The Jard Family: Intergenerational Trauma

This is a story of what gets passed along to our future generations. It’s a story not written by me by by my second cousin Maiala Waters, her Mumma Rennae is my first cousin. Maiala’s matriarchial line is through her Mum Rennae, her Grandmother Janet McCabe (my Aunty), and her Great Grandmother, Alice James.

Every Aboriginal family are survivors of slavery. The country we see now, it’s infrastructure and this economy, and the prosperity and economic opportunity exists as a result of slavery and stolen wages. Slavery and colonisation also causes trauma, so the legacy of that will be passed on to future generations, also the very obvious and real financial disadvantage. So here we are, taking steps to heal and support eachother in our community. Some times we get lucky and we get to do it as our day job.

Below are some reflections from my cousin Maiala Waters.

Here is her voice..........

As some of you may know I have been working in Child Safety most of the year and recently made the switch to community, still in the same sector, but now I support families to lead the discussions about their lives and their children. I work in this sector not to point the finger at our mums and dads struggling with the challenges life brings or to remove our babies. I work in this sector to create space where we can have real and raw yarns about how we are in the position we’re in today. I wrote similar words today that I thought I would share. Not to big note how deadly a writer I am (cause I already know that derrrr) but to do what we have done for tens of 1000s of years, share one of my stories. One of the stories that make me who I am today.

I leave you with a raw reality of intergenerational trauma. The same reality shared by the families I work with every day. The reality of my Great Grandmother, Alice James, a proud Pitta Pitta woman who was a mother, a Nan, an Aunty and a respected Elder. Before my Grandmother became any of these things though she was nothing but a slave. Despite being the best Mum, Nan, Aunty and Elder she could be, those days of being a slave always stayed with her. And it stayed with my Nan and it stays with my mum and now me and my daughter. That is the reality of intergenerational trauma that we don’t see. That is the reality of intergeneration trauma thousands of Aboriginal peoples carry. This is why I do the work that I do. Because I know the worlds our families are in. Because I too am in that world. And I can hear the pain they don’t know how to voice. Because I too, carry that pain. I want to create spaces for our families to share their yarns. I want to create platforms to understand that trauma passed down from our old people and hopefully keep some of our babies out of the system. I carry my Great Grandmother’s strength in all I do. And I see that strength in my daughter and my son. I see that strength in all my people and I want to empower our families to know, they too, carry that strength. Here are some photos of my Old Nan and women who I love that share the same beautiful strong matriarch I do