“Go to school, get an education so that you so come back and have a great job.” That’s Andrea Andersen’s advice. She is from Makkovik in Nunatsiavut and she has lived in Iqaluit, Nunavut for eight years now. She works as a physiotherapist in the Qikiqtani General Hospital and she’s one of ten in the territory with a population of 30,000. She works with patients at every stage of life, from infants with decreased muscle tone who need help learning to sit up to postoperative fracture recoveries to home visits with elders to in-patient stroke patient recovery, all in the span of a day.

As a teen who played a lot of sports and lived in an athletic community known for its badminton and volleyball players, Andersen needed physiotherapy for her feet. Getting care for her arches was something she enjoyed. While pursuing this as a career seemed like a natural choice as someone who is naturally athletic, it wasn’t her first choice.

For the first two years of university, Andersen pursued Chemistry but realized she didn’t want to be sitting in a lab for the rest of her life and she craved more movement. A friend suggested a human kinetics and recreation course and it was so aligned for her. The biomechanics worked so much better for her brain than the Math and English required for chemistry.

Andersen decided to pursue an undergraduate degree in Kinesiology through Memorial University. Later, she had to decide whether to pursue Public Health, Physio Or Occupational Therapy, Medicine, Nursing or Chiropractic. She opted for Physiotherapy at Dalhousie University, the closest program to home. It was still a two day trip to get back,  longer depending on the weather. One Christmas she spent nine days waiting in the airport.

Going to university was overwhelming for Andersen. Out of her graduating class of ten, she was the only one who didn’t pursue a trade and she had to move from her community of 350 people.  Her first math class was bigger than her home community. She was still glad she tried it and wasn’t afraid of the change. The first couple years were the hardest and it got easier as she went along.

Her advice for Indigenous students leaving their home community to get an education would be, “It is very difficult, because not only are you leaving your friends and your family, but you're also leaving a lot of your lifestyle and your diet….and having to disconnect also and your support system being so far away…,But then you think about it, it's only a few years. You have your whole life.…Just think of what type of life you want for yourself, and that there are going to be sacrifices that you're going to have to make. Some of them might be small, some of them might be big, but in order for you to grow, you have to make changes, and one of those changes is leaving home to get an education if your program is not online.”

Playing intramural sports, provincial, summer, and winter games helped connect Andersen to familiar things and helped her manage stress. At home, she had winter and fall sports meets and she traveled to regional and provincial competitions. She competed in badminton nationally. At school, she also went to the school gym and stayed in residence, there were teams competing against each other. She also wrestled for Memorial University’s wrestling team as the only Indigenous person on the team.  She recommends building a social network for support and community while away.  

As far as obstacles, Andersen struggled with learning how to learn and study. In high school, her teachers were online and she did distance studies so it was a very different experience in university. She found going to subject-focussed help centres helpful and she had to get over reluctance to ask for help given she’s so independent. Leaving behind her culture, food and family was tough, but Friendship Centres and Indigenous resources offices on campus were great. Meeting other Indigenous students was comforting when she was far from home. When wrestling, some of the questions she dealt with about Indigenous people were inappropriate.

Thinking about reintegrating after school, Andersen was determined not to move back to a city, preferring to live somewhere small. She wanted to reconnect with culture, language, and spend time sewing, hunting, picking berries, fishing and being on the land. She was supposed to cover for someone for eight months and ended up staying longer than expected but she’s made a home there, finding ways to connect with her culture. In her home community, there would be no job for her and she didn’t want to start a private practice. She has no plans to move at the moment and she’s had some exciting opportunities. Andersen got to manage Team Nunavut, an experience she found exciting and emotional, having represented Newfoundland and Labrador before.

To manage her mental health, Andersen makes art by sewing, drawing or crafting. She spends time on the land, whether that’s walking, going out to the river, skidooing or boating. She does counseling and volunteers. Generally, she looks to do things that bring joy and don’t add stress. What she loves most is cleaning seal skin and going hunting. Both take a lot of energy so she doesn’t have to go to the gym, and she can share her cultural knowledge with others at the same time.

When it comes to inspiration, Andersen looks to Nelson Mayer, past president  of the National Association of Friendship Centers. When he was on the youth council, she found he created a comfortable environment and amplified youth voices on Indigenous rights. Her young daughter also inspires her, teaching her patience, to slow down and letting her teach. “I also get inspired by anyone who is okay to step outside of their comfort zone, because that is probably one of the hardest things to do, because a lot of people don't like being uncomfortable, and a lot of Indigenous people, especially Inuit, it is very hard for us to step out of our comfort zones and to be in spaces like this. I really draw inspiration from people like that,” Andersen explains.

She went to school, got an education, came back and now she has a great job. Working as a physiotherapist, Andrea Andersen works with patients across the lifespan, helping them feel better every day. Leaving home was hard, but she learned a lot to help the North and now she’s building the life she wants to lead.

Thank you to Alison Tedford Seaweed for writing this article!