KENORA — The key to better mental health and addictions care for Indigenous Peoples might just lie in having the right perspective – or perspectives. That’s where the concept of “two-eyed seeing” comes in.
Two-eyed seeing is at the intersection of Western sciences’ way of seeing the world and Indigenous peoples’ worldview. It integrates both perspectives to make science and care more accessible and relatable for an Indigenous person.
The Kenora and Rainy River District Mental Health Addictions Network put on a conference on two-eyed seeing this week at the Seven Generations Education Institute in Kenora.
“Good things can come from both Indigenous ways and contemporary or Western ways,” Ojibways of Onigaming First Nation member Sherry Copenace said Thursday as the three-day conference was wrapping up.
The Kenora Chiefs Advisory has a mental health and addictions program that uses “both a contemporary therapist and land-based or cultural ways,” she said.
Asked for an example, Copenace said Ojibwe ponies are used as part of therapy in the region. She knows first hand how a little equine therapy can do a body good.
“Even just the very act of visiting those horses, for me it makes me happy,” she said. “It makes me well.”
Dr. Sean Moore, Lake of the Woods District Hospital’s chief of staff, said the conference provided insight into “melding or finding the strengths in each of the systems of care and the systems of thought.”
The Treaty 3 region is uniquely gifted with Indigenous and non-Indigenous cultures “that can really help each other ... as we work together for not just a hospital- but a community-based healing approach,” he said.
“It’s happening in the hospital, where we have people that are not just doing translation – which is of course important, too – but are involved in helping guide people through the experiences and find those culturally based areas that are important to acknowledge for individuals, to give them a safe space for healing.”
