Paul Bickford/NNSL photo
A healing retreat will be held next month on the Hay River Reserve.
The Oct. 4-16 retreat – called Journey to My Best Self – will be hosted by Shakes the Dust Hope Consulting of Yellowknife.
It will be held at the Dene Wellness & Development Centre, the former Nats'ejee K'eh Treatment Centre.
"It's a place of healing," said Frank Hope, a co-owner/operator of Shakes the Dust Hope Consulting. "We're very excited to return and to do some work. It's an ideal place to do this type of work."
Hope noted that the consulting firm once offered a one-month trauma recovery program in the building.
The new program is something similar, but with a lot of updated information, he said.
The understanding of trauma has come a long way in the last 10 years, he added. "So we know a lot more about it. And in regards to many of the Dene and Indigenous people across Canada, we've all been somewhat impacted by colonization and oppression and residential schools and those type of things."
Hope noted those impacts include physical, mental and sexual abuse.
"The residue is very much alive today in the younger generation," he said. "So a trauma that's not transformed gets transferred, meaning it gets transferred to the next generation. So that's kind of the core work that we do, but it's so much more than that."
The retreat will address issues of grief and loss, intergenerational trauma, mental health and wellness, and reclaiming Dene traditions and customs for a strong and positive Dene identity.
His wife, Beverley Hope, is the co-owner/operator of Shakes the Dust Hope Consulting.
Beverley Hope noted the upcoming retreat at the Dene Wellness & Development Centre is being supported by funding from the National Indian Brotherhood.
"This proposal was written quite a while ago, but because of Covid it kind of put us on stall for a little bit," she said.
There will be no cost to the participants, other than those from outside of the Hay River Reserve or Hay River will have to pay for their own transportation to get there and back home afterwards.
"For the participants, we'll all be staying together on site because we're going to lock in because of Covid-19," said Beverley Hope. "Nobody is going to be going on outings unless it's a group outing, unless we're going to go pick medicines or unless we're going to go for a recreational activity. We're all staying together."
In all, the participants will be staying at the Dene Wellness & Development Centre for 12 days.
The program will accept a maximum of 25 people, with about half of those spots reserved for members of K'atlodeeche First Nation (KFN).
And there is a lot of demand to attend the retreat. As of late last week, Beverley Hope noted there have been 38 applications from around the NWT.
Chief April Martel said KFN is providing the use of the Dene Wellness & Development Centre for the program free of charge.
"We're trying to utilize our building more because it's just sitting there and there's so much trauma in the communities," said Martel. "And so we're trying to get that for people, trying to get healing for our people."
The chief said she and band council want more healing retreats to be held at the centre.