Six Feet Apart, Yet Closer Than Ever: Mental Health of Kids and Teens from 2020

Native American Identity by Perry J. Horse (Kiowa) talks upon the cultural change occurring amongst Native Americans with the transition into the dominant white culture. Horse talks about how his grandmother told him as a child that “Someday we’re all gonna be like white people.” With time the younger generations were not speaking their traditional language, the tribes were taking in their schooling system, working modern jobs, making car and mortgage payments, and overall assimilation into the dominant white society. Horse continues to talk about the ethical nomenclature of being called an American Indian or a Native American, White privilege and the study of white people, and the legal and political status of Native American sovereignty. Horse covered many of the topics surrounding the Native American culture, legal status, and ways of life in today's modern society.

Horse, Perry G. “Native American Identity.” New Directions for Student Services, no. 109, Wiley Periodicals, Inc, 2005. pp. 61-68.

In Jeannette Armstrong’s story “Sharing One Skin” she describes to us where, and what she is from. She talks about how her language is connected with the earth and how she as a person is connected to the earth. She continues to explain her duties as a river and mountain women, as well as how everything correlates with each other. Armstrong tells a story of how she grew up and was raised to know her ways and her duties as a Native woman. On page 463 she states, “The physical self is one part of the whole self that depends entirely on the part of us that exists beyond the skin.” This stood out to me because she explains how we have many different types of skin and different levels of skins, but she uses skins as a type of metaphor to what we are all built of.

Armstrong, Jeanette “Sharing One’s Skin: The Okanagan Community.” Jerry Mander and Edward Goldsmith(eds). The Case Against the Global Economy, San Francisco, CA. Sierra Book Club. Steenbock Library, 1996 pp.460-470.

Mental health has always been an issue for Native Americans throughout the years. From having to deal with historical trauma to being a minority in today's society, there are more than enough stress factors in our everyday lives. But with 2020 being filled with lots of momentous events, the state of mental health in Native Americans has been awfully incompatible to past years. According to the article by Ana Sandoiu ‘The effects of COVID-19 on the mental health of Indigenous communities’, “Limited access to healthcare, overcrowded and multigenerational housing, high rates of poverty and chronic disease, and limited access to clean water and grocery stores are only some of the social determinants of physical health in these communities during the pandemic.” These are just a few of the physically seen hardships many Native American communities face in the 21 century across the world. These are also not only just physical factors they are also mental health factors. These are some reasons that can be a stress factor to those who live in these Native American communities and the children who are still learning to understand our ever changing world. The article also states, “According to Mental Health America (MHA), 19% of the U.S. population that identifies as Native American or Alaskan Native have reported having a mental illness in the last year. This amounts to almost 830,000 people.” Also, “The suicide death rate for Native/Indigenous people in America between the ages of 15–19 is more than double that of non-Hispanic whites.” These statistics are basically saying that Native American communities in 2020 weren’t only battling the COVID-19 pandemic they were also in war with their own thoughts. More specifically teens and young adults dealt with the troubling mental health issue of depression and suicide, many have fell victim to their own overwhelming thoughts.

Sandoiu, Ana. “The effects of COVID-19 on the mental health of Indigenous communities.” Medical News Today. https://www.mhanational.org/issues/native-and-indigenous-communities-and-mental-health .

In a Time magazine article “Health Officials Fear COVID-19 Pandemic-Related Suicide Spike Among Indigenous Youth” explains how indigenous tribes have had mass numbers of suicide deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic. The article tells of how the rural Fort Peck tribe and Pine Ridge reservation have dealt with more suicides amid the COVID-19 Pandemic. For already living in an area that is basically in the middle of nowhere they were essentially cut off from large gatherings with families and friends, leaving them more vulnerable to depression and suicide. The article stated, “In a typical year, Native American youth die by suicide at nearly twice the rate of their white peers in the U.S. Among those are vulnerable children on remote reservations who are cut off from their larger families and communities by COVID-19-caused restrictions.” The article continued to say, “Tribal members typically lean on one another in times of crisis, but this time is different. The reservation is a COVID-19 hot spot. In remote Roosevelt County, which encompasses most of the reservation, more than 10% of the population has been infected with the coronavirus. The resulting social distancing has led tribal officials to worry the community will fail to see mental health warning signs among at-risk youth.” With not being able to be around their peers in School, due to the mandated social distancing orders, for most kids and teens who live on the reservation it was their time to have interaction and play sports to relieve their stress. After losing that interaction for so long, the child or teen are more likely to experience depression. The article continues to state, “Poverty, high rates of substance abuse, limited health care and crowded households elevate both physical and mental health risks for residents of reservations.”The Fort Peck tribe had much stress held over them with having a large number of the tribe infected, and the other half continues to fall victim to suicide from their oppression. With a hospital that is half an hour away, being a tribe living in a low income community not all families have vehicles, resulting in a large number of those infected will be one of many to fall victim to COVID-19. With no in person counseling the resources for help are slim.

Sara Reardon / Kaiser Health News. ‘Health Officials Fear COVID-19 Pandemic Related Suicide Spike Among Indigenous Youth’. Time Magazine. https://time.com/5921715/indigenous-youth-suicide-covid-19/ 2020

In the articles composed by Becky Little, and Ruth Hopkins ‘Native Americans, Boarding Schools, and Cultural Genocide’ the articles tell of the types of trauma occurred in these boarding schools and the unspoken truth. “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man” were the spoken words from U.S. cavalry captain Richard Henry Pratt. In the 1880s Native American children were to leave their families, homes, traditions, and culture to attend boarding schools where they would be taught the ways of the Anglo-American and unlearn their ways. The lead up to the assimilation was overall about land. In 1830 the government forced the original inhabitants of the land to move west, known as the Indian Removal Act, but taught in history as the Westward Expansion. When the settlers began to run out of land and have already forced the Native Americans to a new place, their resolution was to assimilate the Native Americans into their ways.

Little, Becky. ‘How Boarding Schools Tried to ‘Kill the Indian’ Through Assimilation’. ‘Government Boarding Schools Once Separated Native American Children from Families’. Native Americans, Boarding Schools, and Cultural Genocide http://www.elegantbrain.com/edu4/classes/readings/depository/edu/NativeAmericansBoardingSchools.pdf 2018

The article states, “During Carlisle’s operation between 1879 and 1918, nearly 200 other children were buried”. Those who were buried had unmarked graves and some children being buried with each other, causing it to be difficult to differentiate who was who. Because of this, later in 2017 three of the bodies were dug up to be returned to their homes. While two of those bodies dug up were identified, the third child wasn’t found. The article states, “On August 14, 2017, the Army sent the remains of Little Chief and Horse back to their relatives on the Wind River Reservation. The Northern Arapaho will bury them on August 18, 2017. Little Plume, however, was not sent back because he wasn’t found. In what was supposed to be his coffin, archaeologists instead discovered the bones of two others who couldn’t have been Little Plume because their ages didn’t match his.” This is just an example of one school, and one child out of the possible thousands who unknowingly saw their families for the last time. Although those children who survived were not left physically harmed, their minds and mentality were. They had experienced mental trauma that would affect their everyday life and the life of the future generations to come. A quote from Kiel who is part of the Oneida Nation saying, “My grandmother recalled hearing the Oneida language being spoken around her by the people who were the adults, but they chose not to teach it to children,” he says. “Why? Because it was a source of trauma for them. And they had been told that it was backwards, that it was uncivilized, that it was of the past, that there was no utility in speaking it.” Some thought that speaking it would only be a burden to their children.” Because of the new way of life they were taught it caused many tribes to lose their languages and culture overall leading many tribes into exile. Boarding schools were just only a piece of the intergenerational trauma inflicted from outsiders throughout Native American history. Stella Pretty Sounding Flute was a little girl when she was taken from her family along with her two brothers to attend the boarding schools. “She described the intense trauma children experienced when they were taken away from everything and everyone they know and placed in a strange, cold, impersonal environment cut off from nature

Podlogar, Matthew C. and Novins, Douglas K. M.D. ‘Quality of care in American Indian child and adolescent behavioral health: A pilot study of patient and family perspectives’.US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health. doi: 10.1037/a0038560 2015