Life is tough for Nunavut’s disabled people

Wendy Ireland, the executive director of the Nunavummi Disabilities Makinnasuaqtiit Society, listens to Johnny Ittinuar of Rankin Inlet March 28 at workshop organized by the society to help identify the needs of Nunavummiut living with disabilities. (PHOTO BY JANE GEORGE)

Johnny Ittinuar of Rankin Inlet can’t forget the day he broke his back.

Nineteen years ago, Ittinuar was driving a car down an ice road near Rankin with some friends.

Then, he lost control of the car and it crashed.

Ittinuar, the driver, admits he had been drinking vodka before he got into the car.

Ittinuar says “luckily” he was the only one hurt when they went off the road.

When he woke up in a Winnipeg hospital, he knew he had done “a terrible thing.” While hunting out on the land, he’d seen what broken backs meant to animals.

Becoming disabled was going to be a “life-changing” situation, Ittinuar said. But he decided to return in Rankin Inlet, and not stay in Winnipeg, as his doctors had recommended.

A mechanic, Ittinuar had trouble getting readjusted to work. Since becoming disabled, he’s worked at various jobs, but said he always felt he was the first to be let go “because I’m in a wheelchair.”

However, living on a disability pension — just a bit more than regular social assistance — means he never has enough money.

All in all, life is in a wheelchair is twice as hard, Ittinuar said.

“I’d like to have a better lifestyle, but I can’t.”

And he’s lost his independence, although he’s grateful for the help he gets from his daughter and her boyfriend, who live with him.

Over the years, Ittinuar has learned how to be as self-sufficient as possible. He uses an adapted electric wheelchair to get around outside and a sleek, hand-driven second wheelchair, given to him by the Rick Hansen foundation to use indoors.

In Rankin Inlet, people are always ready to help, and he says he gets better care there than physically disabled people receive in Iqaluit where there is no permanent occupational therapist.

However, Iqaluit is getting more accessible, Ittinuar said. For example, the Legion now has a ramp, he said, whereas before he couldn’t make it inside.

“If you speak up, things can get better,” said Ittinuar, who says he’s an “eternal optimist.”

Nunavut is just starting to pay attention to its disabled residents and Ittinuar, a volunteer board member of the Nunavummi Disabilities Makinnasuaqtiit Society, said that group, founded in 2005, has helped Nunavut’s disabled, who number about 3,000.

Another active supporter and board member of the Makinnasuaqtiit Society is Noah Papatsie who lost his sight 10 years ago in work-related accident.

Today he gets around with a special cane and is hoping to get a seeing eye dog, like the one he tried in Ottawa. That’s because it’s not easy to manage with a cane in Iqaluit: there are fewer surfaces to guide him in the sand and snow of Iqaluit, he said.

Papatsie already has received equipment from the Canadian National Institute for the Blind that lets him reach out to the world — a computer that speaks to him and a watch that tells him the time out loud.

But, along with his wife and three children, he’s still adapting to being blind. And he’s also dealing with how people respond to him now because “people see us as totally different.”

The Nunavummi Disabilities Makinnasuaqtit Society the only territory-wide advocacy organization representing Nunavummiut living with disabilities. The group survives on $100,000 in annual core funding from the Government of Nunavut, which pays for the office rental and the salary of one staff member, along with occasional grants from other government agencies and non-profit groups.

But on March 28 it organized a special workshop, funded in part by Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada and the Canadian Association for Community Living.

There, you could find Ittinuar, Papatsie and about 50 other Nunavummiut with disabilities or interested in disabilities who came together to talk about subjects like accessibility, employment, new technology and how to make Nunavut a better place to live for the disabled.