Information


Name: Northern Cheyenne

Tribe: Cheyenne

Population: 4,470

Native: 91%

Counties: Rosebud
Big Horn

"The faster she drove, the madder she was," says her daughter, Thilla Red Bird.

And when she was upset, they knew they were going to get beaten.

"She'd hit me with anything she could find," Red Bird says. "Fly swatter, fan belt, wooden spoon, chokecherry stick—those ones actually rip the skin open."

Red Bird, 36, says there were happy times in her childhood, but those were phony happy times.

"We had to play a wonderful family, be a Brady Bunch when somebody came over. Everyone thought we were a perfect family," Red Bird says. "I ruined that perfection when I became suicidal."

She immediately ducks her head to wipe the tear streaming down her cheek.

She tried to kill herself when she was 12.

Sometimes Red Bird feels the pain again, the pressure of her uncle on top of her. Her wrists and ankles hurt from being tied down together. She screams and feels her face being smothered by a pillow.

When it's over, Red Bird opens her eyes and wakes up sweating. He's not there, and the pressure on her wrist is just the weight of her bracelets and watch. She used to take her socks off and be scared by the ankle lines left by the elastic bands. They were just like the lines that made their mark when she was tied up. It's why to this day she won't wear a bracelet or socks, even in the coldest weather.

This nightmarish vision is a part of her post-traumatic stress disorder. She still suffers from the abuse, 23 years later.

"All I can say is (sexual abuse) isn't normal when I thought it was normal the whole time," Red Bird says, as more tears fall. She promptly wipes each one away. "What's hard for me to finally realize is that I am a good person and it's not my fault."

Red Bird has four kids now and is determined that three generations of abuse will stop with her.

"So what if my grandma went through it? So what if my mom did? My kids don't have to go through it," she says.

Outside her house, Benjamin and Naomi, ages 4 and 6, play in the snow.

Benjamin makes a snowball, and mischievously looks at his big sister. He waits for the right moment, and tosses it at her.

Their mom finishes mopping the floors and calls them inside, making sure they take off their shoes before entering. They abandon their muddy shoes in a pile at the door, going inside to play with their aunt, cousin and older brother Caleb. Red Bird notices the dried mud caked on Benjamin's arm and sighs in defeat.

"I can't keep him clean for nothing," she says, smiling.

Red Bird does the dishes while everyone else encircles the kitchen table, rolling a bouncy ball from person to person.

"Keep it rolling!" Benjamin yells.

After the game, Benjamin throws the bouncy ball at his sister, hitting her in the back.

Benjamin's aunt sees, and immediately tells him no. It's not OK to hurt someone else.

Benjamin and Naomi have never been abused, and neither, she says, have her older children, who are 17 and 12 years old.

People always told Red Bird it would be hard to break the cycle. But she knows what to do differently.

"I know what I have to change," she says. "I'm finally talking about all this."