Pubdate: Wed, 08 Jun 2005
Source: Yorkton This Week (CN SN)
Copyright: 2005 Yorkton This Week
Contact:  http://www.yorktonthisweek.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2543
Author: Theresa Seraphim, staff writer

SPEAKERS TELL OF DRUGS' EFFECTS ON FAMILIES

Problems with alcohol and drugs will affect not only the person
addicted, but also the entire family, a point brought out by two
speakers during Gang Awareness Week.

Sheryl Mydonick and Wilfred Whitehawk shared their stories during a
presentation at Yorkton Faith Ministries.

Mydonick, who grew up in a home with alcoholism and was given away at
age 2, said the reality of drug abuse came home to her 10 years ago
when her oldest son Neil's life changed dramatically.

"He became a very angry, angry young boy," said Mydonick, adding he
was kicked out of school and in trouble with the law.

She said the signs of drug abuse had been there - Coke bottles with
the bottoms goner, knives on the stove, and hair pins twisted. Indeed,
Neil, unbeknownst to his mother, had been doing drugs since the age of
11.

Then, a break in occurred at her workplace after she had changed some
money for him. When the police told her they suspected Neil, she
confronted him.

"He just had this dead, I-don't-care look in his eyes," she
stated.

After she urged him to accept responsibility, he admitted to some 40
break ins, to get money for drugs.

In fact, Mydonick's search of her house's attic revealed more than 600
cartons of cigarettes, as well as battery chargers, candy and other
items Neil had stolen .

Neil's bail conditions included being with Mydonick 24/7 and "the
police had the right to come to our place at any time and search it,"
she said.

A trip to Winnipeg - where Mydonick was heading to a studio to be a
narrator for a National Film Board film - became the catalyst for
Neil's recovery.

She had to get permission to take him with her, and the entire trip
was quiet, she reported.

"I could feel the hatred coming from him."

During that trip, Neil took off and ended up going to Emerson,
Manitoba with his sister - and opening up about his feelings.

"By the time they got to Emerson, he had told her he was scared"
because of the hallucinations he was experiencing.

"He got down on his knees that night and he asked God to help him,"
said Mydonick, adding after a 24-month sentence - which, she noted,
was "the best thing" for him - he got married and currently, at age
24, has a six-year-old daughter.

"I believe it was praying" that helped him overcome the addiction, she
said.

"I believe that drugs are more than just an addiction - it's
demons."

Mydonick called the experience "devastating", but said it was also "a
gift because it brought us together as a family.

"It has given me a compassion for kids in drugs and in
gangs."

Whitehawk was a residential school survivor who got into alcohol and
drugs before giving them up 18 years ago.

Whitehawk's father was also in a residential school.

"I don't think people can ever experience what I experienced,"
Whitehawk said, alluding to the physical, emotional, sexual and
spiritual abuse he went through.

"I was angry at everybody," he noted, adding it was taken out on his
children not physically, but emotionally.

"I can't believe the man I was."

Whitehawk also said he hurt women, for the sake of having control over
them to get what he wanted.

"Yet, today, these are my greatest allies," he pointed
out.

On October 15, 1987, said Whitehawk, "I made a drastic change in my
life" - a decision to give up drinking and drugs.

"I'm a lot better than I was 18 years ago," he noted.

Today, his granddaughters "are a blessing for me . . . (they're)
teaching me how to be gentle, teaching me a whole new way of life -
they're so precious to me."

Whitehawk has worked for 15 years in th e field of additions,
especially with residential school survivors, "walking with them, not
leading them" to healing, he said.

He also has a new zest for life.

"I'm grateful for (it), but I'm also not afraid to die, because it's
part of the cycle of life.

"I enjoy life as it comes today, and do what I can."
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin