After the Gathering, We Keep Listening

For the families who keep asking, the communities who keep searching, and the women whose names must never be allowed to disappear.

There are days when the red dresses are hung where everyone can see them. People gather. Names are spoken. Photographs are held close to hearts and lifted for strangers to see.

Then the gathering ends. The chairs are folded. The dresses come down. People return to the things waiting for them at home.

But for a family whose loved one is missing, the waiting does not end when an event is over. And for a family grieving someone who has been murdered, remembrance is not confined to a square on the calendar.

I have been thinking about what it means to stay present after the crowd has gone.

What does it mean to keep listening?

Behind Every Name Is a Life

When we talk about missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, it can be tempting to reach for a number because numbers seem to explain the size of a crisis. But a number cannot tell you the sound of a person’s laugh or the story her grandmother loved to tell about her.

It cannot tell you about the people who know her as a daughter, a sister, a mother, an auntie, a friend. It cannot hold the ordinary moments that make a life a life.

This is why I return to the words I wrote in Before She Became a Statistic. Every person deserves to be remembered as more than the most painful thing that happened to her.

And when a person is missing, our words matter, too. Missing does not mean forgotten, and it does not give us permission to invent an ending. Families deserve careful reporting, current information, and respect for what they choose to share.

Listening Is Something We Do

Listening can begin with a name, but it should not stop there. Indigenous families and advocates have been telling us what they need: to be heard, to be taken seriously, to have their loved ones searched for, and to have their communities’ knowledge and leadership respected.

The National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center shares Indigenous-led advocacy and resources on missing and murdered Indigenous women and relatives. Its MMIW toolkit for families and communities offers information for people navigating a missing or murdered loved one’s case.

If you want to help, begin by listening to the family and to Indigenous-led organizations. Share a current notice from a reliable source, and follow the family’s wishes about what should be made public. If you have information about a case, send it to the investigating agency rather than posting guesses online.

Support can also look like showing up for a community event, offering the practical help a family actually asks for, or supporting an Indigenous-led organization doing this work. It can mean asking elected officials what they are doing to support timely investigations and services shaped by the communities they serve.

None of these actions asks us to make a family’s pain our own story. They ask us to stand beside people who are already carrying it.

There Is No One Way to Remember

Some families speak publicly. Some organize walks or share photographs. Some may need room to grieve away from strangers. Some may feel hope and exhaustion in the same hour.

We do not get to decide which response is the right one. We can respect the boundaries a family sets and leave room for their voices to lead.

And we can remember that Indigenous communities are not defined only by violence or loss. They are living communities of distinct nations, languages, families, traditions, creativity, and joy. Their futures matter as much as their histories.