Baker Lake (Oct 20/03) - In a land where she once felt alone and misunderstood, Mary Kreelak is making a difference.

Kreelak, 54, was just 12 when her family was forced to relocate to Baker Lake.

Born and raised in Chantry Inlet, about 45 miles south of Gjoa Haven, Kreelak grew up in an isolated camp.

"We were nomads at that time, searching for food," she recalled.

They ate mostly fish, and Kreelak never tasted "southern food" until she was about eight years old and tried a chocolate bar.

"I didn't like it," she recalled. "it was really bitter."

Kreelak's father died suddenly while the family still lived in Chantry Inlet, and it caused a great deal of turmoil for the family.

Her father had been a great hunter. Kreelak recalls her mother got very sick when he died, and for a time, sought help at a mental health facility.

When people found out about her mother, Kreelak remembers being teased about it.

"People didn't understand about mental illness," she said. "So the children were teasing us."

The family moved to Inuvik where Kreelak did her schooling. But just as she was getting used to life in the Western Arctic, the government relocated the family to Baker Lake where everything was strange and new.

Kreelak said the move was "very painful."

The surroundings were unfamiliar and the dialect in Baker Lake was totally different than her family's Ukusiksalikmiut dialect (from the Kitikmeot).

"It took me a long time to get used to it, and get used to the way people lived."

To this day, Kreelak still struggles with the Baker Lake dialect.

"But you have to adjust," she said. "What else can you do?"

Kreelak, who now counsels people with drug and alcohol problems, has been on her own healing journey for many years since the relocation.

She jokes that she "seems to be getting younger and younger every year."

"I'll tell you why," she added, cheerfully. "Now that I've gone through healing, after relocating to another settlement, I'm starting to feel really good about myself. I'm starting to live life."

She started working for Tunganiq Addictions Project in Baker Lake in 1997. "That's where a big part of my healing began," she said.

Kreelak has five kids, and also adopted two. Their ages range from the oldest 32, and the youngest, 12.

When Kreelak is not working as an addictions counsellor she likes to go fishing with her husband.

"I tag along," she said. "Fish are the only game I hunt. I don't have the heart to kill caribou," she said.