Abused runaway finds her calling

Cape Bretoner helping others who need help on P.E.I.

There is a clinking of empty glass bottles and an inescapable funk of spilled drinks and vomit that clouds the air.

It permeates the walls of the Cape Breton home, where eight children are invisible from mainstream society, their parents milling around in a drunken world.

It's still vivid in her memory, and when looking back at her childhood, Belinda Woods wonders how she survived at all.

“I had a terrible home life — a father who was very physically brutal, a pedophile. I was charged with attempted murder and served time,” she said in a soft but matter-of-fact way.

Her composure is calm, professional, as someone that has learned there is a future beyond the rubble.

Yet her hands tell a different story. There is a restlessness about them when sharing her past as if unveilling a gangrenous wound — foul and profound.

Woods shares she has manageable post traumatic stress disorder.

“When I was 10, my mother died. She was ruthless too. Mother often burned my hands on an oil stove, and I had to peel them off. The beatings were so bad. That is why I feel I should have been dead so many times, but you can overcome anything," she said of growing up in a small rural community outside of Sydney.

‘A CRAZY LIFE’

At 14, Woods packed her few belongings, and with the belief that nothing could be worse than what she was running away from, she left home in the quiet hours of the night and hitchedhiked to Ontario.

In their last published statistics, the RCMP claim “58 per cent of all missing children or young people involve females.”

In 2019, the RCMP said runaways represented most of all missing children in Canada, with reports at almost 30,000.

Woods may have been one of them, but she believes running away from home most likely saved her life.

“It was a crazy life. A lot of bad things happened along the way.”

Woods joined her older sister in Ontario and found work in a factory before Cape Breton pulled her back.

“I got married in Cape Breton as a teenager and we had a baby girl. But that did not work out, so I moved back to Ontario with my daughter. I worked all the time and eventually remarried.”

The man she married was an alcoholic, although he was not drinking at the time.

Four months in, Woods

found herself running away from him with “a peace bond and many bruises.”

She lost everything except the clothes on her back. But she discovered something incredible about herself: in a dire situation, there is always a choice.

“Stay and wallow in the situation or persevere and triumph over those obstacles,” she said.

The latter, she admits, is no easy feat.

“Having my daughter kept me going. I would bounce from job to job to keep a one-room apartment roof over our heads while she slept in a bed and me on the floor," Woods said.

"But I decided to break the chain of abuse and neglect that I suffered as a child. My daughter would never know.”

TROUBLED TIMES

Woods sought counselling for her past and, after time, mustered the courage to confront her father.

“I was halfway there when I learned he had died of a stroke. But I look at it like this — my father was such an alcoholic that he would never have remembered. It would have brought no closure.”

Her siblings struggled from the physical and sexual abuse, alcoholism and violence they had endured in childhood.

“To give an idea of mental health, my oldest sister that took the brunt of a lot of things ended up killing someone in domestic violence. She got life in prison, but after 10 or 15 years, she was safe and released. But she struggled from the past. She died alone. Her body was discovered a few days later," Woods said.

“My brother, a few months later, suffering from schizophrenia, threatened to kill his girlfriend. He beat her badly and took off with her vehicle. In a police chase, there was a crash. The car my brother was in tumbled over and caught fire. He died.”

HEALING THROUGH SERVICE

For healing, Woods said she found religion, learned to let go of her past burdens and forgive, and in the basement of a commercial-style building in Summerside, P.E.I. opened Free Store.

As the name suggests, those in need can find various goods — ranging from clothing to furniture — free of charge in a non-judgmental space.

Wendy Peters, a volunteer at the store, says the environment

is one of a warm and caring family.

“Belinda is the matriarch, and we always have so much fun and enjoy each other's company," Peters said. "Most importantly, what we do makes a difference in our community and that without Belinda, none of this would be possible.”

Thousands have come through the store since it opened in 2016.

“People can put you in a box and make you feel like you will never amount to anything. But it is OK to say, ‘I want something better,' and strive for it. Never underestimate your abilities,” states Woods, who left school when she was pregnant with a Grade 10 education.

‘WORTH IT’

Looking back, Woods said that her journey has been worthwhile.

“Helping others so they may have a second chance at life is worth it.”

And Woods helps people wherever she can — whether volunteering at the store or working as a full-time settlement officer at the P.E.I. Association of Newcomers to Canada.

When it comes to love, last week marked her 40th wedding anniversary to her husband, Pat.

Woods said some people dream of their wedding their entire lives, but marriage is about commitment, and it is not always glamorous, nor is it for the faint of heart.

“Marriage is about being committed to loving someone through all the highs and lows. And acknowledge every little thing your partner does, be grateful and kind,” she said, while adding that love is action, not empty words.

The couple has built a solid and beautiful marriage and a son from it, she said.

Her story is one of struggle, survival and dreams. It's about finding a way when there is no way.

“The biggest obstacle is to get over that mindset that you can't. Believe you can and you will,” said Woods.