Awakening Within

Awakening Within:

By: Christine McFarlane

My life has been filled with many experiences. One of these experiences has been what I would call my awakening within. It encompasses many things but in awakening within, I have learned through my writing to embrace who I am- a First Nations woman deserving of a voice and a successful life.

As a child of the 60s and 70s scoop of First Nations children being adopted out to non native families by the Canadian government, I grew up immersed in a culture that was not my own. I was a First Nations child who did not know how to live in both worlds- the white world and First Nations world. In not being allowed to draw upon my heritage in any way, I grew up in ignorance of my people, and I grew  to be very judgmental and hateful towards not only myself but to towards the very people who made up my community.  In part this was because it had been instilled in me for so many years that somehow being First Nations meant that there was something wrong with me.

This void that grew within came from being told repeatedly that there was something wrong with me and, that nothing I did would ever amount to anything. I never considered that the people telling me these things were the ones who were sick themselves.  In filling the void that became a part of me, I learned many dysfunctional ways to deal with the hurt and trauma that I experienced at the hands of my adoptive parents.  I learned to be silent, fearful and anxious. I learned that through disordered eating and self harm behaviors that I could numb myself from learning who I really was as an individual.

This all changed when I was accepted into the University of Toronto as a part time student in 2004. In returning to school as a mature student, I immersed myself into my studies. I started to learn about my people, their history, their struggles and their triumphs. I also learned to break away from the very people who were hurting me-my adoptive father and his continuous emotional abuse, and I learned to shape my own identity as an individual, and most importantly as a grown woman.

In shaping my own identity and breaking away from those in the past who had hurt me, I learned that by adopting the very path of re-discovering my culture that had been denied of me, as a child was an immense help.  I learned through ceremony, tradition, being a part of the First Nations community in the Greater Toronto Area and through my writing that I have a voice that matters.

Writing has always fascinated me. It plays a huge part in my healing and recovery and has been instrumental in how I see myself today. I have distant memories as a teen and into my adult years of always having some type of book to write in, and collecting various pens, as though I could never have enough paper or pens to write with. People would tease me about the books and pens that I collected, but they did not know that through my collecting of books and pens, in a way I was collecting the courage to give myself the voice that I wanted so desperately to share with the world.

The art of writing has been an instrumental way for me to stay strong and have the courage to 

keep on going. When I first began to write, I treated the process as though it was my only friend, and meticulously poured out my thoughts in any way that I could. Whether that was through journal writing, poetry, inspirational prose, the process became a way of life for me, a way to express myself in a way that was a safety net for me. I continue to write now, not only for myself but for others too.

In telling my story and sharing my experiences, I am hoping that those who have been in similar experiences do not feel alone, like I did for much of my life growing up. I have found healing in my writing and in my healing I have awakened within.

           

(this is an older story but one of my very first favorite memoir pieces)