Ava Walkingstick performs in Braves on Broadway in the Chief Joyce Dugan Cultural Arts Center in Cherokee, N.C. on the evening of Dec. 13, 2024. (SCOTT MCKIE B.P./One Feather photo)
By BROOKLYN BROWN
One Feather reporter
CHEROKEE, N.C. – Ava Walkingstick is a sophomore at Cherokee High School (CHS). After losing her best friend and cousin, Cynthia “Mouse” Saunooke, in November 2023, Walkingstick has turned her grief into advocacy.
Saunooke’s family, including Walkingstick, were instrumental in the inaugural “From Darkness Into Hope” Mental Health Awareness and Suicide Prevention Event held on Sept. 4, 2024, at the Oconaluftee Island Park. The next event is coming up soon in Tutiyi (Snowbird) on May 1 from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Little Snowbird Field.
Ava Walkingstick speaks at the “From Darkness Into Hope” Mental Health Awareness and Suicide Prevention Event on the evening of Sept. 4, 2024 at the Oconalufee Island Park in Cherokee, N.C. (SCOTT MCKIE B.P./One Feather photo)
Walkingstick, a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, was a guest speaker at the event, where she shared her personal realizations after the loss of her friend, “I realized it’s ok to be hurt. It’s ok to feel the pain that you feel. It’s ok to cry. It’s ok to be mad. Because all those things that you feel are what is a part of you. It’s not just something that’s there, it’s something you’ve got to feel, it’s something you’ve got to express.”
Walkingstick says helping other teens with their mental health has become her passion, which she hopes to turn into a career, “I keep that mindset that helping teens is a big part of my goal right now. I want to do psychology. I want to minor in psychology, and I want to go into my major with a Native American law so I can use that psychology I know, and that psychology that I have personal experience with, to help Native Americans, because Native Americans have difficulty in mental health with suicide, mental illness, depression, and anxiety.”
In addition to her mental health advocacy, Walkingstick is treasurer of the student council, a member of the National Honor Society, part of the youth cultural exchange, in youth council at the Ray Kinsland Leadership Institute, a defensive specialist on the junior varsity Lady Braves volleyball team, a field athlete for CHS track and field, manager of the Lady Braves soccer team, a frontline associate at the Museum of the Cherokee People, and she just received the lead role of Sandy in the Cherokee Central School Musical Theater’s rendition of “Grease.”
Ava Walkingstick serves the volleyball in a JV match versus Swain Co. on the evening of Sept. 3, 2024 in Charles George Memorial Arena in Cherokee, N.C. (BROOKLYN BROWN/One Feather photo)
With quite a lot on her plate, Walkingstick prioritizes her own mental health by journaling, going on walks on the nature trail around the school, talking to her friends or her mentor, CHS English teacher and student council advisor Mindy Ledford, or just taking a day off to rest.
“Cynthia and I are similar. We’ll smile on days that we don’t want to show something, but I’ve kind of learned how to try to not do that,” she said.
“I think, ‘What would Cynthia want me to do rather than grieve?’ And something that I think she would think would be important is to help those who don’t speak up. She would want me to share our story and how I came from what happened and try to help other kids.”
Walkingstick added that anti-bullying is part of her mental health advocacy. “A teen’s point of view for me would be that there’s a lot of bullying, and I see it a lot and I don’t like it…I think schools everywhere could benefit from maybe trying to pull the kid who is bullying aside and finding out, ‘Is there anything going on? Is there anything at home? Are you going through something? Are you doing this because you are feeling pressured or feeling like you need to do it because you want to fit in?’ Have a conversation with them to the point that you are not just getting onto them, but you’re trying to help them. You’re trying to lend a hand or lend advice.”
“If it is a friend group, start at the friend group. You need to start with every single person there and talk one-on-one with them, not in a big group. Because if you do it in a big group, you’re just giving them a laugh. But if you do it one-on-one, they may be more open to listening.”
Walkingstick says mental health advocacy, even anti-bullying, is about empathy. “Unless you put yourself in their shoes, you never know what someone’s going through—until you walk in the lane that they’re walking in.”
