SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - It's been a long road to success for Dr. Suzanne Stewart, a Yellowknives Dene First Nation member originally from Ndilo.

Dr. Suzanne Stewart is a Yellowknives Dene who moved from Ndilo to Edmonton at age two. Her mother's family name is Doctor, and much of her family still lives in Ndilo and Behchoko. Here she sits outside St. Patrick's High School, where much of the International Congress on Circumpolar Health was taking place last Thursday. - Tim Edwards/NNSL photo

The psychologist and instructor at University of Toronto was in Yellowknife last week for the International Congress on Circumpolar Health to bring her views and vast experience on the issue of aboriginal mental health.

"I work in aboriginal mental health in particular," Stewart told Yellowknifer last Thursday.

"I work in a community clinic, an aboriginal clinic in downtown Toronto. I also work full-time as a faculty member at the University of Toronto in counseling psychology, where I do research on indigenous mental health and I teach courses on indigenous healing and on indigenous mental health and psychology."

Stewart, whose maternal family name is Doctor, moved to Edmonton from Ndilo to live with her aunt when she was only two years old.

"I grew up in Edmonton, and I had a kind of challenging life there, I guess," said Stewart.

"Like a lot of people, I had challenges as an aboriginal child, and as an aboriginal youth I was vulnerable to a lot of dangers, you know, and to a lot of people who took advantage of me."

"But, by and large, I came out of it okay."

Having dropped out of high school in Grade 9, Stewart decided at around age 25 that she wanted to go back to school and learn psychology. She went to Grant MacEwan College in Edmonton to get her high school diploma, nervous about whether she could even do it. That kicked off a journey that consisted of 10 years of education, three degrees, and culminating with a PhD in psychology.

"I just really stuck with it because I really wanted to get to that point where I could begin to really contribute to the healing in our communities instead of contributing to the dysfunction," said Stewart.

"As a young person, you know, I was involved in a lot of unhealthy activities and unhealthy relationships, and that really turned around for me over the years."

"I guess when I was a younger person I didn't have a strong sense of identity, you know, I didn't know who I was. I think that that's a big issue for youth in general; for native youth in particular," she said. "It's a big issue, because for us our identities, our cultural identities were taken away legally by the government through legislation like the Indian Act."

She was a keynote speaker at the Congress last week, and also held a workshop on traditional approaches to dealing with aboriginal mental health.

Stewart said one of the things she notices was that the modern model of medicine is often at odds with aboriginal culture.

"It completely conflicted in many ways. It's not to say there aren't some similarities, but there are also some key differences and the key differences are what really seem to matter in terms of creating and delivering adequate mental health care for native people, and making that health care accessible."

"Most native people across Canada, I mean I'm speaking in very general terms right now, don't access available health services because those services, mental health services in particular, are just not adapted to native understandings of health and wellness, or even native understandings of relationship.

"Relationship is a really key concept and way of being for native people traditionally, and that's sometimes missing in the health care system."

Stewart said she thinks this is starting to get more and more recognized across Canada, as more aboriginal people step up to the plate.

"I think that native people in Canada as a whole are becoming more confident in voicing our concerns and beginning to really move through the decolonizing process that has been ongoing for a long time but it's been a very slow and long journey, I think, for people."

She said re-emphasizing aboriginal culture is an important aspect to healing, but it doesn't always have to be at odds with the modern world.

"Culture isn't something that stays the same, culture is something that always changes over time," said Stewart.

"Culture always has to evolve and adapt to the current environment. Just because we all live in western worlds now doesn't mean that our cultures, whatever they may be, your culture or my culture, everybody's own unique identity and culture cannot be maintained and evolved in strong and positive ways."