By Patricia Vickers, Director, Mental Wellness
As children, we can sense that there are roots to the suffering in our family, but social conditioning makes it difficult for First Nations peoples to understand the roots of the suffering. In my case, by the time I was in my mid-teen years, I'd been conditioned to believe that the abuse, addiction and violence in my family existed because my father was an "Indian." Something deeper inside me rebelled against this judgement, but after witnessing and experiencing the violence and abuse, I eventually succumbed to the external conditioning and agreed – it must be because we are Indians.
Repeated experiences of abuse and/or neglect strengthen the conditioning of inferiority and intensify the shame. I was ashamed and yet at the same time I was defiant and respected my grandparents' teachings. The defiance and pride covered the shame—I simply didn't know it as shame, only a dark heavy feeling in the bottom of the stomach.
After my first child was born, however, the feelings of shame and inadequacy increased. Rage against a deep sense of powerlessness increased with the birth of each of my four children. I found myself raging at my children without being able to stop myself. I knew there had to be a different way, but I was unable to find that good way, and my seeming inability to parent respectfully intensified the shame and misbelief of inadequacy. I felt trapped in a vicious cycle. My eldest child was nine years old and my youngest child three when friends of my parents, Bruce and Dolly Lansdowne, came into my life and began to teach me about intergenerational shame, codependence and the roots of addiction. Until then, I'd been searching a very long time for teachings that would bring healing. Not long afterward, I went through treatment for intergenerational shame in Arizona.
I have continued the healing journey since then. It isn't that one is healed from intergenerational shame or that we are forever flawed. One day, good teachers come along and help our understanding to awaken to the need for acceptance, forgiveness and love—first for the self and then for others. They also help us to understand the need to be accountable and responsible for the perpetuation of intergenerational trauma. Learning to live outside of the box is an adventure, a quest, a freedom.
It took a while for me to see that my childhood wasn't all dark and heavy; there were times of deep joy and lasting beauty. The land and nature was a healing force in my life. When I was a child, we lived in Gitxsan territory and I roamed freely, exploring the creek, spring and beaver dam pond. I remember enjoying the sweet smell of moss on the hill under the coniferous trees and roaming through the underbrush with my older sister to pick enough lady slippers for a posy for our mother. These were not only times of respite, they were also times of regeneration, renewal, times of dialogue with a greater force, a force of everlasting goodness.
In my clinical practice as a psychotherapist, I have worked over and over again with people who have had moments of healing from nature. Whether holding onto the trunk of a tree before going into the house, hiding in a secret place of underbrush with a younger sibling, sitting on the beach with a dog, or sitting on the rock by the lake … nature grounds and at the same time gives us the energy we need to do what needs to be done. May you know this force in your life and may it bring deep understanding and freedom. May it bring understanding and the ability to forgive and love—yourself first.
