Bereavement Day service offers solace for those who lost loved ones to drugs

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This article was published 03/05/2024 (877 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There is shame and negativity attached to those who have lost their lives due to substance-related harms as well as the loved ones left behind, who are often forced to grieve in private, says Antoinette Gravel-Ouellette of the advocacy group Moms Stop the Harm Brandon.

“We want to reduce the stigma — because stigma plays a big role in people reaching out to get help and how they’re treated when they do,” Gravel-Ouellette said.

“People often die alone. And this is not just an unhoused population problem — this is in every class of people who have died alone in their homes because of toxics and substance use,” she said.

“So, we’re hoping to remove that stigma so people realize that it’s the behaviour and nothing to be ashamed about, so they can reach out and get the health and supports they need.”

This Sunday during Drug-Related Death Bereavement Day, a memorial service is being held for those who have lost someone to toxic drugs.

It will take place at Brandon’s Dinsdale Park from 4-5 p.m. and is organized by Moms Stop the Harm Brandon in conjunction with members of the group Gone Too Soon.

Gravel-Ouellette said the media is not invited to the event, and the only photos will be the ones that family or friends are encouraged to bring to remember those who have died. There will also be soup and bannock available, and loved ones are encouraged to bring music or a poem in memory.

Drug-Related Death Bereavement Day is a provincial act that started as a private member’s bill in April 2022, introduced by the NDP’s Bernadette Smith when she was the party’s mental health and addictions critic. It passed three months later.

Smith is now Manitoba’s minister of housing, addictions and homelessness.

The act states that the official day to recognize the impact of drug overdoses on families and communities will be held the Sunday before Mother’s Day of every year.

Gravel-Ouellette was present for meetings when the provincial act was being discussed with Smith and said, “Manitoba got it right, when other provinces called it Bereaved Mother’s Day.”

She added: “I don’t want in any way, shape or form to discount mothers who have lost a child at all anywhere, but it’s not only mothers who lose children.

“People lose partners, fathers lose children, people lose co-workers — it is all-encompassing. So this way, it incorporates everybody’s bereavement, and I really appreciate that our province did the wording the way they did,” she said.

There were 445 suspected drug-related overdose deaths in 2023, an increase from 418 in 2022, and 432 in 2021, according to the latest data from Manitoba’s chief medical examiner in the substance-related harms surveillance report.

The vast majority of substance-related deaths occurred with multiple substances being present, including alcohol, the report stated.

Methamphetamines and cocaine are associated with three-quarters (55 per cent and 76.4 per cent) of the 72 substance-related deaths in the months of August and September 2023.

Fentanyl and para-fluor fentanyl caused 50 deaths, or 69.4 per cent. Almost half the deaths are attributed to benzodiazepine at 47.2 per cent, or 34 people.

Gravel-Ouellette said while it’s important to support those who are grieving, using supportive language around people who are struggling is important as well.

“It impacts someone when we call people drug addicts, alcoholics, because the person that is struggling with something, they are not that.

“They have internalized the stigma that they are not worthy, that they do not feel safe to let anybody know, and that is a barrier to seeking help.”

The next step for Moms Stop the Harm Brandon and other support organizations including Healing Hearts, Holding Hope and Gone Too Soon is to reduce the number of deaths by curbing the toxic drug supply, and that will come by reducing the stigma, said Gravel-Ouellette.

For more information about Drug-Related Death Bereavement Day, email brandongonetoosoon@gmail.com or find Gone Too Soon on Facebook.

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