When I was 14, my mother kicked my father out of the house because she found out that he had a girlfriend on the side.  What she did not fully realize was the abuse I suffered at his hands for years.  From being whipped with a belt for what seemed like hours on end, the ridicule, name calling, and otherwise being bullied by a man who was supposed to by one of the two people who was supposed to love me more than anyone else under any circumstances.  I had already had it in my mind for a number of years (even at that age) that when I was an adult and moved out that he would be out of my life.  Well, a month and a half after he moved out, he decided that he was too disenfranchised with the Catholic church to attend my confirmation.  He couldn’t even be there for me for something that was so important because of his self-absorption.  That was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

 I informed my mother the next day that I wished to have no further contact with him.  She thought I would come around after a while but she had no idea how deeply I felt about him.  At the time, I truly hated him (time and maturity have helped me to forgive him for my own benefit since then).  I was roundly criticized by his parents and any number of family members on my mother’s side that are of the belief that parents should receive a free pass for their actions.  My father also resorted to trying to bully me and insult me ("you want to be a baby the rest of your life and not talk to me, FINE!!").  However, many of the relatives that criticized me so heavily at first, while not necessarily agreeing with me, at least came around to see my point of view and why I did what I did. 

Since then, I have graduated with honors from my high school, magna cum laude from college with a degree in accounting, and currently have a steady, well-paying, full-time job in the worst economy in the counrty.  I met my wife in 2005 and we will be celebrating our first anniversary in just over three weeks.  Maybe most importantly, I determined my own definition of being a good man instead of accepting his.  I treasure my wife for accepting me the way she has in spite of all my flaws and lingering issues from my childhood. 

I know that I am rambling a quite a bit I just want to leave with one piece of advice that I fully intend to follow with my future children; parents should be just as accountable to their children as the children are to their parents.  It should never be taken for granted that they will be there later no matter what.

Divorcing my first husband — my family was totally against it ("what will we tell people?") and I got absolutely no support, emotional or otherwise from them.  I had been miserable for ten years, and I couldn’t deal with it any more.  I had to find a job and learn to take care of myself and my two kids (5 and 9).  This was in 1968, just before the divorce boom.  I had a number of rough years, but put myself through graduate school, got an MBA and climbed up the corporate ladder.

It took a lot of courage for me to do this.  "Friends" told me I was crazy.  We were financially comfortable and I had to give that up and fend for myself.  I’ve never been sorry, and I’m much happier today.  I have a wonderful, loving husband and a good life.

I decided to move to Mexico and three months later was there. I had never been to Mexico and it took guts, but the real braves things are the ones we don’t even realize we have done until it’s over.

I saw a small beautiful dog being abused by a Mexican. I threw on the breaks of the car, put it in park and threw open the door and got out.  I yelled and screamed at him for a whole block. 

In Mexico with the "macho" thing still alive and well, and guns everywhere, it was not the wisest thing to do. But if it made one difference in that animals life it was worth it.

There was a line that the actor James Garner said in one of his parts that went something like this (after someone had called him a hero): "A hero is just someone who is so sick and tired and disgusted with the matter, that he just doesn’t care anymore…" 

I get like this alot and just up and spontaneously blurt crap out in hopes of rectifying matters, or at least putting a spotlight on a subject.  After I say it, later on in the day I realize what I did and tell myself to shut my ass up, or somebody’s gonna shoot it!

A fella I onced worked with, we had to keep a blog of our mechanical duties (we were mechanics in a bowling alley) in order to let the next one on shift know what maintenance had been done on the 40 separate pinsetter machines.  We used to spice up the blog with humorous anecdotes to leave the next reader (there were 4 of us who all worked a lone shift, just ourself and the machines) a warm human contact of sorts to get them through the shift.  We were all pretty miserable in our loneliness of the job and wouldn’t let the other one go home for a while after his shift was over, to have someone to talk to… 

Anyway, in a fit of misery, this fella writes in the blog: "I’M SICK AND TIRED OF BEING SICK AND TIRED!"

Well there you have it… =o)

To answer the question "what was the bravest thing you’ve ever done"?, it would be easy to pick having a natural birth at home in 1974 before it was ‘in’ and the doctor was late 30 minutes after I gave birth, or hiking the Grand Canyon on a torn knee tendon for 17 miles to a ranger station, but that was only a physical challenge, I could say raising my 3 young kids on a remote mountain alone without hot water, a phone, or a bathroom after my husband abandoned us but that was my duty, or maybe pushing on my daughter’s abdomen while she was in labor to straighten out my granddaughter who was crooked and not coming out so she could enter the birth canal and my daughter could avoid  undergoing an emergency c-section.  That’s what a mother does to help her child.  No, all great times in my life, but the bravest thing I ever did was stand up to my boss. 

After 2 of my kids were grown it was my turn to fulfill a dream so with my youngest in high school I returned to WSU to earn my degree in natural resource management and eventually I put both my youngest son and me through college at the same time.  I began working for the federal government as a GS-4 federal ranger. In just 3.5 years, I moved up the promotion ladder to a GS-9 Natural Resource Specialist at the Yuma (AZ) Area Office where I wrote legal environmental compliance documents and manage an invasive plant species program. 

This is where I met two racist and sexist men who turned my life into a living hell.  As soon as my supervisor learned I’m Native American he hated me and began a vicious physically and emotionally abusive campaign against me.  He had a coworker as his henchman who was sexually harassing me and several other women in the workplace.  This male, who stated he didn’t believe women should be in scientific positions in the government, which was me, also did what he could to sabotage my work so he could have my high-priority project removed from me and given to him for the career advancement and kudos.  My supervisor, a large bulky man,  screamed at me often and on two occasions tried to attack me to hit me. He said racially denigrating things about Indians in our staff meetings and I was rdiculed for being an Indian and for being a woman.  His buddy would ridicule me and tell othe employees bad things about me that were untrue to get people against me. Within a few short weeks, while the office director was out of town, these two men had my program removed from me and given to an outside contractor (an illegal move by fed contracting regulations).  I filed a EEO complaints and Violation of Ethics charges against the two of them.  Then it got bad, very bad, and I endured weeks of hell from these two.  They tried to get me to sign an illegal environmental document that was not defensible in court but, shaking like a leaf, I refused to sign away my ethics. I wouldn’t be their ‘fall guy’. Then my boss warned me if I refused another order he would charge me with insubordination.  Two days later I was ordered to work out in the field in a desert canyon, if I refused I would be fired from the federal government.  I would then be blackballed and unemployable.  I had to go, even though I had a bad right arm from an earlier work injury and I was scheduled for surgery, which they knew.  I was forced to work for 5.5 hours in a rugged desert canyon without food breaks or rest.  A rock gave way under me pitching me down onto a large boulder tearing out my left shoulder and left knee, further injuring my right shoulder, and twisting my neck.  My doctor took me off all work (I couldn’t use my arms for months) and I had surgery but it failed to fix me.  Within a short 10 weeks my boss terminated me from my job stating it was because I was disabled.  He hated me for being an American Indian and a woman and I was injured and lost my job. He took away my civil rights and I was mad. I filed a charge of EEO retaliation against him his buddy and the federal government.  On appeal the EEOC agreed with me and gave me the right to sue.  I sold my property to pay for an attorney and sued the government in federal district court for race and sex discrimination.  I couldn’t believe I was doing it but I did.  At least my attorney got them to face me during depositions - well worth the money! They lied under oath but my attorney was able to trip them up and they got caught in their lies. Some of the truth came out. A little vindication was awesome.  Still, the government has all the taxpayers money to fight back against an employees lawsuit and the district court judge found against me awarding the defendants summary judgment.  I had one last recourse.  The appellate court.  But my attorney didn’t want to and I was out of money.  I’d already spent nearly $50,000 and hadn’t even made it to a jury trial.  But they took away my civil rights.  They didn’t have the right to trample on me.  I filed my appeal in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals pro se, meaning by myself.  I made all the motions and wrote my appeal by myself and with some prayers.  At this point in time my case is still pending at the appellate court.  I likely won’t win but it was something I had to do.  I truly believe that if you aren’t willing to fight for your rights you don’t deserve them.  I lost my job, my career, my profession, I am permanently physically disabled and suffer terrible chronic pain and depression since their abuse in 2004.  So facing the monsters and standing up for myself against racial and gender hatred and their race and sex discrimination that did this to me is probably the bravest thing I’ve ever done and I’m proud of myself.  

Thanks for listening.     

I think Candice is right in that the bravest things involve getting past your own fright, and do not always match what the world may think of as brave. I have done a number of things the world might think of as brave but for most of those things I did not have internal fear, whether sensible or not.

Two of the things I think of as most brave because of most internal fear were:

1)learning to drive mostly by myself. I had this thing about it ever since I was in two minor accidents as a passenger and was also affected by the wife’s death scene in "The Godfather". So, as I was always expecting the car to blow up for some unknown reason (not a rival gang but maybe an inept mechanic), every self given lesson was filled with terror. I also thought maybe I would step on the wrong pedal. The biggest deal was when I forced myself to go out on the highway and then realized that I had forgotten to buckle my seat belt. Then it started to rain. Fortunately it was MLK’s birthday and the traffic was light. Eventually I began to love driving. I also had a "moment" when I ran out of gas on the upramp to the freeway and was nudged up and down another off ramp and across traffic by a police car. My car was in neutral and I had forgotten that you could use the brake so I was sweating bullets going around turns.

2)My beloved cat was old, sick and dehydrated and I was taught how to give him IM fluids. To me that was one of the bravest things I have done as to have caused him pain would have been unthinkable and the idea of using a big needle made me want to hurl, but I did it and for months to keep him going.

So, I have faced down some bullies, moved to a completely new place knowing no one, given what for to close relatives, and brought some suits but none compares to the two items mentioned above.

My bravest moments were when l made a short speech at the University of

Miami School  of  Medicine in Coral Gables back in the mid-nineties.

l’m suffer from bi-polar disorder and l was attending a group every month

with people of the same ilk. A person from U of M came too some of our

meetings, we became friendly and she asked me too make a small talk

about my illness at the School.  Before l knew it l was driving down to

Coral  Gables me with  no sense of directions but l did get there on time

but my stomach had fallen to my feet.

OKAY THE TIME HAD COME   l walked into the room the students were

milling around and there in front of me was a small but very large in my

mind stage.

If you know me I very rarely write anything down l write like l speak.

l was up there for what seemed an eternity and then came questions.

That was my favorite part.  

l felt very brave and proud.

                                             Myr Sylvia Nielsen

I dont know if i would call it the bravest thing ive done but simply something i have to see through to the end.All information is now a matter of public record.

On March 28 ,2008 i was pushed by a male co-worker while employed as a welder  for Altec Ind my first insult. The second insult was for me to be suspended for 2 days without pay when i returned to work that Monday.  When my supervisor came to ask me what happened my paperwork was already filled out to send me home. Wow was i in a twillight zone.

I really thought the co.president or somebody would call me and say we made a mistake or something.

Well i filed charges against the assailaint and who shows up to testify that i told him i thought this man pushed me by accident but the current plant manager. There they are with their company shirts on and a lawyer who looked like he was on the verge of a heartattack during the short and held for the last case on the docket trial.

Well they found him not guilty because i had no actual eyewitness, when i wrote to the State Judicial Committee they said i didnt provide enough information but no one asked me any questions.

I will stand my ground because I know all the testimony given in the EEOC charges are true, when i went to court hoping for just a fair decision in this case those charges were and still are true. AND I HAVE NO PROBLEM TAKING A LIE DETECTOR TEST to any charges i have levied against Altec Inds.

I went back to school and pursued a trade to break a cycle of poverty that we lived in. A single mom striving to provide a quality life for me and my daughter. What worth will I show her and my grandaughters to not speak out and at the same time if it were not true I would not be writing.I have worked with some top notch guys in this trade because I pull my weight on a job. Would i tell a young lady that is struggling to look at the trades, Yes these are jobs that pay above average wages and you usually receive your degree in 1 yr. This was just one dumbass company that woke me up to a very ugly reality that a womens worth is still underappreciated and I cant express how inwardly sad this journey has been. Do you think if I had a husband to go home and tell that i was suspended for 2 days because a guy pushed me things would have turned out like they did? It should not matter that I am Black this is about one sister trying to make it through. Who told this company that it is okay to treat their female employees less than a male. If this is not stopped here what other companies will take the same attitude. My next generation will not have these bias treatments handed to them.

Remember the story of the villager who sat and watched his neighbors being taken away and when people asked for his help he said ’oh its not my business’ and he continued to turn a blind eye until one day there was a knock at his door but there was no one left to hear his cry. 

This is America I must stand on the shoulders of Justice and pray that a blind eye will not be cast my way. It is a funny thing about the truth no matter who it is that ask you or how much time passes by the story will never change. 

One of the bravest things I have ever done is be a mother.

Everyday I worry and wonder how my children will do that day. In 2002, I handed my daughter over so doctors could perform a life-saving heart operation. She is now the star of her swim team and a pageant princess. Everyday I pray my oldest, who has co-morbid Tourette’s Syndrome, will make it through the day without any problems. I pray for a way to pay for his medication and doctors visits. I look at my youngest and worry that time will move to fast because I know he is my last child and this is the last time I will ever see all those little firsts.

I will spend the rest of my life doing all I can to ensure my children grow up and have all the opportunities they deserve. Motherhood is definately not for cowards.