Myra Gyrpuik just wants to be a Canadian citizen. After all, she has lived here for the majority of her life.
"I just want to be a Canadian citizen and naturally I'm getting to the point where I'm going to say 'f**k it' because I don't know what I'm going to get," she said, fighting back her tears and frustration.
In 1964, Gyrpuik was born in Oakland, California, to a mother from Alert Bay (but born near Kingcome Inlet), a village on Cormorant Island, almost three hours north of Campbell River and just off the coast of Port McNeill.
"My mom had a bunch of kids, she had 24 in total, not all, I know, some I've met. When I was months old, my mom brought me and my brothers and sisters back across the boat, and we were in Alert Bay, and I kept ending up in the hospital, apparently with malnutrition," said Grypuik, expressing that this is what she was told. "My dad, who adopted me, was the doctor in Alert Bay, and he turned around and told the Ministry of Children and Families that, 'I want her' and they said, 'You can take her and my mom went to the hospital to get me, and I was gone."
Grypuik would have been around eight months when the doctor, Englishman Dr. Edward Robert Dixon, and his wife, Rowena Margaret Dixon, took her. They formally adopted her on Oct. 14, 1973, in a closed adoption. Dixon has since died, and Grypuik is estranged from her adoptive mother and has no contact or relationship with her.
Grypuik was part of the Sixties Scoop, an informal name for policies in the 60s that allowed the state to take away Indigenous children from their families and communities and place them in foster homes where white parents would adopt them. The term originated in British Columbia during the 80s, among workers in the British Columbia Department of Social Welfare.
Neither Dixon pursued Canadian citizenship for themselves or Grypuik, nor did they find out she was a Canadian citizen until she was 13. She was applying for her first job, and needed to get her social insurance number. She went to the office that would give her that information with Rowena.
After giving the required information to the woman working at the desk, the woman came back and said, "You know, we could deport you right now?"
"That was the first thing she said to me," Grypuik. "I looked at my mom and said, 'What is she talking about?' They adopted me without knowing I was an American citizen."
A Canadian Immigration Record and a 10-year visa sponsorship were issued to her in 1981.
As an adult, Grypuik found out she needed citizenship documents in order to obtain a passport and access to government programs as an adult.
She cannot apply without documents showing her entry into Canada. Her adoption changed her information right back to birth on her birth certificate from California, reflecting her adoptive parents' information instead of that of her biological parents.
In 2005, Grypuik was named as kin of Emmeline Duncan in a letter sent by Judy Raber, an assistant estate liaison officer with the Public Guardian and Trustee of British Columbia. She wrote a statement that she was the lawful daughter of Duncan, who died on June 25, 1997, in Port Hardy and was entitled to a share of the assets of her mother's estate, who she believed died without a will. The only asset of the estate was a sum of $1,859.88 (CAD).
Grypuik actually met her biological mother when she was 28 years old in 1992.
"What happened is I wanted to find out if I had status, and so I went to the Native Friendship Centre in Victoria, and I inquired about it, and my adopted mom and dad told me that if I ever wanted to find my biological mom, they would help me. What they told me was that my mom met an American sailor and then moved down to the States and had a bunch of kids. Well, when I had explained this to the Victorian Native Friendship Centre, within days they found my mom," said Grypuik.
They invited her to the office and told her they had news. When she got there, they phoned her mother, allowing Grypuik to speak to her for the first time, as well as her two brothers, Rudy and Lumario.
The two brothers hitchhiked from Alert Bay to Victoria to see her.
"My best friend had a brand new baby, she drove me up so I could meet my mom personally," she said. "I'll never forget getting out of the car and looking up at the apartment building where they described they lived in and seeing two faces looking down at us, and I knew instantly who my mom was. However, the first thing she said when she said it was, "I'm suing your parents." Those were the first words out of her mouth."
Grypuik's first words to her mom were, "Please don't."
Her mother never did follow up with suing Grypuik's adoptive parents.
"I had a fairly good upbringing compared to my other brothers and sisters, who got put in residential schools and then foster homes over and over again. At least I was raised with a family."
The Genealogical and Archival Research Unit at the Office of the Indian Registrar for Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada in Ottawa was able to connect her with her California birth certificate number to a child born to Emmeline Margaret Hunt. On March 23, 2018, Grypuik received a letter from the Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada office.
Grypuik's birth was recorded, and she was identified as a member of the Tlowitsis Tribe Band (formerly known as the Tlowitsis-mumtaglia Band and the Turnour Island Band), as was her mother. However, they did not have her mother's birth certificate on file, but had two children with birth certificates, including a live birth certificate for a child issued by the state of California that indicated the birthplace of Emmeline Hunt in Canada. Another birth certificate for a different child was issued by the Washington State Department of Health - Public Statistics Section with the mother's maiden name as Emmeline Hunt, with a birthplace in Alert Bay, B.C., Canada.
The letter was signed by Joel Sherlock, manager of the Genealogical and Archival Research Unit.
Emmeline Margaret Hunt was born in Kingcome Inlet, BC on Nov. 24, 1924. According to the U'mista Cultural Society, Hunt is a descendant of Mary Ebbetts (also known as Anein), a high-ranking Tlinget woman, and Robert Hunt, an Englishman born in either Southampton or Dorsetshire who worked with the Hudson Bay Company. The marriage was arranged, with Ebbetts' father hoping to strengthen relations with the company.
Hunt had been married several times and was at one point married to Cleveland Johnson in Seattle, Aug. 30, 1995. At the time of the marriage, Hunt had the last name Seaweed. At another point, she was going by the last name Wallace.
On Feb. 25, 2025, Myra Grypuik (nee Dixon) sent a letter to the BC Court Service asking to accept a request to unseal and un-redact adoption records regarding her adoption on Dec. 13, 1973. She says in the letter that this is for the purpose of proving her citizenship in order to obtain a Canadian passport and participate in government programs.
Adoption records from BC Vital Statistics Agency state the Dixons adopted Myra on Dec. 13 1973, in front of Brian R.D. Smith, Esq. counsel for the superintendent of child welfare after reading the petition (Dec. 7) and the affidavit (Dec, 7) and reading the birth certificate of child birth registration no. 64-093627 and the report of the deputy superintendent of child welfare and hearing what was alleged by counsel.
Someone's name is redacted related to an affidavit, sworn and read on Dec. 11 in relation to the adoption.
In the adoption, Myra's last name is Johnson. The Supreme Court of BC certified adoption in Victoria on Dec. 14, 1973. The Dixons lived on Lower Ganges Road in Ganges, on Salt Spring Island.
A memo was sent by Wayne Matheson, a social worker, to Leslie Bell of the Ministry of Human Resources on Aug. 28, 1984.
Matheson mentions a phone call between the two the day prior. The memo confirms Myra's birth in Oakland. It states that Grypuik's biological mother brought her back to Canada in October 1964. It says she was apprehended by the PCA when abandoned by her mother in September 1965. In 1967, she was committed permanently to the care of the superintendent of child welfare and placed in the care of the Dixons on a foster basis in 1966 and adopted on Dec. 13, 1973. The memo also confirms that Dixons never applied for citizenship for Grypuik and had not been granted landed immigration status either. However, Matheson says this may have been due to Immigration or Human Resources (maybe both).
An application for proof of Canadian citizenship received by Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship (IRCC) was received and confirmed on May 31, 2019.
"I applied within the eight years I moved up here (Campbell River) and I got a letter and this is what pisses me off - 'We feel that you should approve for Canadian citizenship proof of,' - so, I paid $50 for this Canadian citizenship that they now guided me to for Canadian citizenship proof. Why didn't they just accept me as a Canadian citizen? Especially since I'm going to be 61 this year."
Due to her Indigenous background, Grypuik was able to receive her Status Card. However, that hasn't helped her obtain a Canadian passport and citizenship.
"With my Indian status, Immigration Canada can't help me, and I just want to become a Canadian citizen. I've lived here all my life. I'm a landed immigrant," she said. "You know, it's not my fault the ministry turned away and took me away from my mom. If I had been with my mom, I would have had her on my birth certificate, and when I applied for my live birth certificate, I got it with my adoptive parents on it again, because I have to open the file, I guess.
In the eyes of the government, because I have a status card and my mom was Canadian, that immediately nullifies me, my mom being a Canadian and me being a landed immigrant. It made me null and void there. I was so happy when I got there and I thought for sure, but everywhere I've gone, everyone has been not me, you got to go over there.'
When she applied for services from Service BC in 2025, the Ministry of Health sent her a letter on March 3 that told her the information related to her mother did not match records, or some information was missing. They said her parents' birth province and country were not provided, and the mother's birth surname was provided as Wallace. She was asked to write the correct information and return it. If she could not provide that information, the ministry asked her to submit a signed letter outlining why the information could not be obtained, while providing two pieces of identification, and a written verification of identity on official letterhead from a social worker, physician, lawyer, notary public, or religious representative who can verify they have known her for two years.
"Canada doesn't want me. I tried everything I possibly could except hire a lawyer," she said. "I've been here all my life, I have! I have transcripts from my elementary school, I have transcripts from high school, and I have transcripts from college. I grew up here."
Not having a Canadian passport has impacted her life in ways other than government services. She got held up at the Vancouver airport once while trying to get the ferry back to the Island in time. Despite having all of her Status Card, a B.C. Health Card and an employee card, the border agent was insistent on asking her questions for an hour, forcing her to miss the ferry and stranding her in Vancouver.
"This is what I've endured, too. I don't think that's right. I've been in Canada all my life. I shouldn't be treated that way. I wanted to be a 60s Scooper that Canada didn't want because that's what I feel is who I am. This is what Canada has done to me. That's the title I really want because I didn't ask to be taken away, and then they turned away and did the same thing to my daughter, and I didn't raise her, and now I have complications with her because I didn't raise a child," she said.
"If you don't raise your own child, you miss that. A whole chunk of you is gone. I don't know what it's like to be a mom. I watch people around me, and I see them, and I see the way my mom is with me. I didn't know love looked like that. I'm just so done. I just want to be a Canadian citizen."
