Residential school trauma of previous generations continues to tear through Indigenous families

Friday, June 04, 2021

Here’s what you need to know to get the day started:

Residential school trauma of previous generations continues to tear through Indigenous families

WARNING: This story contains details some readers may find distressing.

The last residential school in Canada closed by the 1990s, but the abuse students endured within them has lasting physical and mental effects for generations, experts say.

For Adam North Peigan, who was taken from his mother by child-care authorities when he was a year old, the recent revelation from a First Nation in B.C. that preliminary findings of ground-penetrating radar indicated the remains of around 215 children on the site of a former residential school brought emotions flooding back.

"I've been having a really difficult time, over the last couple of days, trying to come to terms with that," said North Peigan, 57, a member of Piikani Nation in southern Alberta.

Amy Bombay, an Ojibway researcher who is an assistant professor in the schools of nursing and psychiatry at Dalhousie University in Halifax, has looked at the various ways the residential school trauma has trickled down through generations. One of her studies found that children with a parent who endured residential school had an increased risk of suicidal thoughts and attempts as teenagers.

Childhood abuse can disrupt that stress response for life, Bombay said. Hypertension, diabetes, chronic pain and heart disease can result. Chronic stress can also increase the risk of depression and mental illness, while also lowering a person's resilience and immune function.

Suzanne Stewart, director of the University of Toronto's Waakebiness-Bryce Institute for Indigenous Health, says it takes "about five or six generations" for an original trauma to be healed if it's not mediated.

For North Peigan, the journey toward healing began when he reconnected with his mother as an adult. He hopes the dialogue and action happening now doesn't end. "We are good people," he said. "We're just not people out there who experience social problems and addiction problems. There are reasons why that's going on."

Support is available for anyone affected by their experience at residential schools, and those who are triggered by the latest reports.

A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for former students and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour national crisis line: 1-866-925-4419.

More on this issue

Ottawa promises 'transformative change' to address violence directed at Indigenous women and girls.

Archbishop's comments on residential schools draw ire.

Commemorations in Hong Kong on Tiananmen anniversary

(Lam Yik/Reuters)

University students clean the "Pillar of Shame" statue at the University of Hong Kong on Friday on the 32nd anniversary of the crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators at Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989. Police have arrested an organizer of Hong Kong's annual candlelight vigil commemorating the crackdown and warned people not to attend the banned event.

In brief

The public inquiry examining the circumstances of the Nova Scotia mass killing is calling for a Halifax publication to remove audio of 911 calls — including one from a child who witnessed his parents dying — placed the night the shooting began that would leave 22 people dead. Several family members of people killed expressed outrage and anguish on social media after Frank Magazine posted online the tapes and transcripts of three calls made from the rural community of Portapique on April 18, 2020. The magazine posted them online Wednesday evening. The Mass Casualty Commission, a joint federal and provincial inquiry examining the circumstances of the tragedy, issued a statement Thursday saying it condemns the posting. "We are extremely concerned for the privacy of those affected by the content, especially the child," the statement said. The RCMP says it is investigating whether the release of the recordings broke any laws. Read more about the controversy here.

The federal government began accepting applications for its vaccine injury support program this week. Serious side effects have been very rare among the millions of doses administered in Canada this year. But they're possible with any vaccine, and this new program covers not only COVID-19 shots, but other vaccines as well. To qualify, an injured person has to have received a Health Canada-approved vaccine in Canada and be diagnosed with "a serious and permanent injury." Health Canada declined to answer questions from CBC News earlier this spring about the precise amounts available and the total funding allocated for compensation. But 2021-22 spending estimates tabled in Parliament seek authorization for $19 million to cover the program's first months of operations. Read about the support program, and concerns it may not be enough, here.

Ontario long-term care homes continue to break the law without facing serious penalties, with egregious consequences for seniors in the province, CBC's Marketplace reports. "We need to really overhaul the inspection regime and make sure that we are properly holding to account, frankly, the slew of bad actors that exist in this sector," said Vivian Stamatopoulos, an associate teaching professor at Ontario Tech University and an advocate on long-term care issues. After a year that revealed the cracks in the long-term care system, with 3,773 residents dying of COVID-19 in Ontario nursing homes, politicians promised better conditions for those living in long-term care. But some homes continue to be cited by provincial inspectors for serious violations of Ontario's Long-Term Care Act. Read more about the issue here.

When the federal government launched its Canada Greener Homes Grant program a week ago, the interest level was high enough to crash the website temporarily. The program has received at least 30,000 applications so far. Now, energy auditors and contractors say they're fielding a wave of inquiries from homeowners keen to apply for what could amount to $5,600 in federal support per household. "There's literally thousands of homeowners calling," said Peter Sundberg, executive director of City Green Solutions, an energy efficiency non-profit in British Columbia. "I think there is extremely high demand already." Read CBC's explainer about the scope and limits of the grant program here.

The rapidly spreading delta variant of the coronavirus is causing some concern and debate in the U.K. The variant, also known as B.1.617.2 and first found in India, is now the dominant strain in England. To fight it, communities with outbreaks have launched mass coronavirus testing and stepped up vaccination campaigns. People living in areas with increasing cases of the variant are being advised to socialize outdoors and limit travel if possible, though there are no restrictions on movement per se. Concerns have led to a partial rollback on international travel from England, and some calls for the government to slow the country's staged reopening. However, Public Health England found that vaccines are effective against the delta variant after two doses, and government officials say there is no reason yet to slow the reopening. Read CBC's Renée Filippone's report from London here.

Now here's some good news to start your Friday: The ear tags on three lanky calves loping around the pasture at Bow Park Farm near Brantford, Ont., read 1, 2 and 3. They're triplets, a fact one bovine reproduction expert estimates at one in 100,000 births. Calculate the chances that all three would survive and multiply it by the fact all three are male, and you've got a situation that's hard to believe. That mother Emma was able to deliver all three on her own despite the risk of a "traffic jam in the birth canal" is "very exceptional," said Dr. Stephen Leblanc, who described what happened as a "nice human interest, or bovine interest, story." Read more about the triplets — Hans, Carson and Louie — here.

Kamloops residential school: What happens next?

When Marie Wilson started her work as a Truth and Reconciliation commissioner, the first community event she attended was at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in B.C. That is where a devastating discovery was made recently: the unmarked graves of Indigenous children. That has prompted calls for action and accountability on the legacy of residential schools across Canada, including from Wilson.

Today on Front Burner, Wilson talks to guest host Elaine Chau on what needs to happen next, as the country reckons with its residential school legacy.

Listen to today's episode

Today in history: June 4

1838: North America's first officially recorded baseball game takes place in Beachville, Ont.

1896: Henry Ford takes his first automobile for a test run in Detroit.

1940: The evacuation of Allied troops from the French port of Dunkirk comes to an end. About 337,000 troops were safely transported to British ports as the German army completed its conquest of France during the Second World War.

1979: Joe Clark becomes Canada's youngest prime minister when he is sworn in one day before his 40th birthday.

1989: Hundreds of people die when Chinese troops storm Tiananmen Square in Beijing to crush a seven-week pro-democracy protest.

2014: A heavily armed gunman kills three Mounties and injures two others in Moncton, N.B.