Becoming disconnected from home

In addition to experiencing culture shock in their host contexts, participants identified challenges pertaining to a growing sense of disconnection between themselves and their cultural roots as they moved away from their home communities. It was emphasized how the physical distance separating the participants from their families and homes triggered feelings of isolation, while also stirring up negative reactions among their on-reserve peers. Participants also felt disconnected from their Aboriginal culture as they immersed into the Euro-Canadian context, challenging their sense of identity and belonging to their home community. The sub-themes identified were (a) being distanced from family, (b) losing loved ones while away from home, (c) missing the Aboriginal culture, and (d) dealing with on-reserve rejection.

of homesickness that plagued them as they moved away from their families to pursue new sport opportunities. They described their homesickness as a sense of being physically and

psychosocially disconnected from their core relations, lending to feelings of isolation and a loss of support in their host contexts. In his mandala, Patrick visually centralized the importance of family connectedness and support in his relocation experiences (see Figure 11):

I drew my dad, my sister, my brother, and myself in the center of the circle, and on the outside I put the things that we’ve shared, like some of the values that we were taught. I wrote “Dad gave us opportunity” by allowing us to live in [city] as opposed to [reserve]. Then at the bottom it says that “this enabled us to reach our full potential” as to the goals that we wanted to achieve; which was hockey for me and my brother. Basically, the things my dad gave us while we were in [city], most people that live on the reserve probably never get a chance to have those opportunities. Not even just in sports, but maybe educational wise too. My take is that he just wanted us to reach our full potential in whichever way that was. And I think that’s why it’s important to have family around you, to have support from your family. Because if you don’t, no one is going to be there to support you and push you to achieve what you want. (Patrick: 23 year old male) Patrick went on to explain the struggle he had once he was physically disconnected from his family and alone in his sport environment:

I played in the [elite hockey league] for three years, and then one day I just didn’t want to go back. I didn’t want to play anymore because I wasn’t enjoying what I was doing. So I chose to come back to [city near home reserve] and play at home. At that time I was 19 and I’d been living away from home since I was 16. So I guess maybe a lot of it was that I missed my family. I think that’s what I had a hard time adjusting to when I moved away

– there was no one there, no family. Everywhere I went I was six or seven hours away from my home, so it wasn’t like it was close or anything like that. And when you’re playing in the [elite hockey league], it’s such a high level that you only get six days to come home at Christmas and then you’re not home again for the rest of the season. So it was challenging, because you’re so young and you’re looking for support and guidance, but there isn’t really anyone to give it to you, so you have to try and guide yourself... It wasn’t until I moved back home that I started enjoying hockey again. And I think that’s because I had all the people around me who supported me – my family.

Figure 11. Mandala created by Patrick.

Building on this experience, Andrea used her mandala to visualize her heart’s connection to her family (see Figure 12):

Those three houses [on mandala] are pretty much the heart of my family, just because we’re so close together. There’s my house, then my next door neighbour is my grandma, and then next door is my auntie and uncle with their kids. So we’re all in one little area. And I put a heart because I’ll always love being there, home in [reserve], surrounded by the people who have supported me and pushed me to become the best that I can be.

That’s where my heart will always be. Like, when I moved away to [city] it was hard because I was by myself for the first time and my family wasn’t there anymore. It was really, really tough, going from all the support to – well, I know they supported me, but I didn’t feel that. I felt alone. My heart was pulling me back to this place [shown on mandala], and it was a very emotional experience. (Andrea: 18 year old female)

Figure 12. Mandala created by Andrea.

These participants’ mandalas helped to reveal a core belief within Aboriginal culture – that one’s greatest resource lies in family relationships and community connections rather than in external successes (Pattel, 2007). In this manner, the mandalas provided a deeper understanding of how the participants were conflicted, on an ongoing basis, by being physically disconnected from their kin. This finding highlights the athletes’ experiences of being pulled within and between each culture at various times in order to address tensions which had no static resolution (i.e., the collectivist need to be near family in the Aboriginal culture, and the simultaneous need to pursue their individual sport dreams in the Euro-Canadian context).

unexpected challenge of having family members pass away while they were away from home. They again emphasized feeling torn between their need for kinship during these hard times and their individual goals and desire to continue on their athletic journeys. This was exemplified by Caroline’s use of a rain cloud in her mandala (see Figure 10):

I put the raindrops [in mandala] as people that I miss the most and that passed away… My uncle passed away this year, right around the time I was supposed to go to [city] for a tournament. It was kind of hard, because he had supported me. He helped me raise money to get up there to [city], he always told me that I was a good hockey player, and he used to come watch me all the time. So when he passed away, I just didn’t know what to do. I had to make decisions to go back home or go to the hockey tournament. I felt that was hard and it got to me later at a point that I just felt I couldn’t do it anymore. That was probably the toughest thing. (Caroline: 14 year old female)

Though Caroline initially struggled with the idea of giving up her hockey opportunities to go home and grieve with her family, she later realized that she needed to continue pursuing her dreams. She depicted this psychological shift as a sun rising above the rain cloud, explaining how her uncle’s passing gave new meaning to her sport journey:

I started thinking about [uncle] and how he’d be so proud of me and that he was

supporting me before [his passing]. I knew that he’d want me to do this. I think I felt that when I tried out this year for [team]. I felt that I was thinking of him more and trying harder because I thought that he’d be watching me and cheering me on.

The images used by Caroline helped to depict the acculturation process as being in a constant state of flux, wherein seasons (or experiences) are ever changing and must be navigated fluidly. For this individual to move forward from the unexpected loss of her uncle and make her

relocation journey more meaningful, she had to re-conceptualize her journey as a means of honouring her uncle’s memory and making him proud, rather than perceiving it as her own individualistic pursuit. Conversely, Jordan explained how he felt the need to re-prioritize his family and give up his hockey career after losing his father (see Figure 8):

I had just been given the news that my father died, and my team had a game that next night. I decided I’m going to play it. I probably had an hour of sleep the night before, and I was mentally drained because it wasn’t even 24 hours yet. But I decided to play. And I ended up scoring a goal 30 seconds into that game… That was such a high in the midst of a trial. I remember being on that ice and I was almost crying… But from then on, for the next year and a half, that’s when it was just a rollercoaster ride. I put “confused” [on mandala], because I did have the chance to pursue pro hockey. But I turned it down to stay closer to my family because my father had died. I wish I would have pursued pro hockey, but at the same time, it’s my family; you only have one. We were a very tight family, my dad, my mom, and my brothers and sisters. So when he died it was obviously an overwhelming experience. (Jordan: 24 year old male)

Both of these examples illustrate the complex psychological activity involved acculturating, as the participants had to navigate the back-and-forth push and pull between priorities in their home culture (e.g., family) and those in the host culture (e.g., sport careers). The participants had to work actively and fluidly to re-construct meaningful realities that would help them cope with the sudden loss of their loved ones and reconcile their need for family and home connectedness, while also navigating their losses as critical turning points in their sport careers. The ongoing nature of this psychological process was further highlighted by Jordan as he reflected on the word “confused” in his mandala:

I wish I would have pursued pro hockey. There’s always a part of me that will wish I did it. I put “confused” there [in mandala] because not pursuing it made a lot of confusion in my life. Something you work for your entire life – hockey – it’s chopped off right there. Even to this day there’s still a part of me that questions it.

Jordan continued to grapple with his decision to return home following his father’s death, indicating that while part of him recognized the need to remain with his family, part of him will always wish he had persisted with his hockey. His words reveal how the acculturation process is never fully resolved in one context or the other, as the participants’ lives become enmeshed partly in the Euro-Canadian context and partly in the Aboriginal context, in ways that overlap and intersect. As such, the participants continued to sway in their thinking around their relocation and sport pursuits, often feeling challenged by the back-and-forth pull between their two cultural contexts.

Missing the Aboriginal culture. Some participants described being challenged by the absence of the Aboriginal culture as they relocated off-reserve. With the Euro-Canadian culture pervading their everyday reality (i.e., a culture rooted in white European influences, traditions, and values), these individuals began to feel disconnected from their traditional Aboriginal ways of life. This was exemplified by Hailey as she explained why she needed to re-immerse herself in the Aboriginal community periodically and “absorb” the culture:

The one thing that I noticed over the years is that I miss hearing people speak the [Ojibway] language. I’m so familiar with that – I don’t want to call it noise, but those words – that when I’m not around it for a long time I do miss it. As soon as I hear somebody speaking it I just stop and listen to try and absorb it. I find that with pow- wows, too; I miss hearing that beat. When I get to go to a pow-wow it’s like I just want to

absorb everything. It’s like a replenishment of the Anishinaabe in me. When you don’t have it for a long time and then you have it for a brief period, you want to absorb as much as possible to last until the next time. So that’s the cultural thing that I noticed I miss when I’m not at home in [reserve], being around the language and around the drum beat, and those kinds of things. You look forward to when it does come. Living in [city] I felt like I was missing that cultural aspect. (Hailey: 41 year old female)

Similarly, Taylor highlighted her need to stay connected to her Aboriginal culture in her mandala, symbolized through the colour red (see Figure 7):

The red, I guess it just symbolizes the Aboriginal skin colour. I’m just proud of that colour now, I’m proud to be Aboriginal. At first it hurt me and it made me angry, like when I first moved off the reserve and was dealing with things like racism. Then I

actually started to learn about the history of my people and what we went through, which is what this [image of teepee] shows. I learned a lot of stuff, and it kind of made me proud to be who I am again. Now I embrace it, my culture and my people. I want to stay connected to that, even when I’m not living on the reserve. I love coming home for that reason. (Taylor: 19 year old female)

These participants often felt inundated by the dominance of the Euro-Canadian culture in their host contexts, and took active measures to ensure that it didn’t pull them completely away from the Aboriginal culture and identity that they drew strength from. Accordingly, they periodically (and fluidly) withdrew from the host culture and immersed themselves in home environments that strengthened their ties to their Aboriginal heritage and renewed their sense of identity. As hinted at by both Hailey and Taylor, these moments of cultural renewal helped to facilitate the participants’ acculturation by enabling them to retain a critical sense of connectedness to the

Aboriginal community while they simultaneously immersed in and created attachments to the Euro-Canadian host context. As part of the acculturation process the athletes had to dynamically navigate their embeddness within multiple sociocultural contexts, reconciling shifting tensions around the need to maintain meaningful attachments to each context (Agergaard & Ryba, 2014).

Dealing with on-reserve rejection. After moving off-reserve and pursing higher levels of sport outside of the Aboriginal community, many participants noted that they were confronted with rejection from some of their peers back home. Thus, in addition to feeling internally disconnected from their home, there was another disconnect occurring outwardly at the

community level. This was evident when Andrea shared an account of how she was confronted with overt hostility and resentment from a young woman she used to play hockey with on the reserve and was even friends with:

When I moved back on reserve for school in grade 8, after being in [city] with [team name], there was issues with this one girl who used to be my friend. At school she wouldn’t look at me, wouldn’t talk to me, and if I was with my friends she wouldn’t come to us. Then one day she was like “Oh, you think you’re so good. Just because you moved away and are playing for [team name] you think you’re just the best around here, don’t you?” I got up and was about to walk away when she grabbed my shoulder and was like “What, you want to fight?” It just triggered me, and that was my first fight. It was pretty crazy, because we used to be good friends. We used to play on the same team down here [on reserve]. (Andrea: 18 year old female)

Andrea became somewhat isolated from her home community due to perceptions that she believed she was better than local community members for having moved off-reserve.

reserve, symbolized by a wavy line in his mandala (see Figure 9):

I drew a bumpy road because people [on reserve] have said that I won’t make it or whatever, and I get criticized. There’s just a lot of jealousy. People think that I think I’m better than them. I don’t think I’m better; I’m not better than anybody. But that’s what they think. And that’s why I don’t really hang around with people here anymore. So there’s always low points that come with being successful. (Alexander: 16 year old male) These accounts reveal that even though the Aboriginal community is a source of support and substantiation for the participants during their relocation, there are some on-reserve community members who regard their relocation as a form of cultural betrayal and push the athletes further outside the community. The athletes thus had to deal with being positioned as outsiders not only in the Euro-Canadian context, but also in relation to some of the Aboriginal community once they moved off-reserve. They had to navigate their acculturation from changing insider-outsider positions, shifting fluidly along the hyphen and finding themselves partially inside and outside both cultures. The participants were challenged ongoing by the cultural instability this created in their lives, as they had to continually renegotiate their positions and “prove themselves” in both contexts, rather than focusing solely on adjusting to the Euro-Canadian context. This fluidity was insightfully captured by the wavy line in the Alexander’s mandala, demarcating how the athletes struggled to navigate changing cultural dynamics without a sense of stability.