Yellowknife (May 10/06) - "It saved my life." That's what April Alexander had to say about a three-week course she took in Austin, Texas, on becoming a life skills coach.

She was among eight women who have lived in the North their entire lives to take the course last March. The course specializes in group therapy and teaching people how to set goals planning and learning their limitations.

The women got more than they bargained for when the workshops exposed their own inner demons, Alexander said.

"It left me naked at my core," said Alexander, who is from Yellowknife.

"I was dying, falling into old habits, depression. (The course) saved the lives of my children," she said.

The underlying theme of the course was dealing with addiction and suicide in aboriginal or indigenous people, said Yellowknife resident Alanna Fitzgerald, who also took part.

"We were so far away from home and out of our comfort zones that there was no hiding from our problems," she said.

Learning about how to help others made each of the girls realize that they needed to deal with their own problems, said Arlene Hache with the Centre for Northern Families, which organized the trip.

She knows what it's like to want to live a better life, but not know who to turn to.

"I could never keep a job for more than three months," said Hache. She said she wishes someone had helped her learn skills to deal with her problems and live a more fulfilling life sooner.

Seven of the women are now doing internships at the centre. Most hope to receive more training and be certified as life skills coaches, a job Hache said doesn't exist in the North.

The centre sponsored the project with funding they received from the GNWT at a cost of $40,000.

The women stayed at the Centre for Social Change, just north of Austin. The course and the centre are run by the Indigenous Women's Network - an organization dedicated to helping aboriginal communities self-govern.

Hache said the program was more than worth the cost. The women can now bring the lessons they've learned back to Yellowknife and the NWT.