D, Take a Hike youth

"As I get ready to graduate from Take a Hike, I’m excited to get ready for my future. "

Before Take a Hike, my life was unstructured. I wasn’t going to school, and I was arguing with my mom a lot. I was doing things that maybe a kid shouldn’t be doing, and life was just unhealthy. I wasn’t in the best state, mentally or physically. Eventually, I learned about Take a Hike through a friend of a friend. They told my mom about the program and since it had worked so well for them, my mom signed me up. We met with Kayla, the Youth and Family Worker and some of the teachers and it went really well, and I felt comfortable coming to Take a Hike for my grade 10 year.  

Coming into the program, I still felt like it was just school but as I started to warm up it felt better being in the program. In the beginning, I definitely struggled with being shy and being a bit uncomfortable cause, it does take time for me to warm up. The first year for me at Take a Hike was a bit nerve-wracking because I’m shy and I didn’t really have friends and didn’t consider the kids in the Take a Hike program as being my crowd. I still wasn’t coming to school very often and disappeared for a while but then I would actually come back and started to enjoy coming to school. Before coming to Take a Hike, I would complete maybe a third of the year and then just not come back. At mainstream school, I never had any friends and then I wouldn’t want to go. And because I didn’t go, I would get behind on my work and it would pile up and any motivation to go would be gone. When I joined Take a Hike, I started to make friends and I actually wanted to come to class. I started to keep up with my work and I felt good about school and just kept going. 

My second year at Take a Hike was even better. I became less shy and began making friends and getting along with other kids in the program. I started to really get to know myself and my comfort level began to grow. Now, in my third year, I have no anxiety at all. Besides the odd time when I have to get my schoolwork done, I don’t experience anxiety very much anymore. I’m still a bit shy when it comes to pursuing friendships but if someone were to come up to me with the goal of being my friend, I wouldn’t shy away from them and be way more open to building a friendship than I ever was before. 

I have so many great memories from the last couple years at Take a Hike. One that stands out to me is last year when we went to Evans Lake near the end of the year. It was a one-day trip and we set up a campfire and sat around the fire playing a game where everyone closed their eyes, and someone walked around the group to tap someone on the back to show appreciation. It was great to see everyone go around the circle and share who they were grateful for and who they appreciated. It was a nice feeling to be able to share and get to know each other better. There was another time that we were out on a trip and at one point, I looked up and all the adults were standing together, and the fire was lighting up their faces and they were all smiling, and I looked around the campfire, and everyone else was smiling too. That moment sticks out to me because it made me happy, and I realized I was smiling too. I had brought my blanket and I was snuggled up by the fire and I was just happy. I knew I belonged. In the beginning, I saw the trips as just field trips and when we go and do things outdoors, I just thought it sucked. But as we started to do these trips more, I started to get more comfortable and actually enjoyed the trips. While I still don’t like the physical part of the trips, I really like getting outdoors because I don’t get to do that much on my own. It pushed me to get out more and I’ve really grown to love it. Before Take a Hike, I would have never gone out but now I seek out the outdoors and it’s a bigger presence in my life. 

I’ve learned a lot about myself over my time at Take a Hike. I’m a pretty self-aware person and I’ve been like this for a while. I like to take things apart and find out new things about myself. Through my time at Take a Hike, I’ve realized I’m not as shy as I once thought I was. I just needed the right people around me and Take a Hike provides that. I’m discovering new things about myself. For example, I used to act on instinct and now I stop and think about the consequences of my actions, and I check in with myself more. Last year, I started doing breathing exercises with our Clinical Counsellor Greg and I’ve found this has helped me connect with myself and manage my anxiety. We learned about the Window of Tolerance and I’m able to understand my tolerance level and know how to handle situations better without getting mad. I’m a lot calmer and situations go a lot differently for me now than they would have before Take a Hike. 

As I get ready to graduate from Take a Hike, I’m excited to get ready for my future. I want to continue being in the outdoors and exploring part of the world through nature. I’m thinking about going into either post-secondary or trades to go into plumbing. I’ve also developed an appreciation for my community. I would like to volunteer more and give back to my community. My mom and I used to go the food bank when I was younger, and it would be great to be able to give back to my community knowing what it’s like to be on the other end. To be honest, before coming to Take a Hike, I wouldn’t have even had this plan. I wouldn’t have bothered to think about the future. Take a Hike has done a lot for me. 

— D, Take a Hike youth