Yukon opens traditional healing camp

A new addictions treatment facility near Whitehorse is combining traditional aboriginal teachings with modern methods.

The land-based healing camp officially opened Thursday at Jackson Lake, about a half-hour's drive from downtown Whitehorse and situated on the Kwanlin Dun First Nation's traditional territory.

Sixteen women have enrolled in the camp's first five-week treatment program, which begins next week.

"Being on the land, I think, it will bring more inner peace than a program like a treatment centre," said Jessie Dawson, a councillor with the First Nation.

"When you're in a treatment centre, you go out but you're going into the city," she added. "I think this is a better way because you're on the land and when you go for a walk, you're just going in the bush."

A similar intensive program for men is slated to begin at the healing camp this fall.

The Yukon government hasgiven the Kwanlin Dun First Nation more than $410,000 to operate the land-based healing facility.

Complementary treatment

While the camp has been designed primarily for First Nations people, it is open to all Yukon residents who are struggling with alcohol and drug addictions.

Bill Stewart, a counsellor who helped design the treatment programs, said clients will be offered a combination of modern theory, holisticprograms and traditional teachings.

"We have found at least one of the places, or some of the places, where they each complement the other," Stewart said.

Camp officials say they believe the land-basedprogram will be more successful than existing residential treatment programs for First Nations people.

"I can't believe that this is going to be my first time sobering up in the Yukon," said Nora MacIntosh, the healing camp's first client. "Usually I go down south or move away just to sober up."

MacIntosh said she learned about the healing camp after she went to the Kwanlin Dun First Nation's health centre, desperately seeking help to escape a life of addictions.

"I opened up my eyes one day and just begged for help, because it was either that or suicide," she said.

MacIntosh added that she is especially glad to be treated on Kwanlin Dun traditional land, since that is where she had spent time hunting with her family when she was a child.