Transcript
(waves crashing)
(birds chirping)
As an indigenous person
it was a big challenge
being an enlisted person in the military,
dealing with difficult
people, the harassment,
the biases, the racial remarks,
not only as a person
but as a female as well.
Every station I went to, there
was some sort of incident
that would occur, and
it was usually by people
that were a higher ranking than me.
You know, they forced themselves on me,
and it was kind of destroying
who I was as a person.
I didn't really realize until later
that it actually was
military sexual trauma.
My name is Suzanne Allen.
I did a total of 20-years
military service.
(gentle music)
I am actually a Sac and Fox Nation
of Oklahoma tribal member.
(gentle pensive music)
I remember the teachings that
my grandmother taught me,
you know, about prayer
and having faith and hope
and belief in yourself
and her telling us to not
completely trust everything,
because of the way she grew up,
and just the way our treatment
has been throughout history.
The way the tribes dealt with outsiders,
only talk to the ones you really trust.
(airy music)
When I went into active duty,
I was under the assumption
that everybody was kind of treated equal.
Unfortunately, a rude awakening
that I was treated quite differently.
That resulted in several incidents,
what you consider basically assault.
I turned that stuff inward,
but that's when the
binge drinking started.
I did seek out help from what
you would call medicine men.
They provided certain, I guess,
I don't know if you call 'em, rituals
or things they wanted me to do every day.
At the beginning they
were helpful somewhat.
When I retired, that was the point
where everything came back out.
You know, I spiraled out
for a good four or five years there.
I lost a lot of jobs.
I went through, I think a total of 17 jobs
that first five years out.
I was homeless like three different times,
and I was hospitalized three
times for suicide attempts.
I remember sitting on the floor,
I had broken a razor, and
I was cutting my wrist,
and all of a sudden I
said out to the universe,
I said...if the universe out there,
I don't know what to do.
And then in that moment I
actually heard this voice to stop.
And I stopped what I was
doing and I'm like, what?
'Cause I thought there was
someone in the room with me.
(gentle music)
And I felt like at that moment
that was like my grandparents,
they were telling me,
"No, you can't keep doing this."
You know, going to the VA was
helpful after all of that,
because I don't think I
would be here at the moment
if I hadn't.
I think as an Indigenous person
you have to look at traditional treatments
as your base for everything,
and then sometimes you're gonna
have to go outside of that,
because one or the other
is not gonna be the sole
thing that's gonna help you.
You're gonna have to seek out
as many resources as possible.
Going through the VA
and getting counseling
and going to the programs
has helped me deal
with a lot of things.
Have to go through the
anger and that resentment
and those feelings and
thoughts of yourself
and the people around you
before you can get to the other side.
And that that's been
the biggest help for me
is going through all of that
and getting to the other
side to where I am now.
But for our tribe,
there are things that
everybody has gone through,
whether we are in service or not,
that you need to try to be open with.
'Cause that's really the only
way you're gonna heal yourself
is you have to talk about it.
You have to take that step.