Essay On The Legend Of The Rock Bottom Trauma

The Resilience of the Indigenous Victim
Canadians are just recently beginning to realize the detrimental aftermath of the years of trauma experienced by Indigenous peoples of Canada, such as the survivors of the residential school system. It is often difficult for these people to overcome the impact that follows. Undoubtedly, it requires help and support from others, but these people must make their personal healing journey themselves. The passages “Rock Bottom” by Steven Keewatin Sanderson and the “Legend of the Sugar Girl” by Joseph Boyden prove that although trauma can significantly undermine groups of people, they can overcome their difficulties. Both authors illustrate how trauma negatively affects characters, causes them to fall victim

to hardships, and depend on unhealthy coping methods throughout their lives. As seen in both passages, the authors challenge the victimization of these people and demonstrate how they are on their journey to healing. Therefore, the trauma faced by Indigenous peoples has caused damaging effects through generations, yet they are showing progressive resilience in coping with their situation.
Firstly, both Sanderson’s “Rock Bottom” and Boyden’s “Legend of the Sugar Girl” involve Indigenous characters that experience significant trauma from a young age. The white men force the Sugar Girl and her siblings to attend a residential school, and they tell her parents “they will live in [their] world and learn [their] ways” (Boyden 163). This is a heartbreaking moment that divides the Sugar Girl’s family apart and forces them to let go of their Indigenous ways. Moreover, his loved ones and his people surround the drunken man on the floor in “Rock Bottom, when he is young. Similar to the Sugar Girl’s experience, the residential schools also take away this young boy from his home and send him to the school against his will. There, students are punished, mistreated and beat for speaking their native language. Additionally, Catholicism is forced upon them, which replaces their sacred and spiritual beliefs. Similarly, in The Medicine Walk, by Richard Wagamese: Franklin Starlight asks his father, Eldon, if he knows “any Indian stuff,” but Eldon states “most of the time [he] was just trying to survive” (69). Children in the residential school also have fearsome experiences during school. In “Rock Bottom,” the nuns creep into the children’s rooms at night, where they lie in fear and agony of their pitiful situations. Equally important, is the fact that such distressful events have major impacts on the rest of the characters’ lives. During her childhood, the Sugar Girl has “a good life, especially in the summer” (Boyden 163). As she grows up, “summer [becomes] a strange time for the Sugar Girl” (Boyden 166). This shows the drastic turn that her life takes, ever since these devastating events have occurred. Therefore, the authors demonstrate how the values and innocence of young Indigenous children are stripped away, after enduring these situations.
Furthermore, both the “Legend of The Sugar Girl” and “Rock Bottom” emphasizes the hardships of Indigenous peoples who are victim to traumatic experiences.

These individuals struggle to get by and become successful. Since the Sugar Girl and her siblings are away at residential school, their family breaks apart and there comes a point when they “barely talk with their parents anymore” (166). This shows how the families of Indigenous peoples suffer and struggle to maintain strong relationships, due to such unfortunate events. Over the years, the Sugar Girl grows more comfortable with her life at the residential school, since she thinks the nuns provide her everything she needs. However, once it becomes time for her to leave the school, she realizes that “what they neglected to give her was the ability to find these things on her own” (167). The Sugar Girl was given minimal independence and opportunities to develop these skills. As a result, she and others in her position struggle to get by in the real world. As for the drunk man in “Rock Bottom”, he finally leaves residential school, only to find his family engaging in violent relationships. Likewise, Sanderson illustrates how the young man struggles to obtain a job and actually keep it. He does not have enough money to pay his bills, support himself to make a living, or access adequate food and shelter. Moreover, he is eventually evicted from his apartment, as he is unable to pay his rent, and turns to a local shelter.

Similarly, in The Medicine Walk, when Eldon’s father passes away, he and his mother struggle to survive and “[are] lucky to get anywhere and [take] whatever they [can] if it [means] full bellies” (84). Much like the characters in Boyden and Sanderson’s works, Eldon, a young man of Indigenous background, tries to get by while living in poverty. Furthermore, since the Sugar Girl does not have much memory of her parents, she cannot recall their parenting strategies and fails to be a good parent to her own son. She decides it is easier to “spank the boy when he [is] naughty, quiet him with candy, and feed him the things same things she [eats]” (168). She turns to these methods because it is the only way of discipline and raising children that she is familiar with, through what she experiences in her childhood. Hence, the authors show that Indigenous people that suffer from trauma, face many challenges throughout their lives.
Likewise, these works reveal the negative and unhealthy coping methods that Indigenous peoples turn to, as they numb their pain by eating and drinking away their burdens.

The Sugar Girl “becomes possessed by the idea of hoarding candy,” (166) as she becomes extremely reliant on this sugar food to keep her happy. However, these unhealthy obsessions have consequences, which cause “her teeth [to] [turn] brown” and her “skin [also] [suffers]” (166). As she grows into a woman, “alcohol [becomes] her new candy” and it “[makes] her forget” all about the horrific and painful times of residential school (168). Nonetheless, this new addiction has its own consequences too. When the Sugar Girl drinks, she does things “she normally [does] [not] do” (168). In the same way, the drunken man in “Rock Bottom” begins to drink because he is angry about the trauma and difficulties he faces. At first, drinking brings him joy. However, he begins to lose control of his actions, acts violently towards others, and gets in trouble with the police. His drinking negatively affects his family life, as he eventually leaves his family due to the drinking problem that is interfering with his life. With the little money the man has, he spends it on more alcohol, bringing him deeper into debt, and eventually becomes homeless. At this point, the man is highly dependent on alcohol, to the extent that he cannot go without it. He digs through dumpsters, in hopes of collecting old bottles of drinks, and

gets a hold of as many as he can. Comparably, in The Medicine Walk, Eldon “[takes] to drinking” in order to cope with the loss of his best friend, Jimmy, and the horrors he witnesses during the war. For Eldon, “life [becomes] the ins and outs of drunkenness,” and he puts up with “the miserable dryness of work in order to pay for another binge” (174). This shows how alcohol and comfort foods, despite the consequences, become essential to the people in these situations. Therefore, the trauma and challenges that limit the success of Indigenous people, lead them to seek comfort in unhealthy habits such as substance use and abuse.
Above all, the “Legend of the Sugar Girl” and “Rock Bottom” prove that despite all the suffering and victimization endured by Indigenous peoples, they are gradually showing resilience. The survivors of traumatic experiences, such as the residential school system, are on their healing journey. Once all Canadians are able to understand this, everyone can truly move forward in harmony. Although the Sugar Girl and the young man undergo trauma and difficulties, they gradually work towards being able to overcome them. When the Sugar Girl has her son, she feels as “healthy and happy as she [is] as a child” (170). Despite the fact that the Sugar Girl passes away, her “son [is] strong. After all, his blood [is] Cree” (171). Here, Boyden shows how these nations are slowly rebuilding their strength and identities. Furthermore, he expresses that “legends are not meant to be sad stories only. They are told to express a people’s magic, to make victor’s out of weaklings” (171). Hence, there is great significance behind these legends and storytelling, since they are a part of the culture and traditions of Indigenous peoples. Similarly, in “Rock Bottom,” a young man who is on his way to meet someone, scowls at the drunk man on the street, at first sight. The young man has a disgusted expression, which slowly softens as he begins to feel empathy for the man on the ground. He realizes what the man is going through and how his life has been. Furthermore, he develops an understanding of the solidarity and foundation of their nations peoples. He decides to help the man seek emergency attention and sacrifices his own plans for the night, allowing this man to potentially become a survivor among his people. Therefore, these Indigenous peoples are on their way to becoming survivors, whether they are the survivors of residential schools or other harsh experiences.
In conclusion, Boyden and Sanderson demonstrate how the Indigenous peoples of Canada are coping with trauma from the past, and hardships in the present. The trauma that causes them to engage in unhealthy behaviours and gives them difficulty, is being replaced by recovery. Likewise, they are overcoming these challenges and are beginning to take on the role of survivors, as their communities show resilience. Once Canadians understand the weight of the impacts on First Nations, they can offer support to these people and take the next step in unity.