National Day for Truth and Reconciliation

Source of image: https://www.aptntv.ca/ndtr/

In my country, Canada, today is the second official National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

There were 140 federally-run residential schools all across Canada that operated between 1867 and 1996. The intent was to ‘teach the Indian out of the child’: complete assimilation, in other words. The children were forcibly removed from their homes. Their hair was cut; they were forbidden to speak their native tongue; they were forbidden to practice their spirituality and their traditions; they were not allowed to go home and they endured unimaginable abuse: either of neglect, physical and sexual abuse, or worse.

They were sent home when they were eighteen.

And many never made it home at all.

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Letter to a Pedophile

Trigger alert: this post is about child sexual abuse

Um, before you rape that little boy, could I have a moment of your time?

Boys Will Be Boys

My apologies; I have been unable to write much of anything in a month. In the past two years, Canadians have been pulled into the reality-TV vortex of the drama south of our border like never before. The Blasey-Ford/ Kavanaugh debacle has reduced me to a despondency and a hopelessness I cannot even begin to adequately describe. So many of us have 36-year old stories to tell: and 10-year old stories; and 50-year old stories. We are legion. And like the good, meek voiceless women our abusers wanted us to be, we have kept our collective mouths shut. When women like Dr. Ford come forward, they give hope to the multitudes of hurting, silent victims who have stayed quiet for decades. And when rich, entitled white men viciously beat them back down to their proper ‘place’, they also beat down every one of us who were once victimized. All over again… You never forget what happened to you and you never ‘get over it’. You just figure out a way to live with it.

I Hope You Have Changed

My mother is the Queen of Stain Removal.