(Holy Woman, Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor. Winter 2003-2004: interviewed in
her home.)
Tuhiwai Smith (1999) in her book Decolonizing
Methodologies: Research and indigenous people challenged the
traditional academic White Nation's approach toward
researching u s from their worldview instead of our own.
Tuhiwai Smith (1999) recommended that as Original Nations,
we need to start controlling, designing, and doing our own
research using our own culture, view of our world, and our
traditional ways. I fully agree with and support using our own
cultures to conduct research for and with our own People. But,
the remaining question was "how"? Tuhiwai Smith (1999) did
not provide step by step "how to" guidance as to how I would be
able to draw upon and use my own Red Nation cultures to

66
appropriately design a research methodology that would
actually make sense to us, fit our own needs, be do-able within
our own cultural ways, and be useful to us. Thus, I decided to
take the next step....
Before I started to design an Indianized research method
that I could understand from my own cultural ways of being, I
first had to understand what was required of me if I was a
traditional old school academic White Nation researcher.
"First seek to understand and then seek to be understood"
(Author Unknown). I began by researching existing traditional
and contemporary White Nation qualitative research designs
and the necessary ethical and academic standards for a Master
level thesis (Badine, 2002; Cone & Foster, 1993; Cutcliffe, 2003;
Cutcliffe & McKenna, 2004; Horsburgh, 2003; McCormick,
1998; Morse & Field, 1995; Murray, 2003; Ramcharan &
Cutcliffe, 2001; Reinharz, 1992; Rubin & Babbin, 2001;
Tuhiwai Smith, 1999; University of Northern British Columbia,
1995; Youngblood Henderson, 2000). I came up with
petroglyph of a skeleton containing the minimum standards
that I needed to address in this research project as well as in
the actual writing of this thesis. With this skeleton of minimum

67
thesis, ethics, and qualitative research standards, my second
step was to go back to my own Blackfoot and Sioux cultures to
draw upon elements of my history, ways of doing things,
concepts of understanding, and even my Sun Dance ceremony.
Due to significant cultural difference between Red and White
Nations, I needed to draw upon my own Sioux and Blackfoot
cultures so I could fully understand what I needed to do and
why I needed to do the standards, in my own cultural identity,
traditional ethics, and worldview. Research is not a normal
activity that we do in our everyday lives so I wanted to take a
least intrusive approach when working with the participating
Warriors. To be least intrusive, I needed to be Indian (appendix
C, D, E, and F) which included being respectful of my fellow Red
Nations' Warriors and their own cultural way of doing things.
Thus, I drew upon my Blackfoot and Sioux traditional ways so
that my research would be the least intrusive and foreign to the
volunteering Warriors. As a result, I needed to and was able to
"Indianize?' my research methodologies to meet the requirements
of both Nations and worlds.
By Indianizing my research, I have been able to meet the
academic requirements of my White Nations' university world as

68
well as meet my own cultural existence and my hereditary Chief
duties to my People, in my Blackfoot and Sioux worlds. More
specifically, to Indianize this research project, I looked back into
my own Blackfoot and Sioux cultures to determine if there were
any natural occasions when a Warrior would share h i s / h e r
truth speaking battle stories with our People?
Today, back home on reserve, there are two common
occasions for us to stand as Warriors and share our personal
battle stories. One is in front of our A.A. (Alcoholic Anonymous)
or N.A. (Narcotics Anonymous) meetings and the other is when
we count coup on our Sun Dance Centre Pole. One occasion is
the result of cultural assimilation and the other occasion is in
spite of it.
I chose to use our Sacred Warrior Piercing Sun Dance
Ceremony to give understanding, procedural structure, worth,
dignity, depth, and meaning to this Indianized methodology and
to driven to suicide. Sun Dancing as a pierced Warrior is not
much different than suffering from driven to suicide. Driven to
suicide is like being pierced in life by life which causes
unbearable suffering, deprivation, and tragedies while not being

69
able to break free from our enemies 25 that we are tethered to.
Unbearable anguish in our lives not only happens within the
Sun Dance arbor, it also happens in our daily semi-assimilated
and damaged lives. I also used the Sun Dance Ceremony to
give understanding, structure, purpose, depth, and meaning to
this research project by emphasizing the sacredness of our Sun
Dance in stark contract to the holocaustic horrors of Christian
Indian Residential School (see appendix G).
Lastly, when I would watch our Holy Woman speak about
her Sun Dance experiences, she would come alive with sparkle
in her eyes and her face would brighten up while she shared
ceremonial meanings and teachings that she loves and believes
in. Thus, I wanted to have the Holy Woman share her sacred
Sun Dance Ceremonial experiences with us so we will not only
know our Holy Woman as a suicidal tortured child rape slave
from her Christian Indian Residential School experiences but
also recognize her for her most sacred rites that she was meant
to perform at our annual Sun Dances.

Enemies such as poverty, unemployment, destroyed traditional food sources,
crowded housing; unclean drinking water, alcoholism, drug addictions, bingo
and gambling,

70

Back home, in my semi-assimilated Indian world, our Elders
teach u s that the toughest journey that we will ever need to
walk is from our heads to our hearts. Because the unbearable
pain of driven to suicide lies within our hearts and souls, the
thesis h a s been written from my traditional Indian heart and
soul, rather than from my academic and logical head (appendix
C and D).

In our hearts and souls, we are taught acceptance;

to accept "what is". There are many aspects of life that do not
make any logical sense to u s but they still do exist. A good
example of this existence is that there is no scientific reason for
a bumble bee to be able to fly but he does anyway in spite of
and independent of the lack of scientific calculations and
theories. Thus, the bumble bee teaches u s that sometimes....
we need to accept what is without having a logical, medical, or
scientific explanation for it.
In my traditional ways, we are also always expected to speak
our truth that comes from our hearts and souls rather than
from our heads. However, in my White Nation academic world,
I have also been taught to use my head to critically think,
discover, challenge, expand, and push the outer boundaries of
existing knowledge. Hand in hand, it is in my traditional way of

71
"with a sincere heart and good intentions" and with an open
mind of curiosity to learn and understand that I have designed
and implemented this research project to the best of all my
worlds.
I have also been very privileged to be a student at the
University of Northern British Columbia. I am grateful to UNBC
and my professors who provided space for me to exist in a very
supportive learning and research environment. The research
environment was progressive yet safe; I was able to challenge
my status quo thinking by asking myself, "why can't I quote and
reference my own Red Nation's Elders' oral words of wisdom as
much as I was referencing my own White Nations' Elder's words
of wisdom that were documented in their books and scholarly
journal articles"? Due to UNBC's academic environment and
freedom that allows u s to be creative and progressive in cutting
edge research, I have also been able to break trail for the coexistence of both worlds within one thesis through referencing.
In this thesis, I valued and referenced my Red Nations'
Elders as equals with my White Nation's Elders. Throughout
this thesis, the reader will notice equality represented through
the co-existence of both Red and White worlds. I have

72

referenced my Red world of Elders; our Holy Woman, who is an
Indian Residential School victim and suicide survivor, other
suicide survivors, and our participating Warriors. I have also
referenced my White Nations' Elders' academic work written by
Shneidman, Durkheim, and many others.
In Chapters 4 and 5, for equality amongst all the truth
speaking Warriors, I have intentionally referenced every Warrior
in every discussed concept. I wanted all their voices to be heard
equally. Amongst our People, some of our people are gifted with
the ability to speak easier than others. At our gatherings, they
are usually the ones who are heard and listened too more often
than anyone else. But, I did not want that to happen in this
thesis. I wanted all the Warriors to be heard equally
independent of how difficult it was for them to put their
thoughts and feelings into words. Thus, the Warriors were all
quoted in equal amounts.
Lastly, I would like to request that the reader does not forget
that the main focus of this research project is not research
methodologies; methodologies are only the vehicle in which we
search for the undiscovered truth. The main focus was not to
create a new medium of research so my Elders from both worlds

73

co-exist as equals, at the same time, in the same book, on the
same page. The main reason for this research was also not to
"Indianize" qualitative research so my cultures would exist in a
written book on a university library shelf, in a city far away from
my People. The main activity for this research project was to
learn from the Warriors what they did for themselves and what
external resources were available to them that helped them win
in their battles against driven to suicide. The main purpose for
this research project was to find practical cures to share with
our People so they will not have to suffer as much as we have in
fighting for their lives. We have all suffered enough. Now, it is
time to heal...

The Elders' blessings
On November 23, 2005, the following research proposal
received written blessings from the UNBC Research Ethics
Board's Elders (appendix A). After receiving their blessings, I
began to search for a research location. My number one
priority was to find Red Nation Warriors who would be in a safe
environment when sharing their suicide truth speakings.
Emotional safety, anonymity, and confidentially were the

74

primary factors when selecting a Red Nation off-reserve
community based agency. After selecting a potential Red Nation
agency, I contacted two Elders; the Executive Director and the
consulting Elder for the Board of Directors. After visiting with
each Elder on the telephone, I went out to their agency to
present my proposal and to address any concerns the Elders of
the full Board of Directors had regarding the nature of the
project and how the research would be done. The original
proposal was adjusted to bring peace to the Elders' concerns
regarding the safety of anonymity within their agency as well as
within their small community and surrounding traditional
territory. After the changes were written into the proposal, the
Elders gave their oral blessings; their traditional form of
approval.

Calling on the Warriors: Purposive sampling
All the Warriors, who were accepted into this research
project had suffered from and successfully won their own
personal battles against driven to suicide. They were of legal age
for the province of British Columbia and all were members of
their own Red Nations and clans. Participation was on a n

75

informed and voluntary basis for all the men and women
Warriors. Their truth speaking stories were of their own
personal experiences that they had suffered from driven to
suicide including their thoughts, feelings, experiences, and/or
attempts. Prior to the truth speaking gathering, I assumed that
it would be too personal to ask the Warriors to share their
individual stories of what led u p to their pending or actual
suicide attempts. However, all the Warriors wanted to and
freely began telling their truths by sharing with me the
sequence of events that led up to their pending suicides. After
they shared their sacred stories, they went on to answer the
three pre-determined research questions.
For this research project, five Warriors shared their truth
through their personal stories. This gathering of Warriors' truth
speaking stories fell within the range from 5 to 18 participants.
This is similar in sample size with other Red Nations' suicide
research projects (Gosek, 2002; Paproski, 1997; Walker, 1999).
This was also in-line with phenomenological research methods
that do not pre-determine a specific number of participants
prior to beginning the research (Morse & Field, 1995).
According to Morse and Field (1995, p. 80) data is collected

76
until there is "a rich and full description" or "until the primary
researcher h a s exhausted all the potential research participants
in the participating community". For this project, all the
available Warriors at the non-reserve community based agency
took part in this project.

Gathering our Warriors' truth speaking stories: Data
collection
All the Warriors who participated in our project had defined
themselves as victims and survivors of driven to suicide and had
willingly volunteered to participate by truth speaking (purposive
sampling 26 ). Before the interviews were conducted, I thanked
them for volunteering and thanked them for fighting for their
lives. Without the Warriors being alive today, there would be no
truth speaking stories to hear. Without the Warriors, there
would be no suicide intervention strategies to share with our
People, who are still fighting for their lives.
Prior to interviewing, I provided a copy of the research
information letter, two copies of t h e consent form, t h e list of t h e

three primary research questions and a list of emergency

Rubin & Babbie (2001).

77

counseling contact phone numbers (Appendix B). The Warriors
all carefully read this introductory material prior to signing their
consent form. By reading the introductory letter and the
consent form, all the Warriors were able to freely give informed
consent ((Appendix B). Ongoing consent was also received every
time a Warrior mailed back his/her corrected transcript and
after reviewing Chapter 4's and Chapter 5's drafts 27 .
To conduct the truth speaking, the oral story gathering, the
first Warrior did not feel comfortable with having his/her truth
speaking tape recorded due to the spiritual nature of his/her
story.

To honour and respect this Warrior's wishes, a quasi-

traditional way was done. I wrote contemporary hand notes
while listening in our traditional way. The second Warrior did
not have a preference as to whether his/her truth speaking was
tape recorded or done in hand written notes. The Warrior
turned the decision over to me. I decided to go with hand
written notes to establish the same level of accuracy for all the
remaining Warriors' truth speaking rather than having some
tape recorded and some recorded by doing hand written notes.
' Ongoing consent is based on traditional values of honour and respect which
are echoed in the concept of "ethics as process" (Ramcharan & Cutcliffe,
2001).

78

Looking back on the truth speaking, I realized that tape
recorders may not have a place in Indianized research.
Traditionally, we were taught as children to listen very carefully
and remember in detail; we were to develop our traditional
memory and recital skills. In the days of our Grandparents, as
children, they were expected to someday be able to repeat back
word for word what they had heard. It was through this skill
building that our oral history remained accurate from one
generation to the next.
Immediately after each day of truth speaking, the hand
written notes were typed out into type written format. The
typed notes were then mailed out to each Warrior, asking the
Warrior to review his/her typed notes as if it was the transcript
of their truth speaking that I heard with my heart 2 8 . They were
asked to review all the statements in their transcripts and then
decide if they wanted to accept, add, subtract, a n d / o r change
any portion of each statement. Some Warriors decided to
completely withdraw some of their statements because they did
not feel fully comfortable having those specific statements

28

1 have been taught, in my traditional ways, when people speak from their hearts
I am to listen with my heart rather than with my ears.

79
recorded. All the Warriors requests and changes were fully
respected and done. This continuous editing was done until
each Warrior had exactly what h e / s h e wanted heard and
understood for their truth speaking. It was also done to insure
that the Warriors had the safety of having complete and exact
control over all the contents of their truth speaking.
Transcripts were mailed back and forth until all the
remaining statements were accepted and there were no further
changes. Transcript editing varied from one to seven drafts
before the final transcripts were achieved. From the very
beginning through to the final transcripts, the Warriors
continued to maintain their traditional rights of ownership over
their truth speaking. Their blessings only gave me the right to
use their truth speaking for this research project. Their truth
speakings belongs to them; it is a piece of who they are and
what they have done to be with u s today. The final transcripts
were then kept for data analysis. Four months after successful
completion of defense and meeting all academic requirements,
all the transcripts, petroglyphs, and hand notes will be burnt in
a traditional way with prayers of thanksgiving and tobacco.

80

Scraping the hides: Data analysis
Step 1: Understanding and learning from individual truths:
Intra-participant

analysis

In this first step of analysis, our Warriors truth speaking
transcripts were read, one at a time. After reading each
separate truth speaking, I put the transcript away and reflected
on it. While reflecting on each separate truth speaking, I wrote
out a second set of notes in regards to what aspects stood out
the most for me, for each research question. In addition, I was
also able to write out significant events and experiences of their
pending suicide deaths. All the Warriors were excellent in
sharing their truths which made it easy to hear and understand
what their significant experiences were. I was surprised that all
the Warriors could easily remember their suicide experiences so
clearly and so accurately. It appears that their suicide
experiences have had a significant impact on all of the Warriors
and their lives. Even though it has been many years later, their
suicide experiences continued to remain a very memorable and
traumatic life experience for all the Warriors; they even could
clearly remember details.

81
At this stage of analysis, I was beginning to see each
Warrior's suicide interventions and experiences coming to the
surface. I then went back to each truth speaking transcript to
highlight significant examples of the theme(s) that stood out the
most for me for each research question. Once the specific
examples were gathered, I bundled these examples together, in
groups, for each research question, for each Warrior. Due to
the large amount of individual examples for each question, I
drew out a chart to organize the information/data. The chart
contained each Warrior's name at the top of his/her column
while each row contained one of the research questions. Boxes
were created from the coming together of each column and row.
Each box contained the significant suicide interventions and/
or experiences for each individual Warrior. This chart brought
together, all the significant suicide interventions and
experiences of all the Warriors as individuals, on to one page.
Step 2: Understanding and bringing together a collective truth:
Inter-participant

analysis

In this stage of data analysis, I gathered the truth speakings
together to see if there were any common theme(s) 29 that ran
29

For further information in regards to "meta theme" see Morse & Field, 1995

82

throughout all of the Warriors' truth speaking in regard to
suicide intervention strategies and/or experiences. At first, it
was very confusing to try to make sense of all the Warriors'
individual bits and pieces from the chart that I made in step
one. I tried to use all the truth speaking stories all at once
using one question at a time, but it was just... not... going any
where. All I could still see was an even larger pile of individual
bits and pieces.
Out of frustration, I started all over again. Only this time, I
took one Warrior's truth speaking at a time. Out of habit, I
started to automatically doodle on paper a graphic expression of
the sequence of significant behaviors and events regarding the
first Warrior's suffering, breaking point, and healing journey.
From that first doodle, I added the second Warrior's significant
behaviors and experiences which started to firm u p and
organize a sequence of events that echoed the first Warrior's
suicide - healing journey. Then, while I was adding the third
Warrior's data, I realized that ah ha., it finally made sense. I
had unknowingly built a petroglyph of the basic skeleton
structure of commonly shared events and experiences using the
first two truth speakings. By the third truth speaking, I was

83

now only adding on another layer to the already existing
skeleton. This layer added more strength to the existing pattern
of events and experiences; more meat on to the skeleton's
bones 3 0 .
I started doodling in order to understand the assortment of
bits and pieces of information, in my visual, Indian, wholeistic
patterned way. After a few moments, the petroglyph began to
take on a voice of its own. The petroglyph began to tell me a
story that spoke of the commonly shared precipitating events,
suicide interventions, and helpful phenomena that the Warriors
had experienced on their own, as individuals. As I layered the
significant points from each Warrior's truth speaking on to this
collective skeleton, the petroglyph began to take on shape and
strength of its own. By the time I had added the third Warrior's
significant events, I had reached an 'ah ha'., in understanding
the commonly shared sequences of events for all the Warriors

1

As an Indian traditional healer in mainstream clinical practice, I have spent
decades doodling and drawing out stick people pictures for my clients, in their
therapy sessions. My doodling is my wnolistic Indian way of helping people
understand how their behaviors can keep dysfunctional relationship patterns
going. Doodling out the circle of events also helps us discover any pivotal
points where the client could do a small behavioral change to create a
significandy different outcome. I have been clinically doodling circular
behavior patterns and my stick people for decades as a therapeutic tool as well
as an alternative to using written words and note taking. Jokingly, I call my
clinical circle doodling, my therapeutic Indian petroglyph art.

84

b u t one. When I added on the fourth Warrior's story, there
were no new points added on to the petroglyph, the collective
whole. However, there was one exception that was very
different and unique from all the other Warriors' truth speaking.
This one Warrior had been clean and sober for seven years prior
to being cursed with bad medicine. This Warrior was also
unique in that h e / s h e used traditional Elders and ceremonies
in his/her healing.
The multi-layered petroglyph showed me that there were
several consistent, strong, commonly shared suicide
experiences and intervention themes. The petroglyph also
showed me that there was a commonly shared pattern to our
Warriors' suffering, breaking point, and healing journeys. The
petroglyph showed me a common pattern of precipitating
factors that built u p over time which left the Warriors
vulnerable. Then a significant event came along that was so
overwhelming that it drove the Warriors on to their death trails.
The petroglyph went on to show me that there was a common
breaking point event when each of the Warriors decided that
they didn't want to die. The petroglyph's path than started to
decline when the Warriors started fighting for their lives by

85

accessing short term and then on to longer term treatment. The
final stage of this petroglyph represented the 2 - 5 years of
sobriety and education that led to full time employment for all
the Warriors.
The petroglyph represents common themes for four out of
five of the Warriors. However, there was one of the Warriors,
whose truth speaking could not be blended in without losing
very important and culturally unique suicide experiences and
interventions. This Warrior's truth speaking contained some
commonly shared suicide interventions and experiences similar
to the other Warriors. However, it also contained some very
unique, one-of-a-kind suicide precipitating factors and
interventions that were reflective of the Warrior's traditional
culture. I decided not to throw away this unique and true story
even though it did not fit in with the rest of the truth speakings.
The uniqueness that this Warrior's personal truth speaking
brings to this research project is about being cursed with bad
medicine in his/her community as well as the use of his/her
Nation's traditional ways of healing from suicide curses. This
unique one of a kind story was kept separate and included in
Chapter Four's findings; this Warrior's truth speaking provided

86
a Variation and enrich[ed] the data with a range of experiences'
(Morse & Field, 1995).
Step 3: Petroglyph: Understanding the themes
In this step, I used the petroglyph's commonly shared
themes, the meta themes, of the precipitating factors, suicide
interventions, and experiences to write Chapter Four's,
significant findings, and Chapter Five's discussion of results. To
accurately write out this research project's findings, I used
many quotes from the Warriors' truth speaking as a way of
maintaining accuracy and authenticity.

Using exact excerpts is

a common aspect of our oral traditions. This use of authentic
material from the original source is also commonly done by
White Nation researchers. Morse and Field (1995) encourage
researchers to use quotes "from the interviews [as] concrete
illustrations to provide a realistic and accurate portrayal of the
phenomena for the reader[s]".
Step 4: The Warriors' blessings: Degree of accuracy
To verify the quality of my workmanship in regard to how
accurate I have been at understanding and interpreting the
individual and common themes of the Warriors' truth speaking,
I went back to the Warriors to share with them the findings. I

87

asked them, from their point of view, if the contents of Chapter
Four's, significant findings, and Chapter Five's, discussion,
"made sense to them" 31 and....
- Did I understand and use their truth speaking in an
accurate, good, and honourable way ?
- Do the findings make sense to them?
- If I have used their truth speakings in an honourable and
good way, could I receive their blessing to send this thesis
on to the next step in its journey to completion and to fill
its rightful place, in the public world.
I received blessings from the Warriors. Their blessings
included ....
Thank you for the opportunity of helping others in a good way
(Warrior).

I would like to thank you for this, as I was reading this, I could
not help but feel very good about the story I shared, and the way
you put it down on paper; very good (Warrior).

"Rigor in any research is required to prevent error of either a constant or
intermittent nature"(Morse & Field, 1995). This will also include the concept
of "fit and grab" as explained in Cutcliffe & McKenna, 2004.

88
While I was reading chapter four, it brought tears to my eyes
(Warrior).
Traditional beadwork: Quality of workmanship
In my Sioux and Blackfoot cultures, workmanship within
both the men's daily lives and the women's daily lives was
highly valued and praised. When my ancestors hunted buffalo;
bravery, accuracy, wisdom from experience, strength, skill, and
a good horse meant the difference between life and death during
a hunt. Through bravery, accuracy, wisdom from experience,
strength, skill, and a good horse, buffalo were harvested for the
winter's food supply. Hides were then scraped, tanned, and
smoked. The hides were used to make teepee covers and
clothing. Besides the everyday products that served useful
purposes, my Great Grandmothers were also known for their
meticulous and beautiful bead work.
In our traditional ways, we were taught that whatever we
make and do with our hands was an outer expression of what
lies within our hearts and souls. Many individuals were known
for and by the quality of their workmanship. As children, we
were taught not to boast about our skills, for the quality of our

89
workmanship would speak for itself. Quality of workmanship is
also valued in research. In White Nation research,
workmanship is measured in four directions; external reliability,
internal reliability, external validity, and internal validity.
According to Collins English Dictionary (Hanks, 1979,
p. 1233) reliability is defined as "able to be trusted, predictable
or dependable". Research has external reliability when the
researcher actually collected information on what h e / s h e set
out to collect. This research project was to collect oral truth
from Warriors who fought battles against driven to suicide. The
focus was on driven to suicide. While collecting the Warriors'
truth speaking, it was soon discovered that there are many
roads that led to driven to suicide. The Warriors' truth
speakings are about their personal battles against driven to
suicide that originated from various unbearable and
overwhelming triggering events. The findings will reflect suicide
intervention strategies that were used in fighting the following
specific suicide triggering events:
-

suicide attempt due to the unbearable pain of the
sudden deaths of a Warrior's four children in a house fire

-

suicide attempt due to the unbearable pain of a Warrior's

90
child being taken away
-

near suicide attempt due to bad medicine cursing from
evil, jealous community members (unprovoked lateral
violence).

-

suicide attempt due to the accumulation of overwhelming
confusion and residual pain of childhood family violence
and alcoholism which left the Warrior unable to be selfreliant; the Warrior believed that he/she lacked the
needed life skills to live and to take good care of
him/herself as an adult

-

a pre-teen suicide attempt that was defined by the
Warrior as attention seeking. As an adult, the second
attempt was done after a chain of events due to the
impact that the Warrior's addictions had on his/her
marriage. An argument broke out that led to a
separation. The Warrior went back to his/her home
reserve. Once again, due to addiction related behaviors
he/she was "kicked out of my own community". The

91
Warrior did not identity what precipitating factors led to
his/her addictions 32 .
In spite of these various suicide triggering events, the findings
resulted in commonly shared suicide interventions as well as
one unique one-of-a-kind traditional healing journey.
Internal reliability in research occurs when the research
project can be repeated and another researcher would get the
same results. It is believed that if another researcher was to
interview the same five Warriors, their truth speaking would
remain the same. Time does not change the truth of a
traumatic history. Any variation in the findings would be the
result of personal differences (biases and skills) in the primary
researcher's ability to listen to, understand, and analyze what
was shared.
The third measure of workmanship is called validity. In
Collin's English Dictionary (Hanks, 1979, p. 1599) validity is
defined as "having some foundations; based on truth" as well as
"logic (of the inference) having premises and a conclusion so
related that if the premises are true, the conclusion must be

In Red Nation treatment programs, addictions are seen as problematic
symptoms of precipitating factors.

92
true: the conclusion will be false if one or more premises are
false. When internal validity is applied to research it means "do
the findings make sense" (Badine, 2002, p. 43). Are the results
an accurate reflection of the Warriors' truth speakings, their
experiences, and their suicide intervention strategies?
In order to achieve internal validity, I took two approaches.
The first approach was done when I asked the Warriors to
review their typed transcripts for detail and accuracy. Revisions
were done from one to seven times which resulted in all
Warriors having their truth speaking exactly the way they
wanted to have their truth speaking heard and understood.
The second approach took place when I went back to the
Warriors to share the findings in Chapter 4 and 5. The bottom
line for internal validity was "do the findings make sense?"
without being written so widely that everything would fit in or
written so narrowly that unique one of a kind experiences
wouldn't be able to exist.
"Observe moderation and balance in all things" (Bopp et el,
1984, p. 81).
Lastly, workmanship in research includes the concept of
external validity. External validity exists when the conclusions

93
from this research project can be applied to other individuals, in
other communities, in other Red Nations. According to White
Nation research rules, due to the very small sample size, the
findings can only be applied to the Warriors who shared in this
project. However, as a traditional Healer/ therapist, who has
worked front line in the field for over 20 years, I have learnt that
suicide tends to cross gender and culture barriers. Suicide
tends to go far deeper than numbers of victims and the colour
of our skin.
Suicide is about the unbearable, un-resolvable, unescapable, never ending pain that lies within our hearts and
souls. It is hypothesized that the unbearable anguish of the
death of a child for one parent is no different than the
unbearable anguish of the death of another child for another
parent independent of what colour our skin is or what nation or
clan we come from... Thus, in spite of external validity rules, it
is also hypothesized that these findings and the suicide
prevention pamphlet will be helpful to others who are in
unbearable pain, who live in different communities, come from
different Nations, clans, and/or different walks of life. However,
we will not know for sure if these findings will be helpful to

others until we look back. We will look back only after we have
driven suicide out of our lives, families, communities, and
Nations.
Because our research project was not conducted in the
traditional academic White Nation ways, cultural difference will
also have a n impact on the quality of workmanship. In my
traditional Blackfoot and Sioux ways, I have been taught to
listen with an open mind and with an open heart. I have been
taught that....
Respect demands that [we] listen intently to the ideas of
others in council and that [we] do not insist that [our]
ideas prevail. Indeed [we] should freely support the ideas
of others if they are true and good, even if those ideas are
quite different from ones [we] have contributed. The
clash of ideas brings forth the spark of truth (Bopp et el,
1984).
In my White Nation research courses, I have been taught
that in spite of being traditionally respectful, I will still
automatically influence the data due to who I am and what I
value in life. This influence is recognized in research and is

95
commonly called our "biases" or "reflexMty"47 (Cutcliffe, 2003).
There are many significant and contrasting cultural differences
between Red Nations' cultures and White Nations' cultures, as
well as vast differences between the Red Nations that have
influenced this research project. One contrasting difference
between our traditional ways and White Nations' is the skill of
listening. We listen to our legends many times throughout our
lives. We would hear the same legend over and over again and
depending on where we were at in our own spiritual, mental,
and emotional maturity would determine what stood out the
most for us, at that specific time. Thus, as we grow more
mature in character and in the depth and meaning of life, we
understand deeper aspects of the same legend.
As I worked through the Warriors' truth speaking, my
analysis was like scraping the buffalo hides of my ancestors. I
worked through layers of information in order to draw out
commonly shared suicide intervention strategies and

' Reflexivity refers to active acknowledgement by the researcher that her/his
own actions and decisions will inevitably impact upon the meaning and context
of the experience under investigation. By means of reflexivity the researcher
realizes that (s)he is an integral part of the world that (s)he studies and that
neutrality and detachment in relation to data collection, analysis and
interpretation are impossible. (Henwood & Pidgeon, 1993; Porter, 1993;
Mason, 1996 cited in Horsburgh, 2003)

96
experiences as well as some one-of-a-kind strategies that were
culturally significant in answering the three research questions.
Through this modern day version of scraping of the hides, I
looked for the Warriors' teachings that laid beneath their words.
The thematic answers that I drew out of the Warriors' truth
speaking were related to where I was at in my mental,
emotional, and spiritual maturity as well as my analytical skills
at the time of analysis 33 34 . Like scraping the hides, each
person who scrapes will bring about a different end product due
to the differences in his/her character and skills 35 . Also, what
stood out as significant during analysis may be different from
what I would hear as being significant ten years from now or
what other researchers may see as significant from their own
personal points of view or culture (Cutcliffe, Qualitative
Research course lecture, UNBC, 2004).
The second influential cultural difference in regards to
thematic analysis (Morse & Field, 1995} is the cultural

48

Guba & Lincoln (1995) "similarly argue that finds are not facts perse, but are
created via the interaction between the participant, the data, the researchers and
the evaluation. As such, they are dependent upon the value system of each
party and the context within which they operate (cited in Horsburgh, 2003).

35

Sandelowski (1993) "stated that two researchers faced with the same qualitative
task will produce different accounts due to their individual philosophies and
theoretical commitments (cited in Horsburgh 2003).

97
differences in how we listen to others. In my traditional culture,
we are taught "to listen with our hearts rather than our ears"
and to listen to the many layers. We are taught to listen to
people's emotions as well as their words. We are also to listen
to "what lies within the spaces between the words". We are to
listen intently so we can notice what meanings may be hidden
amongst and behind a person's words. The cultural translation
for this way of listening is to listen to the nature of the person
that is expressed in the space between their words. We also
hear the speakers' emotions and their unspoken expectations
and assumptions that may be hidden within the words that
they use.
For example, when we hear the words "Honey, are you
busy?", the speaker may actually mean "I want you to do
something for me". The space between the words is filled with
who the speaker is and backed u p with the emotions that the
speaker is feeling at the time. Thus, we learn that what people
say may not always be equal to who they are, what they mean,
and/or what is lying within their hearts. What people say may
also not match with what they are saying with their eyes.

98
In our traditional Indian way, many of u s have learnt how to
read and speak with our eyes. In the past, when the People of
the various Buffalo Nations' lived on the open prairies, their
voices would travel long distances in the wind, thus sign
language and speaking with their eyes was used. In Indian
Residential School, this skill was re-activated. We learnt to
speak to each other with our eyes when we were in the presence
of violent and/or dominating staff (Fournier & Crey, 1997).
Thus, some of u s can still have a traditional Indian conversation
by understanding what lies within each other's eyes by spiritsensing the silent messages that we feel in and with our spirits.
With a slight nod of one's head (Blackfoot) or the pointing with
one's lips (Cree), we confirm with each other the messages we
have sensed and understood from within.
The third significant difference may occur in the cultural
variation that exists in the way that we see and understand
(interpret/analyze) behaviors. What we value in life may
influence how we see and understand h u m a n behavior.

For

example, I once started a job in a remote sub-artic community
wearing an old worn out pair of hiking boots. A woman who
worked in a clerical position, who valued fashion, commented to

99
me that I should buy myself a pair of dress shoes. An RCMP
(Royal Canadian Mounted Police) officer commented that I
should be wearing a pair of women's shoes. Lastly, an Elder
came up to me to whisper in his quiet and gentle way. He
spoke with a sparkle in his eyes. He mentioned to me that I....
"must have walked a long ways to be here today". He had
noticed how worn out my boots were and was happy to see that
I, too, had walked a long ways to be in his community on that
day.
As a way of reducing the amount of misinterpretation of the
Warriors' truth speaking (reflexivity), I asked the Warriors to
keep, correct, add to, and/or delete all the statements, in their
transcripts. This process was done to insure that I have
listened and understood what they were trying to tell me. By
going back to the original speakers to learn from them what
they meant and what they wanted me to hear for their truths,
we the readers are receiving information directly from the
source rather than reading second hand, interpreted material
that has been processed in and by a different culture. The best
way to understand this concept of direct understanding would
be similar to when we go directly to the mountain to drink

100
spring water rather than going to the local grocery store to buy
spring water that has been distilled, bottled, and shipped.
Sakej (James) Youngblood Henderson (2000) h a s also explained
this same concept from his experience and his point of view,
[B]ecause of their superior civilization, classic
ethnographers assumed an illusion of objectivity, although
few of them actually mastered Aboriginal worldviews,
consciousness, or languages. Most re-created the
Aboriginal realm in their own likeness and confidently
taught it to Eurocentric society as the actual Aboriginal
truth.

Within the sacred circle: Ethics
Hold thy word of Honour sacred. Lying is at all times
shameful for the Great Spirit is everywhere all the time.
To swear falsely in the name of the Great Spirit is a sin
worthy of death" (Seton & Seton, 1963).
It is our traditional teaching that before we do anything, we
must first determine if it is the right (ethical) thing to do. Before

101
this research project was started, my first visit to the
community was to visit with the Elders. The original research
proposal was adjusted to meet the Elder's confidentiality
concerns in their small community. Like most small
communities, strangers are noticed, questions are asked, and
gossip begins. Thus, to protect and honour the privacy of the
participating Warriors, the original proposed sampling method
was changed. After all the changes were completed, the Elders
gave their oral blessings for this research project to take place
with their People, in their non-reserve community within their
traditional territory.
Prior to receiving the Elders' blessings, four sacred circles of
ethics were recognized and respected. Like a pebble tossed into
a pond, there are many circles that radiate outward from that
one pebble. As the primary investigator, I stood at the centre of
the circles like a pebble. As the primary investigator, I am also
an Elder. As an Elder, I live and work according to my Sacred
Pipe and my traditional Warrior Piercing Sun Dance Code of
Ethics 36 . By taking one step outward, I enter into the second
36

The Ways of our Sacred Pipe and the Warrior Piercing Sun Dance Code of
Ethics has not been put into written form. However, our traditional laws are
very black and white. They are not up for discussion or negotiations. They are

102
sacred circle which was my Blackfoot Code of Ethics (Bopp et el,
1984, p. 72-84). Another step outward brought me into the
third sacred circle which was the traditional ethics of the
participating Warriors that I was to respect in order to work
with them in completing this research project. As an outsider, I
needed to learn, honour, and respect the Elders' and the
Warriors' own unique cultural set of ethics. The last step
outward took me into the fourth sacred circle which was the
University of Northern British Columbia's Research Ethics
Board's Code of Ethics (UNBC, 1995).
As a commitment to myself, my children, my People, my
Elders, the participating community's Elders and Warriors, and
the Elders of UNBC, my research was not conducted in any
known dishonesty or unethical behaviors.

Prior to starting, I

give my word ....
If he gives you his word that he [the Indian] will do a
thing, you may safely stake your all on his fulfillment of his
promise" (Caitlin, cited in Seton & Seton, 1963).
figuratively written in stone. O n e of our basic laws is that we stand alone to
face our Sacred Father, the Creator Sun, our Sacred Mother, Earth, the Sacred
Tree of Life and our true selves. We are to live according to our Sacred
Father's and our Sacred Mother's laws and fulfill the purposes that they have
for us. We are also accountable for everything we have thought, spoken, done,
and failed to do (Bullchild, 1985).

103

Limitations to the study
In December 2005,1 received the Elders' blessing to conduct
this research project in a very small mixed culture community,
in a Nation's traditional territory, in northwest British
Columbia, Canada. All the available Warriors who wished to
participate in this research project were interviewed. However,
due to the small sample size of five Warriors, it is not known if I
have collected all the information that I needed in order to have
a full and complete understanding of what this Nations'
Warriors did on their own and what events occurred in their
lives that helped them win, in their battles against driven to
suicide. In White Nation research, this responsibility to gather
enough information to have a true, accurate, and complete
understanding is known as achieving data saturation point
(Morse & Field, 1995, p. 80).
If the community had more Warriors and I continued to
interview only to learn more of the same repeated themes then I
would have been assured that the findings were indeed a full,
rich, and complete description (Morse & Field, 1995, p. 80) of all
the commonly shared and unique one-of-a kind suicide

strategies. But, without more Warriors to interview, I am not
sure if I have reached a full and complete understanding or if I
need to listen to more truth speaking. Thus, it is not
recommended that these findings be used to generalize a n d / o r
apply to other Red Nation Warriors, who live inside or outside
this small community. Due to the small number of Warrior
truth speaking, it is also not recommended that the findings
from these Warriors' truth speakings be applied to other Red
Nation communities. However, the findings do represent the
true lived experiences of these participating Warriors.

De-limitations to the study
Due to this project using an Indianized research
methodology that I designed and implemented by drawing upon
my Blackfoot and Sioux Sun Dance cultures, it was
hypothesized that this methodology would not fit or work well
with research participants, who came from long house cultures.
However, in this research project, we discovered that driven to
suicide cuts so deep into People and their lives that as a
researcher coming from my Blackfoot and Sioux Sun Dance
cultures, it didn't matter. Driven to suicide is understood within

105
the heart and soul of many People, independent of what Nations
we come from.
Maybe... the de-limiting factor that driven to suicide wanted
to teach was for u s to discover that the human heart and soul
feels unbearable pain and anguish independent of what
cultures and languages we speak from? Maybe our soul felt
tears of our broken hearts, wounded souls, and shattered lives
speak the same language to all of u s who have lived through the
same unbearable anguish such as the death of one of our
children?.... Maybe.... as researchers, we were to learn that
unbearable suffering and human anguish of driven to suicide
h a s no colour or culture attached to it?.... Maybe healing the
depth, meaning, and overwhelming pain of driven to suicide will
actually bring u s together as Nations rather than pull u s apart?
We will not know if healing from driven to suicide and its
unbearable, un-resolvable, un-escapable, never ending pain will
bridge all our cultural barriers or if it will continue to tear us
apart as Nations? We will not know until ... .we have come
together to heal our broken hearts, souls, spirits, and lives. We
will not know until we have all fought together for our lives and
won against driven to suicide

106
CHAPTER FOUR
SIGNIFICANT FINDINGS
Reasons for dying....
According to our Holy Woman, who was driven to suicide
while attending a Christian Indian Residential School and
according to Shneidman's (1999) research findings, the way of
life prior to a suicide attempt is filled with unbearable pain and
suffering that is "accompanied by thoughts of suicide". In this
research project, the Warriors' lives were no exception. All of
them had suffered difficult lives before they were hit with
another one of a long line of one too many overwhelming
traumatic events. In unbearable anguish, they prepared to die
through suicide.
All the Warriors felt that they were driven to suicide because
the pain and fear of living was greater than the anticipated relief
that death would have brought to them; relief from unbearable,
un-resolvable, un-escapable, never ending pain. The traumatic
events that led to their unbearable pain and suffering came
from three distinct directions. One Warrior suffered unbearable
physical and mental anguish that originated from curses of bad
medicine otherwise know as witchcraft in his/her Nation.

107
They came one by one when I was in a vulnerable time.
When I was weakened and my support people were busy.
I knew I was dying.... Four old people came to me in the
physical world; they were not elders. They were old
people. They were from the dark side. One was from the
spirit realm. I had no sleep; maybe 8 hours in three
months. I was saving up pills. I was losing weight. I had
scrambled thoughts. I was mixed up in time. I was
questioning "why is this happening?" (Warrior)
Two Warriors suffered unbearable anguish when their children
were tragically killed or taken from them.
I was separated and I was really missing my son. I
couldn't live without him. I blacked out from drinking; then
took the sleeping pills (Warrior).

As for my suicide

four of my children were killed in a

house fire. I was angry at the Creator. I was full of anger
and rage. I pushed everyone away because I was afraid
to hurt somebody so I pushed them away....

J remember

my daughter was about 3 years old, she would sit on my

108
knee and sing so happy. I loved her very much and I was
so angry at God for taking her away (Warrior).
The remaining two Warriors suffered unbearable pain when the
impact of their addictions had destroyed their marriages; their
spouses and children had left them.
When I attempted to commit suicide, I was feeling alone, I
did not have control over my wife. Ifelt like she [wife]
didn't care any more. I went home and I started afire on
top of the cooking stove. I went into the bedroom to lie
down and wait to die (Warrior).

I got kicked out at Christmas. I can't remember what we
were arguing about... Probably about money because of
my active addictions (Warrior).

Preparing for death
Each Warrior remembered what h e / s h e did to prepare for
their pending deaths. One Warrior " wrote out [his/her] wilF.
Another Warrior "parked [his/her] truck on a hill pointed into the
lake" while he/she continued to drink. Another Warrior "took
pills" while drinking heavily. Another Warrior had decided....

109
my thoughts were that I was going to see my kids one last
time. I thought of jumping off the bridge into the [river] or
jump in front of a semi

I was walking around [town] with

a chocked feeling in my throat I was trying to hold my
tears. I didn't want people seeing that I was crying so I
walked around really messed up and confused (Warrior).

The moment that divided death from life...
In the winter of 2003-2004,1 consulted with our Holy
Woman in order to operationally define driven to suicide. She
shared one of her many life experiences. In a Christian Indian
Residential School, she was driven to suicide. She remembers
having been brutally raped the night before and left to bleed to
death in her bed. The matrons found her the next morning
barely alive. That moment of suspended time which divided our
Holy Woman's life from her death was also the moment that
converted the Warriors' pending deaths back into life. While
waiting for their deaths to come to them, all the Warriors
remembered making a conscious decision.
Once they made their decision not to die, they started
fighting for their lives. Some decisions were made using

110
thoughts and words. Others used life saving actions.

Each

made their own individual decision based on the fact that they
didn't want to die. They also decided on what they wanted to
change in themselves to improve their future lives. Their
conscious decisions included....
I had to decide if this is the life that I wanted to continue. I
made a decision (Warrior).

/ went into the bedroom to lie down and wait to die. While
I was lying in bed, I started thinking about what I was
doing. I also started thinking about what I needed to do to
change in my life (Warrior).

I had no awareness about what was going on.... What
brought me out of the state I was in was a dream that I
had. I was in this room with no doors or windows.

I

looked around the room and saw people who were moving
around under blankets. A loud voice came out of me, 'I am
not going to stay here - you people can stay here but I'm
leaving' and I left through the door (Warrior).

Ill

It all piled up on me. I reminisced of the past and the
future. I guess the Creator was talking to me at that time.
I started to think about my Grandchildren and think of the
hard times that are coming up. I didn't finish what I was
drinking. I got out of the truck. I sat by the lake. I listened
to God's Creation; the surrounding sounds. I started to cry
and pray. I thought about the Creator and where I was
going. I went to see the doctor (Warrior).

I realized that I couldn't do it any more. I was walking
around town with a chocked feeling in my throat I was
trying to hold my tears. I didn't want people seeing that I
was crying so I walked around really messed up and
confused. I couldn't kill myself. Ifelt helpless,

hopeless

(Warrior).

Reaching out for help
Within moments of consciously deciding that they did not
want to die, the Warriors started to fight for their lives. They
continued to think for themselves in regards to what they
needed in order to save themselves from their near suicide

112
deaths. The Warriors immediately made plans on how they
were going to save their lives by defining what steps they needed
to take. One of their first steps was to reach out for help. For
two of the Warriors, this was the first time in their lives that
they had asked for help:
I went to see the doctor. I told the doctor, I needed help.
He said 'okay, III find a treatment centre for you'. I had
never asked for help. I guess most of my life, I had been
alone. I prefer to be alone. I didn't know nothing about
treatment centres (Warrior).

J think while I was lying in the bedroom I was thinking ... I
was wanting somebody to come in and intervene but
nobody came. I didn't know how to ask for help (Warrior).
The remaining Warriors accessed traditional, community,
and/or medical services that they were aware of;
I knew that there was a psych ward at the hospital so I
went there. Ifelt that the only place I could go was the
psych ward. When I walked in I stood there waiting and
one of the nurses walked up to me and asked me if she

113
could help me. I told her that I wanted to talk to somebody
(Warrior).

I decided that, 'I need to get out of here' the drinking
environment at the village. I wanted to re-group myself
and face life again. I went to [a native treatment centre]"
(Warrior).

I spent my days and nights in prayer with a smudge and
my Eagle Fan. I stayed outside as much as I could
(Warrior).

I got up to get the fire out but it was too large. I went to the
neighbors to get help to put the fire out (Warrior).

The helpers and their give away
To serve others, to be of some use to family, community,
nation, or the world is one of the main purposes for which
human beings have been created. Do not fill yourself
with your own affaires and forget your most important

114
task. True happiness comes only to those who dedicate
their lives to the service of others (Bopp et al, 1984 p. 81)
After the unbearable pain that drove them to suicide.
And

after the moment of suspended time that divided their

pending deaths from life. And,.... after each Warrior
consciously decided that they did not want to die, they started
fighting for their lives by making life saving plans. Part of these
life saving plans was to ask for help from another h u m a n being.
These first contact helpers included a stranger, spouses, a
friend, neighbors, RCMP officers, doctors, and a psychiatric
ward nurse. These people clearly assisted in helping the
Warriors fight for their lives. As helpers, they shared their
interpersonal gifts such as; sharing their own suicide story;
helping to put the fire out; therapeutic listening; understanding;
taking the Warriors' suicide pain seriously; offering choices;
admission to the hospital; admission to drug and alcohol
treatment centres; conducting healing ceremonies; and
conducting purification ceremonies. Some helpers even
persevered while some of the Warriors lashed out in pain and
others waited while the Warriors released their pain through
soul felt tears. The Warriors shared....

115
When the cops were driving me to town, I thought they
were going to take me out to the back road and beat me
up. When they stopped at an intersection in the road, they
gave me a choice. They asked me if I wanted to go to the
hospital or to jail. My thoughts about the hospital was that
it was a place where old people go to die. I thought about
jail and the drunk tank and I didn't want to go there either.
So, I picked the hospital (Warrior).

I went to see a Native therapist

Another [non-native]

therapist came to my home, we smudged before each
session. He respected my needs. He listened,

understood,

took it serious and he realized that I was fighting for my
life (Warrior).

I went to see the doctor. I didn't know nothing about
treatment centres (Warrior).

I went to a treatment centre... another thing that helped me
out was good mentors. Having good support is important
(Warrior).

116

Ifelt that the only place I could go was the psych ward.
When I walked in I stood there waiting and one of the
nurses walked up to me and asked me if she could help
me. I told her that I wanted to talk to somebody.

The

nurse left to talk to another nurse and then she came back
and asked me if I would like to have a seat. I looked at
her, sat and cried for about 10 minutes. She was pretty
good; she waited. She asked me 'what is going on?' I told
her everything. She let me sit there again. The nurse went
to talk to the doctor. The nurse came back and asked me if
I thought about suicide and asked if I wanted to stay; I
stayed. It was probably the best thing that ever happened
to me.... The nurse was on the 4 to midnight shift

She

always made time to talk to me. First night I was pissed
off and I swore at her. The second night, I balled my eyes
out. The third night, we had a good visit She started
talking about plans and things I can do for my plan for
self-care (Warrior).

I went to NA meetings. I got myself a sponsor (Warrior).

117
Shocked into awareness: The startling reality of suicide
Each Warrior personally experienced an unexpected
occurrence that shocked them into sudden increased self
awareness. With an unexpected jolt of awareness, each Warrior
was able to realize how life threatening their suicidal behavior
had become. This "wake up call' varied from one Warrior to
another....
I ran into afriendfrom

my 12 step group. He looked into

my eyes and told me to get help - his words shocked me
into awareness (Warrior).

I hit bottom. There is nothing worse than having nothing
(Warrior).

I realized that I couldn't do it (commit suicide) anymore
(Warrior).

One of my bigger impacts was when my daughter

asked

me 'what am I doing wrong?' I was walking up to slap her
and she asked me what she was doing wrong because I

118
was going to slap her and I didn't know. She was 7 or 8
years old at that time (Warrior).

My wife's Grandfather came to visit once and started
talking to me in a kind voice. I had never had anyone talk
to me in a kind voice like that (Warrior).

I was not really aware that my wife and my kids were
downstairs in the house. She had passed out and I didn't
even know that when I lit the fire. I didn't know.... I could
have killed her and my kids as well as myself (Warrior).

I went back to the RCMP and talked to the officer who
busted me and told him that if he had not busted me I
wouldn't be clean and sober today. He was being modest
saying that he was just doing his job but I said no; if it
wasn't for you busting me, I wouldn't be clean and sober
today (Warrior).

A lady was put in my path. She told me her story about
what happened to her when she was given pills and stuck

119
in a psych hospital. She told me her story and she didn't
even know what I was going through. She didn't know
that she saved my life (Warrior).

Reasons for living
Once the Warriors started fighting for their lives, they
defined, for themselves, their reason(s) for living and what they
wanted to change in themselves that would improve their
quality of life. Prior to attending residential drug and alcohol
treatment programs, the Warriors defined their reasons for
living. One of the Warriors decided "to face the darkness

inside

[him/her] and the world". Another Warrior found that his/her
traditional teaching of "survival!' gave him/her strength and a
sense of direction to go on in his/her recovery.
I would think of survival when I didn't want to continue
(Warrior).
This Warrior's desire was ....
I seen my sober friends who had sobered up. I envied
them. All my friends were married, working. They had
children, they owned cars. I wanted to be like that. I
wanted to emulate those people. They looked happy.

They

120
looked all together.
Another Warrior wanted to continue to live so h e / s h e could be
there for his/her children and grandchildren; "I didn't want my
children and grandchildren suffering like I did when I was
young". Another Warrior who grew u p in a broken home plagued
with alcohol fueled family violence and neglect wanted to
continue to live because, [I] always wanted to give my children a
better life than I had as a child. For the last Warrior, it appears
that his/her reason for living was within him/her underneath
all the unbearable pain. Once h e / s h e was able to release
his/her pain, h e / s h e was freed u p to re-claim himself/herself
and his/her life from his/her addictions.
Ijust wanted someone to listen to me and what was going
on with me (Warrior).

The healing journey and growth
Once each of the Warriors defined their reason (s) for living as
well as what they wanted to change in themselves, the Warriors
took a pro-active approach to improving themselves and the
quality of their lives. One of the Warriors had already had
seven years of sobriety in before h e / s h e was cursed with bad

121
medicine which resulted in him/her having to fight for his/her
life. At first he/she worked on his/her own to save himself/
herself from his/her cursed suicidal urges.
I couldn'tfeel the sun on my face anymore. I tried to feel
life and spirit but I couldn't

I went to the water and I

would stay in the water as long as I could even though it
was cold. I spent my days and nights in prayer with a
smudge and my Eagle Fan. I stayed outside as much as I
could (Warrior).
However, when his/her own traditional self-healing methods
were not powerful enough to break the curse, h e / s h e started to
search for and access traditional healers and ceremonies to help
in his/her recovery.
I went to see a Native therapist; she knew the spiritual
aspect of what was happening to me; my visions and the
strange occurrences. She helped me see the whole picture.
Another [non-native] therapist came to my home. We
smudged before each session. He respected my needs.
He listened, understood, took it serious, and he realized
that I was fighting for my life. I went to the sweat lodge
and prayed with the pipe. I spoke to a spiritual Elder,

122
offered tobacco and shared with her. I traveled to see a
medicine man after a tobacco offering. He helped me do a
'Letting Go'. I trusted my intuition and relied on my vision
which led me to the people who could help me (Warrior).
For another of the Warriors his/her healing was a blend of
White Nation treatment centre learning as well as returning
back to his/her Nation's traditional teachings that his/her
mother and father had taught him/her, as a child.
When I got on a healing journey, I got stronger. That was
in November - December 1992. I went to a six week
treatment program. At the treatment centre is where I
picked up my tools. I am a traditional believer. I was
brought up to believe in the Higher Power. I was taught to
respect both human beings, wildlife, and mother nature.
My mother and my father taught me to pray in our own
culture. In our culture, in our prayers we say 'All Mighty
Father of the Universe'. I was brought up in the church
and I was hurt [by it] once in a while. It was like 'if you
don't kneel in front of me, you will go to hell' (Warrior).
For the remaining three Warriors, they attended six week
residential drug and alcohol (D & A) treatment programs at Red

123
Nation residential treatment centres. At these centres, they
were able to reconnect with their traditional cultures. The
Warriors also had an opportunity to talk about and release
much of their unbearable pain that had driven them to their
drinking and drug use. Only one of the four Warriors, who
attend a 6 week D & A treatment program, had one opportunity
to talk about his/her most recent suicide attempt. However, it
not clear whether this Warrior was able to fully "make peace" 37
with his/her two previous suicide attempts and/or healed the
reasons that drove him/her to those suicides. This Warrior
shared....
For the first two years of recovery, I started seeing a D&A
counselor. I went to N.A. meetings. I got myself a sponsor.
At six months, I went to [a Red Nation treatment centre]
and spent six weeks [there]. I really talked about things. I
dealt with my brother and my resentments....

my wife. I

found it really tough to talk about my suicide. I never want
to go back to that place [suicide] again.

' Many years ago a Stoney Nation Elder taught me that as Indians we do not
forgive each other. Only the Creator has the right to forgive us of our wrong
doings. As Indians, we "make peace" with each other and leave the blessing of
forgiveness to the Creator.

124
On the last week of treatment was for spouses.

I told my

wife about it. I was surprised when she walked in
carrying her suitcases.

The counselor got us to face each

other. We faced each other and we were to listen without
interrupting each other. She learnt about all the things that
she was doing and saying to me. Her burden was heavier
by the end of it (Warrior).
At the treatment centres, the Warriors lived in Red Nation
cultural environments that were supportive of them through
listening, sharing, and understanding. The Warriors had
opportunities to talk in order to release some of their
unbearable pain that drove them to their drug and alcohol use.
While in treatment, the Warriors also learnt new healing,
problem solving, recovery, and relationship skills;
At the treatment centre is where I picked up my tools
(Warrior).
While at the treatment centres, the Warriors also began to
attend A.A. and N.A. peer support meetings.
Once the Warriors returned to their home communities, they
continued to pursue ongoing healing, learning, and support
from their A.A. and N.A. meetings, their sponsors, and "D & A"

125
counselors 3 8 (Warrior). Upon returning home, another
unexpected event also occurred; their spouses and children
returned to live and be with them once more.
Before I went to [the treatment centre] the wife tried to set
me up with a counselor. The counselor was afriend of
ours. I was angry and I was harsh to her [the counselor].
The wife also took me to a couple's counselor. I thought I
didn't need help. When she left me, I didn't go after her. It
didn't matter to me if I was left alone

On the last

week of treatment was for spouses.

I told my wife about it.

I was surprised when she walked in carrying her suitcases
(Warrior).

While in the first week of treatment, I thought about my
common law wife and I was going to move out. My plan
was that I would build a safe foundation first for one year
before I would go back to claim my kids so they didn't
have to live in an alcohol home. While I was in treatment,
after the first week, my wife quit drinking too (Warrior).

Drug and alcohol counselor

126
I quit the drugs. And I got back with rny family.

My wife

took me back (Warrior).
For many of the Warriors, their spouses, children, and extended
family members continued to provide on-going encouragement
and support in the following years.
After [a Red Nation treatment centre] I was scared to leave
the house because I didn't trust myself. My wife would
kick me out to go to A.A. support meetings; she would tell
me that I needed a meeting (Warrior).

The biggest help today is my wife, family, and
grandchildren (Warrior).

My Mom was a big support in my early sobriety. She and
two of my sisters were at [Red Nation treatment centre]
before me and I didn't even know. My Brother-in-law got
me back out in the bush walking around and camping. I
never thought I had any support when I was trying to kill
myself but I did (Warrior).

127
I went to N.A. Mondays, Wednesdays,

and Saturdays.

For

two years, when I missed a meeting my wife would notice
that I was more agitated and she would remind me to go to
a meeting (Warrior).
While continuing with their ongoing healing and addiction
recovery peer support programs, the Warriors next step in rebuilding their lives was to attend career focused education.
I went back to school for upgrading. I then went to (postsecondary educational institution) and took all the courses
one week a month for four years. I got to learn the road
between here and Edmonton and back really good
(Warrior).

I decided to go back to school to do upgrading to get my
ABE. The teacher started doing my test for me because of
time. It felt like when I was a kid, when I was pushed
through the school system and I didn't want that to be
repeated. When I went back to talk to the teacher about
how Ifelt about the test, I ended up in a life skills program.
I kept it one day at a time and keep it simple. After the life
skills program in the village, I applied for and paid for a life

128
skills coach training course. I had a choice of Edmonton or
White Rock. I talked with my wife and she encouraged me
to go. I had to complete 480 hours to get my certificate - all
free too (Warrior).

When I came hack from [a Red Nation treatment centre] I
went to college in [the city] for two years. I took business
admin courses. I wanted to sharpen my skUls in
bookkeeping (Warrior).

A [clinical staff] position came up and I took it and I went to
[required] training (Warrior).
At the completion of their career oriented education, the
Warriors obtained positions working in the helping field of their
choice, within their own Nations and communities.
Today, all the Warriors have been successful at putting their
traumatic experiences, addictions, unbearable pain, and
suicides to good use in their chosen careers. In their careers,
they share from their hearts and souls their pain-filled journey
in and of life. Lives that consisted of.... the unbearable, unresolvable, un-escapable traumatic events that led them to their

129
unbearable and never ending pain which in turn led them to an
increase in their addictions which in turn led them to very poor
quality of life which in turn led them to wanting to die and their
suicide attempts. While waiting to die the Warriors decided that
they didn't want to die. That is when they started fighting for
their lives.... which in turn was their turning points in their
lives which in turn led them to their healing journeys which in
turn led them to their new reasons for living which in turn led
them to their drug and alcohol treatment programs which in
turn taught them new life skills and re-connected them with
their traditional cultures which in turn led them to new career
education which in turn led them to achieving a new and better
quality and way of life.
With the use of external helping services and their personal
dedication to and invested strength in healing, recovery, and
growth, all the Warriors have survived their suicide attempts.
Today, they are active members in their families, communities,
and Nations. In their chosen careers, they share their wisdom,
experiences, and solutions while helping others to recover from
their own life's unbearably painful traumatic events such as:
deaths; loss of marriages and children; family violence and

neglect; childhood abuse; emotional, life skill, and cultural
poverty; addictions; lateral violence; bad medicine; lost a n d / o r
damaged cultural and personal identities; Indian Residential
School trauma; and.... suicide attempts.

Summary
For all the Warriors, their death trails began with an
unbearable, un-resolvable, un-escapable traumatic event. The
traumatic event was the result of; bad medicine curses, tragic
deaths a n d / o r loss of children, or the loss of marriage and
children due to the impact of their addictions. The traumatic
event led to the accumulation and acceleration of unbearable
pain and suffering for each of the Warriors. With the exception
of one Warrior who was cursed with bad medicine, all the
remaining Warrior's turned to alcohol a n d / or drugs to selfmedicate their unbearable pain and suffering. With the
increased use of alcohol a n d / o r drugs to n u m b their internal
pain, the overall conditions of their lives worsened. Prior to
their suicide attempts, they had all lost or were about to lose
their spouses and children. For all the Warriors, whether j u s t
prior to, during their suicide attempt, or after their suicide

attempt, they were shocked into sudden increased self
awareness. Momentarily, they were able to understand the
startling intensity and reality of their suicidal behaviors and
attempts. Also, during their attempts, there was a moment in
time that divided their pending death from life.
It was while they were preparing to die or waiting to die that
the Warriors made a conscious decision; they did not want to
die. When some of the Warriors broke, they were able to
released some of their unbearable pain through their deep soul
felt tears; the cry of unbearable anguish. Some of the Warriors
returned to their traditional praying prior to defining thenreasons for living and what they wanted to change in
themselves in order to improve the quality of their lives.
Moments later, the Warriors developed their own individual life
saving plans that included reaching out for help from another
human being.
Help came in three forms. The informal form of help was:
strangers, friends, community members, spouses, children, and
extended family members. Formal help came in the form of:
Elders, traditional healers, healing and purification ceremonies,
hospitalization, medication, treatment centres, peer support

groups, associated sponsors, and addiction counselors. The
last form of help came in the form known to the Warriors, as the
Creator.
Three out of the five Warriors believe that the Creator came
to them either through: a powerful dream, directly by talking to
them, through a serendipitous or coincidental sacred spiritual
event, or a sacred life saving event that does not appear to have
any logical, medical, or scientific reason to explain it. For one
Warrior, h e / s h e believes that the Creator saved his/her life
when the Creator gave him/her a powerful sacred dream.
He/she also believed that h e / s h e was saved when the Creator
sent a stranger who unexpectedly shared her suicidal story with
the Warrior; "I can see how the Creator saved my life when I
could have died. All I had left wasjwst my spirit". For another
Warrior, h e / s h e believes that the Creator came to him/her
when h e / s h e was committing suicide to help h i m / h e r compare
his/her past to the future; "I reminisced of the past and the
future. I guess the Creator was talking to me at that time." For
another Warrior, he/she believes that the Creator saved
him/her from a drug overdose; "I didn't die. I believe that God
the Creator wasn't finished with me. Ifound where I am

133
supposed to be; working at [a non-reserve community

based

agency]".
For the Warriors, recovering from their addictions, and their
last suicide attempts did not occur overnight. From the time
that they decided that they did not want to die to obtaining
employment, it took two and a half to five years. During this
period of healing, re-defining, and re-building their selves and
their lives, all the Warriors had successfully achieved and
maintained sobriety. While attending six week residential
addiction recovery programs they learnt new tools (Warrior)
such as life skills, relationship skills, grieving skills, healing
skills, and problem solving skills. At the completion of the D&
A treatment program, they were reunited with their spouses and
children. Back in their communities, the Warriors did ongoing
attendance in peer support A.A and N.A. programs and
professional counseling. All the Warriors either returned to
a n d / o r continued the use of their traditional cultures. Lastly,
they attended career focused education and achieved
employment. Years after their suicide attempts, none of the
Warriors reported having suffered with or re-experienced any
further suicide attempts.

134
CHAPTER FIVE
CONCLUSION
Fighting for our lives: Introduction
Every man and woman, who is in sickness or adversity,
or helpless old age, has a right to the protection and
support of the Tribe - because in the days of their
strength they also contributed to the common weal (Seton
& Seton, 1963, p. 31).
The purpose of this research project was to look for a
practical cure for driven to suicide in our Red Nations. What
was one of the most amazing findings was that for all the
Warriors who were referred to healing services, they were
referred to drug and alcohol treatment programs for their
suicides rather than being referred to any suicide treatment
programs. We learnt from these Warriors that drugs and
alcohol were not the reasons that drove them to suicide. Drugs
and alcohol were only used to n u m b their unbearable pain.
Numbing the unbearable pain did not cure the pain. Drugs and
alcohol only made the quality of themselves and their lives
worse.

135
From the Warriors, we discovered that on their own they
defined what they needed to change in themselves or their lives
in order to have the quality of life that they wanted. By learning
new personal and inter-personal skills when they had stopped
using drugs and alcohol, the Warriors were able to build better
lives for themselves. However, we are not sure if the Warriors
actually fully addressed the core traumas that drove them to
their suicide attempts or if the core traumas were only covered
up by layers of addiction treatment. Future research will be
needed to investigate if addiction treatment actually heals the
core traumas that drove the Warriors to their suicides or if they
only got busy living better lives.
I hypothesize that in order to truly cure driven to suicide we
need to give our People suicide healing treatment services that
will directly address their individualized, specific core traumas
that drove them to their suicides rather than deflect their focus
on to the accompanying self-medicating addictions. In order to
truly eliminate driven to suicide from our families, communities,
and Nations, we need to stop and heal who a n d / o r what
continues to drive our People to suicide... what ever that may be
for each individual sufferer....

136
Key findings
When I hear that someone is suffering from the unbearable
pain of suicide, I assumed that they would go to a mental health
office and get help. What surprised me was that in this small,
rural community there was no mainstream suicide prevention,
intervention, and postvention system, suicide healing lodge,
a n d / o r mental health agency for the Warriors to access in a
time of need or crisis. Instead, each Warrior experienced a
series of serendipitous and sacred spiritual events while they
worked as their own clinical case managers.
This collection of unconnected events played a disconnected
but important role in helping the Warriors fight for their lives.
Events such as.... The RCMP coming to a fork in the road and
asking the Warrior if he wanted to go to the hospital or to jail;
the Warrior made a good choice. For another, bumping into a
friend at an AA meeting and bumping into a stranger who
shared her own personal suicide story saved another Warrior.
For another one of the Warriors, h e / s h e had gone to the city to
say goodbye to his/her children before killing himself/herself.
He/she happened to remember that there was a psychiatric
ward at the nearby hospital so h e / s h e walked himself/herself

137
there and got help. All five of the Warriors experienced life
saving serendipitous events. For 3 out of 5 of the Warriors, they
blame God for saving their lives through sacred serendipitous
and/or sacred spiritual events.
Through the Warriors' truth speaking, we have learnt that it
was the Warriors who saved their own lives. J u s t prior to, or
while waiting to die, all the Warriors were able to physically and
psychologically pull themselves out of their pending deaths.
Somewhere deep inside, they were still able to value themselves
and/or their children in order to p u t a stop to their own suicidal
deaths. After they were able to pull themselves out, they were
also the ones who did their own clinical case management by
reaching out for the help that they needed in order to meet and
fulfill some of their clinical needs.
The most powerful help that the Warriors found was a
series of people who cared enough to take their time to
therapeutically listen to what the Warriors were going through
and/or lend their helping hand by giving the Warriors the
specific help that they needed at each specific step in their
healing journey. One of the Warriors even found a helper who
hung on hard enough to weather his/her lashing out. For

another one of the Warriors, h e / s h e found a non-native
therapist who even did house calls and started each session in
pray and smudging.

Significance of the findings
When we send our suicidal People off to drug and alcohol
treatment and they came back sober, we assume that we have
cured their suicide. However, we may be experiencing a false
sense of security. It may only be an illusion of a cure. In
reality, all we may have done is diverted their focus off of who
and/ or what was driving them to their suicides and on to their
addictions. We may only be diverting their attention off of their
suicides and on to their addictions because we have addiction
treatment programs while we do not have any suicide healing
programs. We may have only flipped their attention off of their
suicides rather than heal the core traumas that drove them to
their suicides. We may have only covered u p or buried their
suicidal core under layers of addiction treatment and not really
cured their suicide and/or their reasons for dying at all?
Our Holy Woman explained that when her skipping rope,
which she was going to use to hang herself, was chopped u p

into useless bits and pieces her overwhelming pain was made
worse and.... she still wanted to die. She still wanted to die
because.... she was still being raped on a near daily basis. In
spite of her hanging rope being chopped into useless bits and
pieces, she was still being raped. Even without her skipping
rope, she still wanted to die because she still had rapists in her
life that still driving her to suicide. From our Holy Woman's
experience, we have learnt that taking away the means of
suicide does not cure the cause that was driving her to
suicide... it only takes away the means.
Four out of 5 of the Warriors were sent to drug and alcohol
treatment programs for their suicides. One out of four was able
to talk about his/her second of two suicide attempts once in D
& A treatment. However, we do not know to what extent h e / s h e
was able to work through the core cause and precipitating
factors of his/her first suicide attempt and/or the core cause
and precipitating factors of his/her second suicide attempt or
his/her sense of worthlessness, powerlessness, and emptiness
or his/her reasons for living. What we do know is that drugs
and alcohol were not these Warriors original core traumatic
reasons for wanting to die. The Warriors only used drugs

140
and/or alcohol to numb the unbearable pain of their traumatic
reasons for dying and.... We also know that overtime, their pain
numbing drugs and alcohol caused more problems and actually
drove them closer to death... Drug and alcohol treatment
helped the Warriors to achieve sobriety but did it truly cure the
individualized core traumatic experiences that drove them to
their suicides?....
When looking for a true cure for driven to suicide, we also
have to be cautious in realizing that shocking people into
awareness does not heal the traumatic core reason either. We
have learnt that when the Warriors were shocked into increased
awareness of his/her pending suicide, there was only a 20 %
chance that this shock was helpful. It appears that shocking a
suicidal person into increased awareness does not stop the
continued inflow of overwhelming pain, or decrease their
reasons for dying, or create or empower their reasons for living,
or increase their sense of worth so they can exercise their basic
Human Rights and Freedoms to live their lives to the fullest, in
their own individual and cultural ways, for themselves.

141
The exceptions
There were two unique exceptions that stood out from all of
the Warriors' truth speakings. The first unique exception was
that one of the five Warriors received specific short term,
stabilizing, suicide intervention treatment when h e / s h e walked
into and was admitted to a regional psychiatric ward of a
hospital for approximately a one week stay. Two Warriors were
admitted to local hospitals. However, only one received
psychiatric services that specifically addressed his/her
suicide 39 . What is unique is that this Warrior's suicide, rather
than his/her drug and alcohol addictions, was recognized as
the focus of short term immediate treatment. What was also
unique for this same Warrior was that when h e / s h e did attend
a six week addiction treatment program, h e / s h e had one more
opportunity to talk about his/her past suicide attempts. This
Warrior remembered how hard it was for him/her to talk about
his/her suicide, in the addiction treatment program. However,

The other Warrior used the safety of the hospital walls to self-isolate in order to
get away from all his/her family members and external demands. By selfisolating, in the hospital, h e / s h e was able to have time to reflect on what
h e / s h e wanted and needed to do to improve the quality of life for his/her
children and himself/herself.

142
this Warrior did not elaborate on how deep his/her two suicide
attempts were addressed.
The second unique exception occurred when one of the five
Warriors sought out and solely used his/her traditional Elders
and healing methods to address his/her pending cursed
suicide. This Warrior had already had seven years of sobriety
that included attending three treatment centres; a six week
drug and alcohol treatment program, a six week trauma
treatment program, and a two week gender specific trauma
program. This Warrior's suicide was also seen as an exception
because the triggering overwhelming traumatic experience was
the result of being cursed by evil people using their bad
medicine which nearly drove him/ her to committing suicide.

Implications for practice: First Nations suicide
interventions
When my heart is broken, don't try to fix the thoughts in
my head...
(Holy Woman, Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor, spring 2006: interviewed in her
home.)

When we have someone who is suffering from unbearable,
un-escapable, un-resolvable, never ending pain that is driving
them to suicide, we have to realize that they can not stop that
unbearable pain on their own. If they were able to resolve the
un-resolvable, on their own, they would have done it a long time
ago to avoid years of unbearable pain. As human beings, we
are not built to be able to resolve unbearable and impossible
traumas alone such as the death of four of our children in a
house fire. As h u m a n beings, many of life's tragedies are
impossible to work through alone. Thus, we need to be there
for one another when all alone.... our best will never be good
enough.
As helping professionals and as community and family
members, we need to start being there for our people who can't
do the impossible all by themselves. As helping professionals
and as community and family members, we need to start hitting
the bull's eye by focusing on what practical help our People
need in order to address their specific, individualized,
immediate suicide intervention needs. Once the Warriors are
safe and stable, we then need to help them find and heal their
source of the unbearable traumatic pain that was driving them

144
to suicide. We need to help them address and resolve who
and/or what was driving them to suicide rather than diverting
our attention and their attention on to fixing their pain
numbing addictions.
As professionals, and as community and family members,
we need to stop being so afraid of driven to suicide. Being afraid
of driven to suicide does not make it go away or heal it. We need
to stop avoiding driven to suicide because avoiding doesn't make
it go away or heal it. We need to stop sweeping it under the
carpet so we don't have to look at it because sweeping it under
the carpet doesn't make it go away or heal it. We need to stop
looking the other way so we don't have to get involved because
looking the other way doesn't make it go away or heal it. We
need to stop passing the buck on to someone else because
passing the buck doesn't make it go away or heal it. We need to
stop covering our buttes to protect ourselves from liability
because we need our hands in order to extend a helping hand
that will help out in healing it and resolving it once and for all.
We even need to stop separating ourselves in to groups of us,
who are doing okay, and them, who are suffering, because

145
separation doesn't stop or heal driven to suicide, in our
communities.
Stopping them by taking away their pain numbing methods
of drugs and/or alcohol does not cure their traumatic suicidal
reasons. Sending them to drug and alcohol treatment programs
only diverts our focus and their focus away from their suicides
and on to their sobriety. Taking away their pills, ropes, or guns
will also not cure the unbearable pain of the core traumatic
experience(s) that drove them to their suicides. Taking away
their means of killing themselves only means that they will not
be able to use that specific bunch of pills or that specific piece
of rope to kill themselves. Shocking our People into increased
awareness also does not cure their unbearable traumatic
reasons that are driving them to suicide. In order to cure driven
to suicide, we need to hit the bulls' eye by helping our suicidal
people heal from their own personal traumatic sources of
unbearable pain that is driving them to their suicides.
From the Warriors' truth speaking, we have learnt that there
was no formal, organized suicide intervention, healing system,
or suicide treatment centre for the Warriors to use. What
helped the Warriors fight for their lives was their own personal

collection of random serendipitous a n d / or sacred spiritual
events that included a variety of informal suicide interventions.
The first type of intervention that saved three out of five
Warriors was what I have described as by the Grace of God.
There is no scientific, medical, or logical reason to explain why
one of the Warriors is still alive today. He/she had taken a
lethal dose of sleeping pills and alcohol. Today, this Warrior
firmly believes that the Creator had intentionally saved his/her
life in order for him/her to fulfill a sacred purpose that the
Creator had for him/her. For the other two remaining
Warriors, they also credit the Creator for saving their lives
through the use of sacred spiritual experiences.
The second type of effective suicide intervention was the use
of traditional Elders, Medicine People, Healers, and ceremonies.
These traditional healers and ceremonies directly helped one of
the suicidal Warriors by successfully breaking and healing a
near perceived suicidal death caused by a bad medicine curse 40
For three other Warriors, they were able to gain inner strength
by returning to and using their traditional cultural ways.
40

If this Warrior had died his/her death would have been seen as a suicide
whereas in reality, according to our Indian laws, it would have been a murder
done by evil people using a bad medicine curse.

Alone, the Warriors were unable to stop, resolve, or escape
the sources of their unbearable pain. They could not do their
impossible alone; they needed help. Thus, one of the most
powerful and helpful suicide intervention resources was helpful,
sincere, and courageous people; people who lent a helping
hand. Some of these people temporarily did a sincere 41 coming
together42 with the Warriors to help the Warriors, in their time
of desperate need. Together, as a temporary working team, the
helper provided needed supportive back-up to the Warrior who
was now able to define what h e / s h e wanted and needed in
order to fight for his/her life. Together, the helper directly face
the Warriors' pending suicide by giving him/her the needed
help that immediately addressed the Warrior's unfulfilled
suicide intervention need(s). These sincere, helpful, and
courageous people included non-professionals and
professionals such as: neighbors, family members, friends,
RCMP officers, a nurse, doctors, strangers, and Elders.

41

Over the decades, I have watched mechanically correct professionals offer the
right procedures but when a different person does the same mechanics with a
genuine and sincere heart, their help is far more powerful and healing to the
suicidal victim.

42

The closest cross cultural translation that I can use to explain this Indian coming
together phenomena would be the same spiritual experience when I spirit
connect with a young untrained horse so it will/oz/z up with me.

These sincere, helpful, and courageous people took the
suicides seriously and directly decreased the unbearable pain
by giving the Warriors what they needed right then and there to
meet the Warriors' immediate suicide intervention needs. These
helpers were able to be there for the Warriors. By providing
immediate assistance to the Warriors, the helpers were able to
decrease some to their unbearable pain by: physically making
them safe, weathering the Warriors' lashing out, listening to
their tearful release of unbearable anguish, and/or physically
doing what needed to be done.
The helpers most powerful and helpful healing skill was
their ability to give to the Warriors what h e / s h e needed the
most at each specific step in their healing journey. This
informal give away 43 gave the Warriors what they needed when
they needed it and how they needed it. This helpful assistance
ranged from: being able to listen with a caring and courageous
heart to the Warriors' soul-felt tears to lending a helping hand
to putting out a fire to driving them to the hospital where they
would be kept safe from outside demands to emotionally being
43

After our warrior piercing Sun Dance, we do a give away to share our material
wealth with others who are less fortunate. I understand in the long house
culture, Chiefs also do give aways to share their material wealth with others.

149
there for them to speaking to them in a kind way to teaching
them their traditional ways to supporting them in their sobriety
to....
Lastly, some of the most powerful self-help healing skills for
driven to suicide victims included their ability to fight for their
own lives once they had decided that they didn't want to die any
further. The Warriors started to decrease their unbearable pain
when they were able to ask for help. Once they got their
immediate suicide intervention safety needs fulfilled, the
Warriors were then freed up to figure out what they needed
from themselves and from others in order to win their battles
against driven to suicide44. Another critical skill for the Warriors
was their increased ability to do truth speaking.
Since their traumatic event, the Warriors had stuffed their
unbearable emotional pain inside their hearts and souls and
then.... they built a tough outer shell so that nobody would be
able to break in. They had built their tough outer shells to
44

W h e n we are in unbearable pain and wanting to die, we will hang o n to our
spirits (lives) until we have a chance to figure out if killing ourselves is the right
thing to do. We are so focused on trying to stay alive in spite of wanting to kill
ourselves that we can't focus on anything else but physically staying alive. We
immediately need gende, emotional, physical, structural, safety so we can be
relieved from our responsibility of keeping ourselves safe. O n c e we are freed
u p from keeping ourselves safe, we are then able to figure out w h o and what
we need to do in order to heal ourselves from w h o a n d / o r what is driving us to
suicide.

150
protect their broken hearts and wounded souls. Now, tough on
the outside while suffering unbearable pain on the inside, they
had suffered in silence for many years. Through spirit,
psychological, and/or emotional break down, the Warriors were
finally able to start truth speaking. Through truth speaking,
the Warriors were able to release some of their unbearable pain
that was stored in their hearts and souls; the unbearable pain
of their impossible traumas that had driven them to their near
deaths.
As victims of driven to suicide, we need to learn how to
reach out and talk to someone who cares. As family and
community members, we need to be there to help our loved ones
decrease the unbearable pain of their impossible traumas....

Implications for further research
When I was in the middle of conducting this research
project, I realized that I had jumped ahead of existing published
Red Nations' suicide research. In a traditional academic
approach, I should have first researched the various types of
suicide that already exist in our Red Nations communities.
Once I had formally documented the various types of suicides,

151
and formally discovered and documented the phenomena of
driven to suicide, then I would have been able to link this
research project to an already existing journal article.
Due to jumping ahead, this research project stands alone
unconnected to existing scientific journal articles regarding
driven to suicide.

However, it does stand on a foundation of

truth speaking and reality. Over the years, whenever I used the
concept driven to suicide, Red Nation listeners knew exactly
what I was talking about. Many of u s have been driven to
suicide independent of whether driven to suicide has been
formally documented in a scholarly journal or not. Thus, I
have researched driven to suicide because driven to suicide was
destroying me and my People and.... I was hoping to find a cure.
From this research project, I was surprised by its key
findings. I never knew that suicidal people were being sent to
addiction treatment programs rather than to suicide treatment
programs. I was also amazed by the fact that when the
Warriors were shocked into increased awareness that it didn't
stop 80 % of them from continuing on in their pending suicides.
Due to these findings, further research is needed to discover if
the Warriors did receive a true cure for their suicides in their

152
addiction recovery programs or if there are still unaddressed
suicidal traumas lying dormant and unhealed under layers of
treatment and sobriety. Did the Warriors actually receive
treatment that truly healed the core causes which drove them to
suicide or did treatment just cover u p their suicides with layers
of avoidance by deflecting their attention from their suicides
and on to sobriety? What specifically do addiction treatment
centers do to help our People heal from the unbearable pain of
their first, second, third,... driven to suicide attempts?

How

does the healing of our traditional Elders differ compared to the
work of addiction treatment centres? It was noted that some of
the Warriors decided to go on living so they could give their
children a better life than what they had as children. But, can
these Warriors go on living for themselves; do they feel that they
are now worth living for? Lastly, research is needed to find out
if there are suicide healing services available to our People who
are suicidal but do not have the needed addiction that would
qualify them to attend drug and alcohol treatment centre.

153
Summary
Sometimes... life is made too hard for us to carry alone. That is
why we need to "be there"for each other....
(Holy Woman, Hereditary War Chief, Traditional Head
Chief, Traditional Healer, Indian Residential School rape
victim, suicide survivor, fall 2007: interviewed in her
home.)
From the Warriors truth speaking, I learnt many teachings
that really surprised me. The first surprise was that the
Warriors had to save their own lives from their own suicidal
deaths; they were all alone when they were waiting to fully die.
The second surprise was that the suicidal Warriors were not
sent off to any suicide treatment programs. Instead, they were
sent to drug and alcohol addiction programs for their suicides.
The third surprise was that when all of the Warriors were
shocked into increased awareness about their pending suicides,
only one of the five was able to get immediate help. The rest
still wanted to die so they continued on their death trails.
From the Warriors truth speakings, it is not clear if drug and
alcohol treatment truly healed all the sources of the Warriors'
unbearable pain and their core traumas that drove them to
suicide or if drug and alcohol treatment just deflected the

154
Warriors' attention off of their suicides and got them busy
focusing on their sobriety and re-building their lives. What is
clear is that today, all the Warriors are alive and doing well with
their families, in their home communities. For many of the
Warriors, they were blessed with gifts in their lives that they
had never anticipated or expected when they decided that they
didn't want to die any further. One Warrior who had suffered
the deaths of four of his/her children in a house fire shared
that h e / s h e was "blessed with two more children". Another
Warrior who lived and almost died in Vancouver's East Side was
blessed when a "[clinical staff] position came up. I am where I am
suppose to be". There was the Warrior who was able to stop
himself/herself from jumping off a bridge remembers the time
in recovery when "Ifelt great just from walking on the other side
of the street".

Another one of the Warriors decided to live

because he/she wanted to give his/her children a better life
than h e / s h e had as a child shared...
My first grandson really helped me when he was being tall
enough to open the door. He would open the door and yell
'ye'eh'. That is the traditional word for grandfather.
would have a big smile on his face. That is what a

He

grandfather is all about They came and hug every time
they see me. My oldest boy and I wrestle, we are pretty
close - him and I (Warrior).
The Warrior who received help, healing, and strength from
his/her traditional Elders shared in humble pride, "I am now
sober fourteen years and ten months. I can see how the Creator
saved my life when I could have died" (Warrior).
Lastly, a blessing of strength from our Holy Woman....
When we lookfor a logical reason to go on and there isn't one....
We go on anyways because going on is about who we are as
Indians, as individuals, and as a Nation

156

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167
APPENDIX A: UNBC Research Ethics Board Approval

UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN BRmSH COLUMBIA
RESEARCH ETHICS BOARD

MEMORANDUM
To:

Beginning of a New Day Hosanna Waa ksis to akii

From:

Henry Harder, Chair
Research Ethics Board

Date:

November 23, 2005
Re: E2005.0520.061
Fighting for our lives: A collection of strategies used by First Nations'
Warriors in their personal battles against suicide

Thank you for submitting your proposal and requested amendments to the Research
Ethics Board. Your proposal has been approved.
Good luck with your research.
Sincerely,

Heftry tfiafeer

168
Appendix B: Participant's information package:
Research project information letter
Fighting for our lives;
First Nations' suicide interventions
Dear Research Participant,
My name is Beginning of a New Day Hosanna Waa ksis to akii.
I am from the Buffalo Nation, Eagle Clan, Thunderbird Family.
Currently, I a m working on my Master's Degree in Social Work, at the
University of Northern British Columbia, UNBC. The focus of my
thesis is to research what various First Nations' People have done, on
their own, in their personal battles against suicide. The specific type
of suicide that I will be researching is when people believe that they
were driven to suicide by one or more people in their lives.
If you are interested in this project, your voluntary participation
will be greatly respected and appreciated.

This research project has

been designed to be a meaningful and rewarding experience for
everyone. However, sometimes we are unexpectedly triggered by
events in our lives. If you experience any stress or feel upset, please
feel free to contact the following emergency counseling services to
have someone to talk to: Crisis Centre for Northern BC at 1-888-5621214 or BC Suicide Crisis Line at 1-800-Suicide (784-2433). You also
have the right to quit at any time and you don't even have to explain
why.
The complete research experience will consist of four contacts.
The first contact will be a telephone call to say hello, introduce myself,
explain the focus of the research to you, and to answer any questions
that you may have. The second contact will be to come out and visit
with you. This visit will be about 1 hour long and the focus of this

169
visit will be to tape record your story of what you did in your battles
against driven to suicide. If you do not feel comfortable in having your
story tape recorded, that is okay. Instead of tape recording, I can
either take notes while I am listening to you or I can write down some
notes afterwards, the choice is yours.
Once I have listened to your story, I will type it out so your story
will be in paper transcript form. I will then mail a copy out to you.
The third contact will be another phone call to orally review your
transcript together. I would like to review your transcript with you so
to see if there is anything that you would like to change, correct, add
to, or take out before I start to sift through it to discover the strategies
you used in fighting for your life.

Once all the stories have been

analyzed, a suicide prevention pamphlet will be developed containing
interventions that were collected from all the participants' stories.
Once the next-to-final draft of the suicide prevention pamphlet are
completed, I will mail out copies to you for your review and to get your
final blessings before the material goes off for printing.

Thus, the

fourth contact will be another phone call to review the drafts together
and to get your final blessings.
From this research project, the most important material end
product will be the suicide prevention pamphlet.

The suicide

prevention pamphlet will contain a collection of strategies you and
your fellow research participants have used in order to win your
battles against driven to suicide. The suicide prevention pamphlet
will be presented as a gift to your community to be shared with others
who are still struggling with driven to suicide. The other end product
will be my Master of Social Work thesis.

Throughout the whole

research project your name and all your material will be respectfully
kept safe under lock and key, anonymous, and strictly confidential; I
will be the only one who will have access to your material. Once I

170
have stood before the UNBC Elders, to defend my thesis, I will
personally destroy all the research materials such as all the
transcripts and notes that I wrote throughout the project. The only
remaining materials products will be the suicide prevention pamphlet,
the thesis, and good memories in my heart.
If you are interested in participating in this research project,
please feel free to call me at 638-2202 and I will book a time to come
out to visit with you. If you need any further information and/or if
you have any questions and/or concerns about this research project
also feel free to contact my thesis supervisor, Dr. Glen Schmidt or the
office of the VP of Research for further information.
Lastly, I would like to thank you, from my heart, for the
courage you have shown in fighting for your life and sharing your
story so others may live.
Thank you.
I tam ma to ta tsi sinaan;
May you walk in peace until we meet again....
Sincerely,

Beginning of a New Day
Hosanna Waa ksis to akii
BSW, MSW (candidate)
phone: (250)638-2202

Dr. Glen Schmidt PhD.
Thesis Committee Supervisor
UNBC, Social Work Program
phone: (250) 960-6519
UNBC; VP of Research Office
Phone: (250)960-5820

171
Informed Consent Form
Informed consent form
Fighting for our lives:
First Nations' suicide interventions
- Have you volunteered to be in this research project?
- Have you received and read a copy of this research project's
information letter?
- Do you understand that you have the right to quit at any time?
- Do you understand that your will have a choice of having your
interview tape recorded or having hand written notes done as an
alternative to tape recording?
- Do you understand diat you have a right to skip any interview
questions mat you do not feel comfortable in answering? You also do
not have to share any information mat you do not feel comfortable in
sharing and you do not have to give a reason. This selective information
sharing will not affect your further participation in this research?
- Have you had an opportunity to ask questions and discuss this project
- D o you understand the possible benefits and risks involved in
participating in this research?
- Has the issue of confidentiality been explained?
- D o you understand who will and will not have access to die
information you provide?
- Do you understand that a thesis, and a suicide
prevention pamphlet will be the material products of this research project?

Yes N o
Yes N o
Yes N o

Yes N o
Yes No

Yes N o
Yes N o
Yes N o
Yes N o
Yes N o

This research project was explained to me by: Beginning of a New Day Hosanna Waa ksis to akii
I agree to take part in this research project; O n this
day of
, 2005, in
, British Columbia.
signature/ symbol of research participant
print name
I believe that the person signing this form understands what is involved in the research project
and voluntarily agrees to participate.
signature of primary investigator
date
- please keep the information letter and one copy of this consent form for you own records
Beginning of a New Day
Dr. Glen Schmidt PhD.
Hosanna Waa ksis to akii
UNBC; Social Work Program
BSW, MSW (candidate)
Thesis Committee Supervisor
phone: (250) 635-9478
phone: (250) 960-6519
UNBC;VP of Research Office,
phone: (250)960-5820

172
List of research q u e s t i o n s
- What did you intentionally do that helped you in winning your
battles against driven to suicide, in order for you to be alive today?
- What events occurred, in your life, that were of significant help to
you in your battles against driven to suicide?
What did you intentionally do to make your life worth living?

List of c o u n s e l i n g s e r v i c e s
I would like to thank you for volunteering as a participant in this
research project. As a participant, you will have the opportunity to
share your story of what you did right when fighting against driven to
suicide. By sharing your story, you will be part of developing a suicide
prevention pamphlet to help others who are currently struggling with
driven to suicide. Most people find that sharing their story in a
research project is empowering and healing for them. However, if you
begin to suffer from flashbacks such as old memories and/or
emotions, please feel free to seek help from your fellow Elders, Clergy,
traditional prayer, a n d / o r contact your Band Office to be referred to a
counselor.
Other 24 hour services include:
Crisis Centre for Northern BC
1-888-562-1214
BC Suicide Crisis Line
1-800-Suicide (784-2433)

173
Appendix C: Language
The language that I have written this research project in is in
my first natural language. I, like the vast majority of my
People, was not taught or "allowed" to speak my Grandma's
language of Blackfoot nor my Grandpa's Sioux language.
However, I still speak my first natural language. My Cree
Mother, of my first adoption, and my Saulteaux Father, of my
second adoption, had taught and encouraged me to speak our
first natural language. Our first language is the language of our
Creator, our little ones, our Elders, and our Holy Ones. Our
first natural language is the language of the truth that lies
within our hearts and souls. Thus, my research proposal has
been written in a format that speaks from my heart and soul
rather than from a purely scientific, logical, academically
trained head.
Due to this thesis being designed, implemented, and written
at a deeper heart and soul level, it may be very confusing,
irritating, a n d / o r even frightening for some readers who
specialize in cognitive level academics. Not all material
presented is logical in nature; sometimes the overwhelming pain
of suicide does not make any logical sense to us, as outsiders.

174
There may also be confusing concepts such as a broken heart
or soul-felt tears; terms that are not found in White Nation's
medical books. However, the realities of overwhelming and
unbearable pain continue to exist within the hearts and souls of
our People and our lives.

175
Appendix D: Inclusion
In my traditional teachings, I would be ashamed of myself if I
was to speak in a language that my Elders would not be able to
understand. I would also be ashamed of myself if I spoke in a
language that intentionally locked people out from knowing and
understanding what I have to share. Traditionally, shunning
was only used in very serious crimes against our People. In
order to prevent academic shunning and to connect my People
back home on the reserve with my White Nation world of
university learning, I have worked hard to translate technical
information into simple every day language so nobody will be
excluded from understandings that I would like to share with
them. In "Fighting for our Lives; First Nations' suicide
interventions, I have intentionally written specifically for Red
Nations' People in a language that hopefully will bring no shame
to any of our People. Thus, I attempted to accurately translate
non-native academic research concepts and my Indian concepts
into a language that All, from both worlds, will be able to
understand.

176
Appendix E:
It is not doing resilience: It is about being Indian
From a White Nation perspective, many may read this thesis
and identify the findings as examples our People's resilience to
foreigner's unbearable living conditions. However, the White
Nation term resilience takes away our right to hang on to what
is rightfully ours. The focus of this research was not about
what we do that is called resilience; it is about who we are as
Indians, as individuals, and as members of our own Red
Nations.
This concept may be a little difficult to understand and to
explain because it is about our right to define our selves using
our own words and our right to hang on to our pieces that are a
part of who we are, not what we do. This dynamic is similar to
when White Nation explorers discovered and re-named our
rivers and mountains and then claimed them for themselves
when we had already had names for them and they were a part
of our traditional territories and our Sacred Mother, Earth. As
Red Nations' People, we have aspects of our collective character
that symbolize who we are. In the English language, this
collective phenomena has been called being Indian. We do not

177
want anyone to come along and grab another sacred aspect of
who we are from us only to re-label it as if it is something that
some of u s have just begun to "do" because a White Nation
person j u s t noticed it.
This research project is not about being resilient; it is about
being Indian and who we are as individuals, and as Red
Nations. In my Blackfoot language, we would say iss tso' kini; it
means to be strong (Frantz & Russell, 1995). Being strong
enough to bend like the prairie grass without giving up our
roots; it is about who we are as Indians. Thus, we are not
"doing" resilience; we are "being" Indians.

Appendix F: Our Elders
In our Red Nation communities and in our traditional ways,
we are to honour, respect, protect, and help our Elders. Our
Elders are more than just old people to u s . They are active,
knowledgeable, and valued members in our families,
communities, and Nations. Our Elders are our band members
who pass on to u s our history, languages, and traditional
teachings. They also pass on their own personal wisdom that
they have earned along the way; their own life experiences.
Some of our Elders have specific sacred rites/areas of expertise
such as using herbs and/or ceremonies to doctor the sick.
Others teach u s our traditional legends, songs, and dances.
Others teach u s our traditional ways of hunting, trapping,
gathering, and fishing. Others carry the sacred Pipes and
Bundles for our People.
One specific type of Elder that was consulted in this
research project is known as a traditional healer/ Indian doctor.
In my Blackfoot culture, in order to become a traditional
healer/ Indian doctor, one has to have suffered from one or
more very painful life experiences. By healing themselves,
traditional healers have learnt and earned their sacred rights to

179
doctor others who are in need of healing from the same or
similar life experiences. Thus, a traditional healer's healing
knowledge and powers comes from his/her own life experiences
rather than from medical or academic books. Traditional
healers are valued and respected in our communities; they are
able to listen to, understand, connect with, and "doctor" the
sufferer. As their patients, we may be scolded b u t we are rarely
shamed for the suffering what we are going through because
our traditional Indian doctors have also suffered the same hard
life experiences in their apprenticeship years as medicine men
and medicine women.

Appendix G: Life in Indian residential school:
Our Holy Woman's truth speaking....
As outsiders to her culture as well as outsiders to her driven
to suicide experiences, and as a consulting Elder, our Holy
Woman wanted to help u s understand the intensity, duration,
depth, and meaning of the unbearable h u m a n anguish that
sometimes drives our Red Nations' People to suicide. For our
Holy Woman, her suicide was not about a chemical imbalance
in her brain due to depression 45 , or distorted thinking 46 . She
wanted and needed to die as a way of protecting herself from life
in a Christian Indian Residential School which was unbearable
for her. It is from her traumatically violent experiences that our
Holy Woman developed her lived definition of driven to suicide
that she shares with u s .
" ....when a person feels that they are being driven to
suicide by one or more violent people in their lives."
Our Holy Woman's life, in a Christian Indian Residential
School, is a living example of Shneidman's definition of suicide
due to unbearable psychological pain (1999). It is our Holy
45

O u r Holy Woman was referring to one of the current medical beliefs that are
shared by the Canadian Mental Health Association.

46

O u r Holy Woman was referring to Ellis & N e w m a n (1996, p. 12)

181
Woman's life experience and her definition of driven to suicide
that has been the gruesome but powerful reality behind her
driven to suicide definition. While in residential school, she was
driven to two suicide attempts. In that locked down institution,
suicide was her only escape from the brutal, shaming, and
terrorizing sexual abuse, beatings, and torture that she could
no longer endure. One August morning, when a child welfare
worker had come to take her back to residential school for
another year, she did her third attempt; she hung herself in an
abandoned barn. She hung herself as her way of protecting
herself from being sent back to residential school for another
unbearable year.
As a five year old little girl, she had decided that she needed
to die because she could not bring herself to going back to
residential school. She knew that she would never survive
another year of brutal rape, humiliation, and torture t h u s she
hung herself. As a little girl, our Holy Woman was found,
hospitalized, survived, and then sent back to the foster care adoption system as an alternative to another year in residential
school. Today, as our Holy Woman who was that little girl, she

182
shares a portion of her truth speaking story as an example of
driven to suicide
I remember being so terrified when the priest would call me into
his office. He had read my child welfare report and discover
that my birthfother had taught me how to give him blow jobs
before I was two years old. While interrogating me, the priest
would slap me on the side of my head; it felt like my ear was
going to explode. Day after day, he would yell at me and hit
me until I could no longer take his beatings. I couldn't hold on
to my secret any longer. I remember breaking down and
crying; I didn't want to tell him the truth about what my birth
father had done to me. I didn't want to tell him the truth...
When I did tell him that it was true, the priest was furious.

He

called me a liar and a sinner. He demanded that I show him
what he was talking about. He grabbed my hair and my head
and forced me to give him a blow job and then when he was
done, he instantly slapped me on the side on my head again.
He was furious with me all over again. He told me that I was
going to burn in hell for what I had just done to him even
though he was the one who had forced me to do it...I was
crying, my nose was bleeding again... my ear throbbed in so

183
much pain. I was so confused that I couldn't understand

what

was going on. I couldn't understand why it was my fault

when

he was the one who forced me to do it to him. After that day,
he refused to leave me alone. The priest would force me to give
him blow jobs about once a week. Once, when I tried to fight
him off he tied my hands behind my back. He grabbed my
head and hair. He used my mouth to push his penis in while
he would tell me over and over again that I was his dirty girl
and that I was so filthy and worthless to him. And then it got
worse. ...He brought in his two friends and I was forced to
politely serve them traditional high tea first before the priest
forced me to give them all blow jobs.... every week; week after
week. I use to be so.... terrified and so.... ashamed of myself
for what they were forcing me to do to them. While I was
serving them tea, they would laugh at me and treat me as if I
was some kind a freak show. Meanwhile, I was so afraid and
so ashamed of myself. Ifelt so unbearably filthy and
worthless.

I would be so, so terrified and so ashamed of

myself that I would run away and hide but the priest would
search the school until he found me. He refused to leave me
alone; hejust wouldn't leave me alone. He would be furious.

He was left handed and he was always slapping me on that
side of my head. He would slap me so hard that my nose
would bleed and my ear throbbed in so much pain and I would
still have to serve him tea and then give him a blow job. At
first, I would faint, or have uncontrollable shaking or I would go
into seizures or I would vomit so hard that I would pee my
bloomers.

I would cry so hard or I would be frozen in terror

and. ...it didn't matter to the priest and his friends.

The priest

would force me to do it no matter how terrified or ashamed I
was of myself. Meanwhile, at the same time, the supervisor
would come into the little girl's dormitory at night. In the
middle of the night, he would come to rape me or one of the
other little girls. I would lie in bed hoping that he wouldn't rape
me but I would still feel so sick and so terrified when I would
hear him raping one of the other little girls. When it was my
turn, he would climb on top of me and use me. After he left, I
would get up to go wash myself down in the washroom and
then.... I would go sit in the sunspot that was made by the
outside yard light shining into the little girl's dormitory

window.

I would sit in that sunspot, holding on to myself as tight as I
could. I would rock myself back and forth to calm myself

185
down just like the way my mom use to rock me in her rocking
chair when I was a little baby. She use to sing me to sleep. My
mom use to wrap us up warm together, in her Indian blanket
while she rocked me and sang me to sleep....I use to snuggle
my face in her long beautiful hair. ...and fell asleep.

I tried

really, really hard not to cry but I would always break down
and cried. It didn't matter how often the supervisor raped me...
I would always cry. I couldn't get use to him raping me. I
always had to cry. I also had to cry silently so nobody would
hear me and.... I prayed so hard ... hoping that God would see
me sitting in that sunspot. I was hoping and praying that God
would hear me. I was hoping that He would look down upon
me and forgive me for my sins and protect me from the priest
and the supervisor. But, He never did... Even God didn't even
come to get me in residential school.
After classes, I would wonder around the school feeling so
sad and so hurt and so empty and so... dead inside. I would
ask the bigger kids to teach me how to play skip rope or how to
colour. But, nobody would take the time to teach me how to
play. I was so empty and so numb inside; I couldn't feel
anything anymore. I couldn't feel the sun on my face or the wind

186
in my hair any more. I couldn't even cry anymore. One day, I
just quit. I quit trying so hard to stay alive. I quit asking the
kids to teach me how to play skip rope or how to colour. I had
decided to hang myself. I was 5 years old and I decided that I
would rather die than spend the next 11 years being raped in
my mouth and in between my legs... I just couldn't take the
white people and their hate any more. I decided to hang myself
with my skipping rope; the one that they gave me for Christmas,
as a present.

REACH OUT FOR HELP

Back then, I couldn't stop the sexual abuse
and violence in my life so I tried killing
myself many times. I first had to escape
and then it took many years of healing,
learning, and getting strong. Today, lam
happy to be alive.

RCMP

BEST FRIEND

FAMILY MEMBER

DOCTOR

I went into die bedroom to lie down and
wait to die. While I was lying in bed, I
started thinking about what I was doing. I
also started thinking about what I needed
to change in my life. I wanted a better life

I didn't die. Scientifically, I should have but
I didn't. I believe that God the Creator
wasn't finished with me. Years later, I
found where I am supposed to be and that
is where I am today.

1-800-SUICIDE

IF.... You are feeling numb.

IF.... You have hit rock bottom
and have nothing to live for.

IF .... You want to die

IF.... You are feeling worthless,
hopeless, confused, or empty
inside.

B

IF.... You are in unbearable pain
and you just can't take it any
longer.

{J*
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T3

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IF .... You are looking for a
logical reason to go on... and
there isn't one.

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1-800-784-2433

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3

FIGHTING FOR OUR
LIVES
OUR WARRIORS SHARE
THEIR STORIES OF THE
BATTLES THEY HAVE
FOUGHT AGAINST
SUICIDE .... AND WON

BC SUICIDE CRISIS LINE

1-888-562-1214

CRISIS CENTRE OF
NORTHERN BC

LET GO OF YOUR PAIN....

TALK TO SOMEBODY....

1 was waiting to die before I realized that I
couldn't kill myself.'

I asked myself if this is the life that I
wanted to continue... I made a decision to
build a better life for myself.

I quit the drugs. And, I got back with my
family. My wife took me back.

I remembered that my mother and father
taught me to pray in our own culture so I
quit drinking and I went back to praying.

I stayed outside as much as I could.

I went to the sweat lodge and prayed with
the pipe. I spoke with a spiritual Elder.

oo
oo

^

GRQWINCbTMAYIlAVKLa-TUS
\UNBL\BLK'rOSUiaDERKK; EMPIRES,

THESUIODEJOURNEYCANBE
BROKENDOWNINIOSTAGES...

IF YOU ARE THINKING ABOUT
SUICIDE.... YOU ARE NOT
ALONE

I was walking around town with a chocked
feeling in my throat I was trying to hold
my tears. I didn't want people seeing that
I was crying so I walked around really
messed up and confused.

I was feeling alone. 1 didn't have control
over my gid friend. I felt like she didn't
care any more.... When she left me is
when I tried to kill myself.

I thought I didn't need help

I was separated and I was really missing
my son. I couldn't live without him....

I was saving up pills....

I knew I was dying

Many of out Warriors and Elders have
fought their battles against suicide and
they have won.. ..They shared their
stories:

TRAUMATIC EVENT OCCURS IN OUR
IJFE THAT CAUSES OVERWHELMING
AND UNBEARABLE PAIN
MAKING PLANS TO DIE BECAUSE WE
CANT GET AWAY FROM ALL THE
UNBEARABLE PAIN
OUR PENDING, SECRET, OR NEAR
SUICIDE THINKING OR ATTEMPTS
DECISION THAT WE DON'T WANT TO
DIE
DECIDE WHAT WE NEED TO
CHANGE IN OUR LIFE TO MAKE IT
BETTER
REACHING OUT TO GET WHAT WE
WANT; HELP

I was so numb and weak that I couldn't
even commit suicide... I could even put
words to my pain; it was so deep inside.

I didn't know how to ask for help

LEARNING NEW TOOLS THAT WILL
HELP US IN OUR FUTURE LIFE

I kept blaming everything and everyone
while I was still dying on the inside.

TALKING TO SOMEONE ABOUT
WHAT IS GOING ON IN OUR LIFE

A BETTER QUALITY OF LIFE THAT
WE WANT TO LIVE AND ENJOY
FREEDOM FROM SUICIDE

WHAT WORKED

I would think of SURVIVAL when I
didn't want to continue.

I went to a six week treatment program. At
the treatment centre is where I picked up
my took.

Sober friends. They were good role
models for me.

I went to see the doctor. I told the doctor,
I needed help. I had never asked for help
before.

I found someone to listen to me and what
I was going through

The RCMP officers drove me to the
hospital

I went to the neighbors to get help

I knew that there was a psych ward at the
hospital so I went there.

I went to see a Native counselor. She
listened and understood me. She took my
suicide seriously and she realized that I was
fighting for my life.

I guess the Creator was talking to me at
the time. I didn't finish what I was
drinking. I started to cry and pray.

I started seeing an A&D alcohol and drug
counselor. I went to NA meetings. I got
myself a sponsor.

CLOSING PRAYER
Atsimoikan

A prayer

Ayo Apistotoki

O Creator

Ispomokinnaan

Help us

Nahkayistsiyisinnaan

Grant u s the wisdom to listen to you

NahkaiMmotsiyisinnaan

To be kind to one another

Nahkayikakimahsinnaan

To try hard

Nahkokamotohsinnaan

To walk the sacred road

Nahkawatoyiitaksinnaan

To hold sacred all of Creation

Ohtokinnaan Apistotoki

Purest Creator

Kimmis kokosiks

Have pity on your children

Iksikimmatapsiya

We are in need

Kaamotaani

Grant us safety

Niistawatsimaani

Help us to raise our families

Naa piio'sini

So that we may live long lives

Ho

Amen