Support for Peyton and Ev

Hi everyone,

My name is Peyton and I come from the Saulteaux people of the Qu’Appelle Treaty in southern Saskatchewan. My mother is Jacqueline Quewezance and my grandmother is the late Florence Big Eyes. I’m a member of Keeseekoose First Nation with strong relations throughout Cote as well. I have been an uninvited guest in so-called Vancouver for four years.

I decided to create this fundraiser for myself and my little sister due to the overwhelming lack of other options we have at the moment. While I have fundraised for my family during emergencies or to support our frontline work, I’ve never fundraised for survival. Doing so feels scary, feels vulnerable, feels painful, feels like something I shouldn’t have to/don’t want to do. Please understand that I don’t take this ask for support lightly and more than anything I wish circumstances were different so that this didn’t feel like the only option to stay safe.

Here’s a bit about my experience and why I’m seeking financial support from you…

I have been unemployed since January 2019. I left my position as an Indigenous youth victims services advocate at a local non-profit after the work environment became increasingly hostile. I experienced racism from clients and tokenization from upper level staff. It became really difficult for me to advocate for youth who were the same age as me as I repeatedly found myself in identical situations to my clients, except without an advocate. My spoons were extremely lacking due to what I was experiencing at home as well, which was the end of a ten year long financially, physically, emotionally and spiritually abusive relationship with my common-law white parter.

Both of these circumstances combined led me to apply for disability, which was only approved after a lengthy appeal for short-term financial support in a lump sum. During this time I also took on the full care and financial responsibility of my baby sister, Evelyn. Due to our mom’s own struggles with mental health after losing her husband to a fentanyl overdose, she was no longer able to parent, house or care for my sister adequately. This role fell into my lap, which we have made the best of but it has not been emotionally or financially easy.

I have acquired just over $9,000 in debt over the last two years since leaving my relationship. This debt is the result of a move to safer housing, diligently showing up to frontline actions and spaces with my sister, caring for two people on one minimal income, creating safety for Evelyn who is severely immunocompromised during the pandemic, accessing clinical therapy when possible, travelling to and from actions here on the mainland and on the island sometimes for a month or longer, travelling to Alberta during the pandemic to support our mom in leaving an abusive situation, and paying rent on credit. At this point this debt feels insurmountable and I have no way to pay this off on my own within my current circumstances.

I have untreated trauma from my previous work environment which makes returning to full-time work feel impossible. I have spent the last 15 years building a resume that reflects my passion and care for Indigenous youth and it feels entirely fraught at this point, as I will not continue to do work that traumatizes me. However, I don’t really have skills/knowledge outside of this type of work so I don’t know where to go from here. I bead when I can to supplement my income but my chronic pain makes sitting for hours and doing repeated hand movements really painful. My government assistance was recently reduced and then cut off, which wasn’t even enough to cover my full rent in the first place. I feel stuck and scared- scared for the way I must neatly tuck away my grief in order to work in order to survive in order to keep my sister housed, fed, clothed, safe.

I have given my entire heart and all of my energy to community work for the last two years from the legislature occupation, to beads4femmes, to months at fairy creek, to the Black & Indigenous fund. This is where I want to put my energy, this is what feels important to me, feels genuine to my skills and what I care about, but unfortunately it doesn’t pay my bills or help me tackle the massive debt I have hanging over my head. Recently I haven’t even been able to engage in community work because of the stacked up police trauma, but without resources to access therapy it’s hard to recover and to continue to show up.

I’m asking for this financial support to help me pay off the debt I have piled up while trying to survive these past two years. I hope to recover from this instability by paying off my debts, getting our car fixed so Evelyn has a safe way to school, and paying my rent for the next two months so that I have time to breathe, do some recovery work, and hopefully carry on by finding work that feels good and safe for me.

Indigenous queer femmes cannot always be productive, cannot always organize, hold community, cannot always show up, create space, share energy. Sometimes Indigenous queer femmes need to recover, need help, need care. I need that really badly right now.

Mahsi cho, thank you in advance for helping us. It means more to us than there are english words for. I promise to continue to show up in community and for land back as my full self, with my full spirit and all of my energy once my mental and financial needs are more met.

Peyton