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20 loved ones lost: Hannah Tooktoo's cross-Canada ride and the Indigenous suicide crisis

She stopped at Shkagamik-Kwe Health Centre on Thursday to talk mental health and more
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Hannah Tooktoo stopped at the Shkagamik-Kwe Health Centre in downtown Sudbury on Aug. 1 as she is closing in on the final leg of her cross Canada bike ride. (Matt Durnan/Sudbury.com)

A journey that started nearly 50 days ago in Vancouver is nearing its end as 24-year-old Hannah Tooktoo's cross-Canada bike ride stopped in Sudbury on Aug. 1.

Tooktoo's ride is one of self-healing and education, she told Sudbury.com during a visit to the Shkagamik-Kwe, as she has been spreading the message that there needs to be more attention paid to and more services for mental health support in Inuit and Indigenous communities.

Originally from the small Inuit community of Kuujjuaq in Nunavik, QC, Tooktoo has spent the last six years living in Montreal on and off as she attends Dawson College. 

Her trips back home have not been as frequent as perhaps she would like, and a suicide crisis in her hometown last year brought about creeping feelings of guilt as she was more than 1,400 km from Nunavik, where 13 people had taken their own lives between January and October in 2018.

"I've lost friends, family to suicide ... a lot of my friends I wasn't talking to or hanging out with as much as I could have and I didn't really know that they were struggling," said Tooktoo, who stopped at the Shkagamik-Kwe Health Centre in downtown Sudbury on Aug. 1.

"I was feeling kind of helpless being so far away and didn't feel like I could talk to anyone where I was. My classmates didn't really understand the situation, most people you talk to they've lost maybe one person to suicide — I've lost 20."

Tooktoo is looking to change the narrative and shed light on the gravity of the issue of suicide in First Nations communities.

"I'll get the question 'what's wrong with Inuit people' or 'what's wrong with Indigenous people' and I know it's not meant in a mean-spirited way, but that's reality, people don't know what's going on in these communities," said Tooktoo.

"I want to help put a human face to these statistics, I'm trying to create spaces where anyone can ask questions and even little meetings like this (in Sudbury) where people can gather and share their stories."

Hanna's decision to make the cross-Canada ride was one that came in a whirlwind and in a span of 24 hours, she had made up her mind.

"It was towards the end of the semester in April and May, I had lost friends to suicide in the winter, and being so far away, I just wasn't having a good time with it," said Tooktoo. "I talked to my husband and he was so supportive of the idea so I just decided that I'm going to do it."

During the four to seven hours a day that Hannah is on her bike, she is meditating and reflecting on the people she has lost, which she says is so integral to mental health. The Inuk student also explains that a lack of support systems for Inuit and Indigenous mental health are a big contributor to issues like drugs and alcoholism in First Nations communities.

"When you have a crisis like Nunavik had last year, you never really have a chance to deal with it and move on," she said. "It's one after another, you lose someone, then someone else, then someone else and you never really get the chance to process it. I think that's why some people turn to things like drugs and alcohol, they don't know any other way to cope."

The isolation felt in remote First Nations communities is another contributing factor, says Tooktoo, and when someone commits suicide it impacts the entire community.

"My hometown is very small, everyone knows everyone, so when someone commits suicide it affects everyone in some way," said Tooktoo. 

While many may suffer in silence when coping with suicide, Tooktoo says that she's been pleasantly surprised with how open and willing to talk the people have been that she's met on her journey.

"There's a level of comfort when you meet and talk to people who have gone through the same things that you have," said Tooktoo. "It's sad to know that this is happening everywhere, but being able to talk and share is an important part of healing."


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