Kerry McCluskey
Northern News Services

IQALUIT(Aug 17/98) - The Baffin region, much like every other region in Canada, is plagued by the problem of child sexual abuse.

But unlike any other area, the Baffin has Monica Mount, a child sexual abuse treatment specialist who is working hard to develop counselling options in all of the Baffin communities.

Based in Iqaluit, Mount travels regularly to the other hamlets on Baffin Island and assesses the need for sexual abuse treatment. She also looks at who is available in the community to offer the service.

"There's not a paid position but there's a lot of volunteers that call themselves care-givers groups. I meet with them and offer them some training," says Mount, who came out of retirement for the second time to fill her current position.

While her plans are steadily progressing, Mount says that there is still a lot of healing to be done but she does take note of those people "that are perhaps ready to take more in-depth training so we can have counselling in every community."

Until that time, Mount and her two colleagues, Manon Leblanc and John Vanderbeldt, reach all 14 Baffin communities a few times during the year and are aware of the therapy needs of most of the residents in each community.

But due to the distance and travel involved, consistent counselling service to people in outlying hamlets often has to be provided by flying the individual into Iqaluit for an extended period of time, or by reaching them by fax or telephone. Soon tele-health will be another option. The device allows client and counsellor to meet via screen for therapy sessions.

"It makes a real difference, meeting face-to-face," says Mount.

Scheduled to retire for the third time in the summer of 1999, Mount is looking for an Inuk resident to replace her.

"The plan was to have an Inuk person train alongside me that would be able to offer this...that hasn't happened yet but we're still looking," explains Mount, who says that with the statistics as high in the Baffin as they are in the south, any counselling or training that she does helps to combat the problem.

Citing numbers as high as two in five girls and one in six boys that have experienced some form of sexual molestation before the age of 18, Mount's caseload is full of clients who range in age from four to 72.

She says that with children, she uses play therapy and guides the care-giver in how to provide a protective and nurturing environment. With adults, she takes them back to the time the abuse occurred.

"I concentrate my work on healing the inner child because they were children when they were abused," says Mount.

Counting extreme behaviour changes as well as physical symptoms as signs of sexual abuse, Mount has to assess each individual situation and treat it accordingly.

"Therapy is back and forth all the time. It's the dance of therapy really. It's going back to the grief and taking the strength in there to heal."