All day Roxann Bighorn sensed something was wrong. Her son Quinn had not returned her or her husband Spike's phone calls.
Even as Roxann, an adviser at Fort Peck Community College, pre-registered students for the next semester, her mind was on Quinn. As she made the five-hour drive to Billings to catch a flight the next morning, the feeling would not fade. Somewhere along the 330 miles of asphalt that spans wide open fields, she had a premonition.
“There was this brightness over in the other lane and I saw this dog. It was a red dog. It was the same red golden retriever Quinn had as a little boy,” Roxann recalls, her brown eyes brimming with tears, as a rueful smile begins to form. “I just knew in my heart of hearts that Quinn was gone.”
When she was able to get cell service and Spike answered his phone, he said the words that tormented her the rest of the drive home: “Roxy, I found Quinn. He hung himself.”
Quinn Bighorn, who died in 2005, is one among a growing number of young people to die from suicide in recent years on the sprawling Fort Peck Reservation in northeast Montana.
In a state that has the highest suicide rate of any in the nation—and twice the national rate—the toll of Native Americans stands out. Between 2003 and mid-May of this year, 23 Native Americans on the Fort Peck Reservation died by suicide, according to statistics from the Fort Peck suicide prevention coordinator.
Youth aged 10 to 24 are most at risk. Fourteen of the 23 from Fort Peck were in that age group. Perhaps even more remarkable is that nationally males kill themselves at rates three times that of females. Yet at Fort Peck, eight of the 14 young people who died were girls.
In the first four and a half months of this year, four young people on the reservation have died by their own hand.
•••
Out of the darkened gymnasium of Poplar High School emerge girls dressed in teal, fuchsia, hot pink and silver. They gather in the lobby to take a break from dancing as they adjust their hair, take off their shoes and talk on cell phones. This year’s prom theme is “Dance the Night Away”. The basketball floor has been transformed into a techno club complete with black lights and glow-in-the-dark necklaces. Tonight is an event that brings students together to interact and be entertained. Many teenagers say safe and fun events are lacking in their community.
“Growing up in Poplar is kind of boring,” Kacie Youngman, 16, a sophomore at Poplar High School, says the next day. Kacie did not formally attend prom this year, but she did go to see everyone in their dresses and tuxedos, including her older sister Lexi Longee, 18, who wore a turquoise dress, her favorite color. Kacie participates in cheerleading and cross-country, but mostly spends her time at home with family.
Kacie believes bullying and rumors sent through MySpace and text messages also make life here more difficult, especially for girls.
“There is a lot of drama at high school,” she says. “If you barely bump into somebody or look at them they’ll think that you don’t like them. Boys get into fights and then they get over it. Girls hold grudges on each other.”
Senior Evie Redboy also says that there’s a lot of pressure on teenage girls.
“I think it’s more harder on girls,” she says. “It’s always like, pressure to be drinking and doing drugs, and like, pressure into sex and what that’s like and everything.”
Evie lost a cousin to suicide after she endured bullying. Evie stayed out of school herself for two months because she was bullied and called a “slut” by other girls.
Shanni Moran, a 17-year-old junior, says young girls have nobody to talk to.
“A lot of times they maybe think about suicide because somebody else did it. They think, ‘Oh, my life’s hard, so maybe I should just do that too.’”
Lexi says she has attempted suicide three times. She appears soft-spoken, though her sister Kacie teases that Lexi, who is in choir, is prone to random singing outbursts. Lexi explains she overcame thoughts of suicide by talking to people. And in the end, she says, she always thought about her family and friends and how they would feel if she were gone.
Kacie, too, battled feelings of depression and thoughts of suicide.
Kacie says while at the prom she thought about the friends she had lost to suicide. “It’s hard and sad and it hurts,” she says. “You don’t see them in school anymore, you can’t talk to them. In this town there is a big problem with teenage suicide.”
She lost two friends to suicide in the 8th grade, and most recently, and surprisingly, classmate Paulette Bemer. “She wasn’t the type to do that,” says Kacie. “She was really quiet and shy.”
Pearl Hopkins, Paulette’s grandmother, also remembers her granddaughter as a very quiet child. “That’s just the way she was, that’s how everyone knew her,” she says.
Pearl sits outside her home in a folding chair as the wind blows across the field and into her front yard. The wind stirs leftover leaves from fall’s early departure across brown blades of grass. Curled leaves and small branches lay sprinkled across a weathered trampoline in the yard.
“She would jump on the trampoline with the younger grandchildren and I could hear her talking and laughing then, but other than that she was a reserved person,” she recalls.
Large tree trunk sections lay scattered in the front yard waiting for Pearl, 71, to split them. Pearl lives five miles from Poplar on a road that follows the train tracks west and falls south onto a gravel road. Her home is filled with Native American versions of Precious Moments figurines, knickknacks and fabric hangings etched and stitched with sayings like “The Road to Grandmother’s House is Never Long.” Above her sink hangs a sign that states, “Home is where your story begins.”
Less than 50 yards from her home is Paulette’s grave. She was just 15.
Pearl says the family may never fully understand why Paulette took her life. But she does believe that more open communication might help prevent others from suffering the way her family has.
“A lot of times our Indian people are hard to talk to sometimes, they got their own ways, and they won’t change,” she says. “They don’t tell and they keep things in, so they need to talk things out more with their families.”
A month after Paulette was buried a ceramic angel stands in for a headstone that has not yet arrived. Her grave is covered in flowers. A Rockstar energy can sprouts from the soft dirt, probably left there by Paulette’s sister, Pearl guesses. Next to the can is a poem that says, “May the Great Spirit watch over you, for he knows the path you walk and he will guide your footsteps gently.”
Pearl circles her granddaughter’s grave as she recalls how many people turned out for Paulette’s funeral.
“Sometimes it takes tragic things to bring good,” she says. “Sometimes God works in mysterious ways. We don’t always understand. She brought all our families close together and now we are all getting along and are close to each other. That is the way it should be.”
Pearl is sure it is the way Paulette would have wanted things. In a letter she left for her family, she wrote, “Take care of all my relatives.”
Pearl points to the sky and moves her finger in a circular motion. After Paulette was buried mourners released black and red balloons. Pearl says that as the balloons rose skyward they appeared to form a “P.” Then an eagle circled and flew away as the balloons dissipated.
“He took her home,” Pearl says of the eagle. “It was protection; it was a good sign.”
•••
Quinn’s death devastated the Bighorn family and that void now spans thousands of miles. Roxann and Spike divorced in 2007 and Spike moved to Washington, D.C. He is the chief operating officer with New West Technologies, an engineering, technical services and management consulting business. He eventually remarried and his wife recently gave birth to twin girls.
“Statistics say your family either grows closer or breaks apart after a suicide. We were one of the statistics where the family broke up,” Roxann says.
Roxann says she and Spike maintain a strong friendship, focused on their other son, Sean. Roxann worries about him, in part because he not only lost a brother, but also his family. The two are trying to make their new house in Wolf Point into a home.
The smell of white hyacinth wafts from a vase as Roxann and Sean sit in the living room. Their entertainment center is adorned with frames housing baby photos, school pictures and Quinn and Sean’s senior portraits. On the floor sits a drawing waiting to be hung on the wall. Behind the glass are the happy faces of Quinn, his girlfriend and their two sons, Jerron and Patton, now 6 and 5, who live in South Dakota with their mother.
Keeping with tradition, the Bighorn family burned most of Quinn’s possessions. However, Roxann could not bring herself to burn everything. She keeps a plastic bag containing letterman jackets for Quinn’s sons. On her right arm she bears the same green Brockton High School ghost warrior mascot that Quinn had tattooed on his arm.
“When you go through his stuff you can still smell him,” Roxann says, holding the letterman jacket to her face. “He always wore that Michael Jordan cologne.”
Quinn was everybody’s star. He was handsome and athletic, with dark hair and eyes, accompanied by a playful smile. Quinn is in the Montana High School sports record book’s top 10 for the most points in a season with 748. He is also ranked 7th on all-season scoring with an average of 29.9 points per game.
Yet for Spike, the two had more than just a father-son relationship. Spike also watched his son from the sidelines as his basketball coach during his sophomore and junior years. Quinn’s basketball jersey with the number 23 hangs retired inside the Brockton gymnasium. The football field bears his name. Spike says watching his son play basketball was one of the most fun and exciting times in their lives. He describes his son as dynamic and aggressive on the court, but off the court completely different.
“He was a very sensitive person,” Spike says. “People thought he was introverted. On the court he was confident, but off the court he wasn’t so much.” His son liked to draw in his spare time and kept a journal, but sports was his outlet and how he identified himself.
In his junior year, Quinn tore his ACL. His parents had insurance through their jobs, which paid 80 percent of the bill while the Indian Health Service paid 20 percent. However, when Quinn was an assistant coach for the Brockton football team, he tore his ACL again. As an adult at age 23, he no longer had insurance. Though he was eligible for IHS care, elective surgery for a life-threatening injury was not possible due to lack of funding for off-reservation medical services.
His family believes his injury played a role in the depression that was a contributing factor in his suicide.
Looking back, Spike can see that Quinn had signs of depression. He often wishes he would have gotten his son help or had gone to live with him. But Quinn always said he wanted to be left alone and Spike respected his wishes. After his son’s death, he received grief counseling for two years and traveled around the country speaking at workshops and conferences.
Spike remembers standing outside of Quinn’s house waiting for the cops to arrive. He struggled to catch his breath, but the lump in his throat made it hard to breathe. It was a lump that stayed there for months. Spike says he never felt angry with Quinn, even as he held and talked to his body the night he found him.
“I did the best I could as a father, I did everything I could. You don’t control their lives,” says Spike. “I can’t take that responsibility.”
Roxann says Quinn was at “the mercy of IHS” and surgery was years away, if ever, because he wasn’t at risk of losing his life or a limb. “I think that is what led up to his depression,” she says. “He was never able to recover from that injury.
“Basically you can walk around with cataracts or a torn rotator cuff for the rest of your life because it’s not life or limb.”
•••
The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention states that even though most people who are depressed are not suicidal, most suicidal people are depressed. More than 60 percent of people who die by suicide suffer from major depression. Some common symptoms of depression are lack of interest in previously enjoyed activities, fatigue or loss of energy, insomnia, increased use of alcohol or drugs, feelings of worthlessness and significant weight loss or gain. The treatment of depression is effective 60 to 80 percent of the time, but according to the World Health Organization, fewer than 25 percent of individuals receive adequate treatment or are even diagnosed.
The Indian Health Service, the tribal government and the school district have rallied to address the crisis of youth suicide, but the issue hasn’t always received the attention that it has recently.
IHS on the Fort Peck Reservation employs five Ph.D psychologists, in addition to suicide prevention coordinator Sherl Shanks, who works on behalf of the tribes to counter the issue of suicide in the community.
“There are so many crises that they are dealing with,” Shanks says of the victims. She cites a “breakdown in families” and adds that “even good families” have suffered the loss of family members taking their own lives. But, she cautions that there is no single answer, or often even a reason anyone can pinpoint.
“I don’t think they want to die,” she says. “They just want to end the pain in their lives.”
Counselor Charlie Whisenhunt agrees that family issues play a role in students’ mental states.
“It’s an issue of what happened last night,” says Whisenhunt, referring to students who deal with drug, alcohol and sexual and domestic abuse in their homes.
Whisenhunt came to the Fort Peck Reservation in the early 1980s to research fetal alcohol syndrome for his Ph. D from Columbia Pacific University. Today he serves many roles: director of special education, school psychologist, and coordinator for mental health services in the Poplar school district.
For a time IHS had only one person in the school district who dealt with mental health issues, he says, but at present “it’s really an embarrassment of riches” in terms of staffing.
In the Poplar school district, the largest on the reservation, six mental health counselors serve the students. Two more mental health counselors are employed by an outside agency.
“It’s a big unit to have for a district this size,” says Whisenhunt as the sound of girls laughing and lockers slamming reverberates into his office from the outside hallway, “but what we have found is because of the numbers, it’s necessary.”
However, he cautions that staffing alone is not the solution.
“Now they are all beefed up and that’s great, but that doesn’t last long usually,” he says. “Money is not going to fix this problem; the community has to rise up.”
Though boys commit suicide more frequently than girls, females have a more frequent attempt rate and Whisenhunt says the numbers of girls attempting suicide at Fort Peck coincides with national statistics. The difference is that at Fort Peck the rate of completion is higher because girls on the reservation choose more lethal means to end their lives.
“We need to teach coping skills and life skills. They need a repertoire of choices besides suicide (and) we need to lengthen that list (of choices),” says Whisenhunt.
Whisenhunt notes that all the psychologists in the school district are certified as both school counselors and licensed mental health practitioners. That’s fortunate, he says, because the school district goes through “some pretty dry times as far as support is concerned.”
Gloria Collins believes support and collaboration are keys to helping the community heal. Collins grew up on the Fort Peck Reservation, but lived in the Southwest until a few months ago. As a tribal member and a clinical psychologist, she has returned home to help.
“I know things can be good, there can be healthy families that are united,” Collins remarks after a meeting in the tribal council chambers that involved all facets of mental health on the reservation. “If we all step up like we did today, that is the start,” she adds. The room was filled with several members of the tribal council and community leaders. Shanks was there along with Doug Moore, acting chief medical officer at Fort Peck’s IHS and head of behavioral health, and Ken Smoker, director of the Tribal Wellness Program.
Collins called the gathering “a healing process” and an important acknowledgment of suicide as a pressing issue at Fort Peck.
She, too, says the responsibility must fall on the whole community, not just individuals. The group scheduled meetings every other Monday to discuss how to address suicide in the community.
Roxann Bighorn was at the gathering too, sitting at the head of the council table. She called the meeting historic in terms of the collaboration.
Her son’s suicide remains the most difficult part of Roxann’s life. But tribal customs have given her some solace.
On the night the family found Quinn, they held a pipe ceremony and sweat to guide his spirit to the other side.
Roxann recalls that night inside the sweat lodge, she could see Quinn standing directly in front of her when she closed her eyes. With each round of the sweat, when the flap covering the lodge was opened to let in the cool air, Roxann says her son’s spirit traveled further to the spirit world. He always had his dog Reggie by his side, but he kept turning back like he didn’t want to leave his family.
“It’s all good Quinn, just keep going on,” Roxann called to him, quoting her son’s favorite phrase, “It’s all good.”
When the final of the four flaps was opened, Roxann didn’t have to tell Quinn to keep going. In her vision he ran toward his grandpa Norman and grandma Deremus and embraced them in front of a huge tipi beside a glistening creek.
“I knew in my heart that I knew where my son was then,” she says. “It was all good.’”