Program helps heals wounds

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Light Walkers International based in Cochrane is offering training that will provide participants with the skills to deal with issues stemming from being raised in an unhealthy environment, and to help others deal with their own healing process.

Gina Russell, 44, is a former participant of Turning Wounds to Wisdom. Russell, who was born and raised in Cold Lake, said that the program helped her to deal with the pain she suffered being parented by residential school survivors.

"Although I went through a lot of hurt and pain, I've been an entrepreneur and volunteered extensively. I have three children and I wanted to break the cycle of what I was raised in, and part of that was needing to be aware of the tools and skills I needed to be a parent to them and how to just get along in life," she said.

"With this training I was able to get some really deep healing and go right to the core issues that affected my day-to-day life and, most of all, my self-worth, because even though I succeeded in a lot of things there was still a part of me that said that I was not worthy. And with the training I was able to identify and work through that and come out with the feeling that I've dealt with something big in my life," she said.

The program is funded by the Aboriginal Healing foundation and is open to all Aboriginal people. The cost to attend the program is $1,000 and director Richard Dolen said that all meals are provided. All the client needs to bring is money for incidentals.

He said that space is limited and the participants have to be committed for the whole length of time of the program, which is 14 weeks.

"When the participants come to the course, they stay here for the first four weeks, then they go back home for five weeks. They come back for three weeks. They go home for six weeks. They come back for three weeks. They go home for 10 weeks. Then they come back for the final three weeks."

At the end there is a graduation ceremony where participants will receive a certificate that says they are facilitators in wellness.

"Which means they can work in treatment centres, battered women shelters and also run their own groups, so it opens doors to many opportunities," he said.

Dolen said that the reason he picked the name Turning Wounds to Wisdom for the program was because he believes that everybody is damaged at some time in their lives, usually as a child, and people tend to nurture those wounds rather than heal them.

"We live in the wound and then we become victims of victims. But this program allows us to visit the wound, so we can heal. People look at it as emotional, spiritual and mental healing, so that they no longer have to live in the wound. We offer an alternative learning for people with long-lasting results."

Turning Wounds to Wisdom is now taking applications for the next semester, which starts in September. For further information contact (403) 932-6912.