The Rural Voice, 2003-12, Page 26Dealing with Stress
BSE, poor hog prices, weather worries with harvest? There are
plentg of causes of stress. Christmas doesn't need to add to the
burden, advisors sag.
By Keith Roulston
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There are plenty of reasons for
Ontario farm families to be
feeling stressed as Christmas
approaches this year. The BSE crisis
has had devastating repercussions for
beef, sheep, goat and some dairy
farmers. Pork prices have not been
anything to celebrat. And even where
prices are strong in corn and
soybeans, terrible weather this fall
has meant worry that the crop can be
harvested.
Alex Leith, Co-ordinator of
Queen's Bush Rural Ministries and
Susan Klein-Swormink, Project Co-
ordinator with The Farm Line say the
stress of this year is taking a toll and
that the Christmas season is likely to
add to the pressure some families
feel.
Klein-Swormink says 70-80 per
cent of the calls to The Farm Line are
related to the BSE crisis with the
calls coming from areas where beef
and sheep farming is prominent.
Callers are under a heavy stress
22 THE RURAL VOICE
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level and expressing frustration at the
situation in which they find
themselves, she says. They have no
sense that they can control their
situation.
Not only farmers but those in the
trucking industry are also being
affected by the BSE crisis, Klein-
Swormink says.
Operating in the centre of
Ontario's of beef and sheep industry.
Leith sees stress surfacing in a
variety of ways among the callers to
his help line which dates its long
history back to the farm crisis of the
1980s. Often the stress comes out in
relations between family members.
Recently he was able to help with an
intervention with a family that feared
the father might be ready to take his
life because of the situation. In
general, though, there haven't been
as many calls as he thought there
might be under the circumstances.
But stress in rural areas goes well
beyond the farm gate. Recently, Leith
said, there seems to be an increase in
the number of people who can't pay
their rent or electrical bills. Food
banks are also getting heavy use.
After years with no increases in the
support paid out by the Ontario
Works system, people are finding
they have to use some of the money
intended for food to pay rents in
order to keep a roof over their
family'sheads.
For farm families under financial
pressure, cashflow problems
and the pressure of a parent
feeling they need to live up to a
certain standard at Christmas add to
the stress on families, says Klein-
Swormink.
Gabriel Del Bianco of lnnerfit
Counselling Centre of Auburn, who
worked with the Huron County Pork
producers to help farmers caught in
the pork price disaster of 1998 and
1999, says that whether you're
pressed for money or you have no
economic worries but feel pressed for