By Lea Wetzel, Drop-in Center Coordinator
March 21, 2023
Living a life to develop the best results in growth and healing, I have learned to be open and mindful of multiple pathways recovery entails. Beyond the inpatient, outpatient, justice programming, and whatever else was “expected” of me, I have dipped into reconnecting to my traditional, American Indian ways.
I have learned it is not just a belief, storytelling, or even history, its all of that, it’s a way of life. Belonging to one of the most unique and oldest ethnic background that came from this area, I take great pride in being a First Nations, Amskapii Piikani, Aki (woman).
I’ll start with my name. Getting a name in my tribe’s clan, there’s a transfer that happens. Transfer of energy, transfer of knowledge, and taking responsibility of holding and preserving the meaning of your name. It’s a great honor to be given a name, especially for women in this way, to get a second name. That was me, I was given a second name, because I had grown out of the first.
From that day forward of the naming ceremony, my journey would connect and withhold the purpose and meaning of my name. In our way, you receive four stories that give you luck, protection, humility, and ground you, to remind you of where you come from, and where you are going.
This is my passion and way of life, beyond those first stages of recovery. I went through and felt every bit of those stories the Elder told when transferring me my name. I went through hard times, I went away from my beliefs, and in the end and beginning, I overcame and continue to grow. I work a recovery that’s rooted in my way of life, of my people. I refer to the Medicine Wheel for self-care, and to remind me of the stages and patterns the human being goes through, every season.
Beyond those first stages of my recovery, I have found myself. I have developed a way that allows me to be open and have humility and kindness in my everyday interactions. Don’t get me wrong, I make mistakes daily, but I look at them as learning experiences, and opportunities for growth.
I will never know everything or have everything figured out, but on this Red Road journey, I have my Creator, and I have the spirit of myself, and the interconnectedness of All My Relations.
Beyond Recovery, gives me peace, when times are tough. Because I know, there is light at the end of the tunnel, and I have a name to continue to honor, ways to continue to connect and learn about, and a way of life, that allows me to be me. Exactly how and what Creator, Mother Earth, and the Universe foreseen, before, during, and beyond recovery.