Ian Forest-Jones · 51 min
Born into a world of outlaw bikers, violence, and fire, Ian Forest-Jones survived an unimaginable childhood to become a mentor, community leader, and living proof that human determination can overcome the darkest beginnings.
Hear this story
Ian Forest-Jones grew up in the north end of Hamilton, Canada, in a neighbourhood marked by industrial decay, gang activity, and substance abuse. His mother was in a relationship with the president of an outlaw motorcycle gang, and the chaos of that world shaped his earliest memories. When Ian was around 4 or 5, he woke to police in his home after a shooting in the living room. A week later, a revenge fire claimed his brother's life. Ian survived by landing near the back door where fresh air kept him conscious, but the loss stayed with him.
What kept Ian alive was not just luck but the people who showed up. His former foster parents, June and Harry, welcomed him back after the fire and became a steady presence throughout his childhood. Church volunteers on Sunday school buses offered him a different world entirely, one where adults showed genuine care without judgment. As violence continued at home through his teens, these relationships became his anchor. He discovered he could choose a different path, and at 18, he moved out, suddenly free to make his own decisions about who he spent time with and what he believed.
That freedom changed everything. His relationship with his mother shifted as she began to see him as an independent person. Ian finished high school, went to university, and eventually applied for a job in Australia almost by accident. He moved to a new country, built a family, and created a life grounded in meaning and purpose. Today, he mentors others and passes on the wisdom he received from those who believed in him when his circumstances offered little reason to hope. He carries honest questions about what may still lie beneath the surface, but he has built something real from the fracture.
“I woke up to this with police all over the place with destruction all over the place there it is you know that's kind of my life”
“I again woke up to see my mother screaming at me from across the living room Through the flames to get up”
“they showed me that life could be better than the violence and the chaos and the substance abuse and the gang involvement”
The hero, today
Ian was deliberately kept safe by his mother's boyfriend despite the violence in the home, but he still lived in fear of what would happen to her on paydays, and this chaos expressed itself physically through bedwetting that his GP linked directly to his lack of control. The turning point came when Ian moved out of home at 18 and suddenly had the freedom to make his own choices about who he spent time with, what he believed, and what kind of life he wanted to build. Ian found his mentors not through any formal program but through foster parents who welcomed him back after a fire killed his brother, and through church volunteers who showed up consistently and without judgment. Ian's advice to young people still in trauma is specific: find adults who live with genuine integrity and authenticity, approach them with humility, listen carefully to what they teach, and make the decision to be better even when you are in pain. Ian has created a life of meaning and purpose as a husband, father, and mentor to others, but he remains honest that he may still carry latent trauma and that healing is not a destination he has fully reached.
Yes. Ian Forest-Jones is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Ian was deliberately kept safe by his mother's boyfriend despite the violence in the home, but he still lived in fear of what would happen to her on paydays, and this chaos expressed itself physically through bedwetting that his GP linked directly to his lack of control.
The turning point came when Ian moved out of home at 18 and suddenly had the freedom to make his own choices about who he spent time with, what he believed, and what kind of life he wanted to build.
Ian found his mentors not through any formal program but through foster parents who welcomed him back after a fire killed his brother, and through church volunteers who showed up consistently and without judgment.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 00:07
Welcome to the Kintsugi Heroes podcast, where we share inspirational stories of everyday people going through different challenges and how they overcome them. Please be aware that the story you're about to hear may have moments of deeply felt emotions and personal experiences. If anything you hear has a triggering effect please reach out to someone who can help keep you safe. If you love this conversation, we'd love you to like and share it with your friends so we can continue to share more inspiration and hope to as many people as possible. Now listen up for our next hero story. And in today's episode, we meet Ian Forrest-Jones. What an interesting story growing up in a household of violence and gangs and addictions, and just his earliest memories were quite traumatic. And just hearing what it's like to grow up on the wrong side of the tracks, but also the power of having someone or people in your life that actually care and that can be almost like a savior to your development and your, and your future life. Ian speaks about all these things, the addictions, the trauma, the family trauma, the heartache, and how he overcame them as a young man and how he created a life for himself after coming out of that. It's another story that highlights the power of the human spirit, and Ian speaks openly and lovingly about his journey and the people who were part of it. I was really grateful for Ian to share the story. I know it wasn't easy. None of these stories are easy to share. He did it openly and lovingly lovingly. I hope you enjoy this story with Ian Forrest-Jones. Hello and welcome. Here we are, it's another episode of Kintsugi Heroes, and I'm here with Ian Forrest-Jones. Ian, it is lovely to have you here today. How are you?
REPLAY · 02:17
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): I'm doing quite well, thanks.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 02:20
Good to hear. I appreciate you being here. And thank you for coming to share your story. I'm excited and very grateful. So I'm going to hand over to you to start us off and take us back to, I guess, the point in time before the challenge hit in your life, wherever that was. Give us some context of what was going on for you before it happened, and then talk us through what did happen.
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Ian's advice to young people still in trauma is specific: find adults who live with genuine integrity and authenticity, approach them with humility, listen carefully to what they teach, and make the decision to be better even when you are in pain.
This conversation includes growing up in hamilton's north end, the shooting in the living room, the house fire, june and harry take him back, life at home doesn't change much and the thing he'd never told anyone.
REPLAY · 02:49
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, I guess the first thing to note, if you haven't already noticed, is I was not born in Australia. I was born in Canada and came to Australia in the mid-'90s for work, but that's not the story I'm here to tell. So growing up in Canada, I grew up in a town called Hamilton. If you've ever visited Canada and gone to Toronto, you'll likely do the day trip to Niagara Falls. As you round the tip of Lake Ontario, Ontario, you go over a rather large traffic bridge. And on your right-hand side, you will see the pit of hell. That's Hamilton. And that's the neighborhood I grew up in. It's that view of Hamilton. It's a very working-class steel town. So what you see there is the steel factories. And it's just a black industrial wasteland. So Hamilton is that kind of rough sort of neighborhood, place to live in. And I grew up in the north end of Hamilton, which is the poorer section. I mean, it's more gentrified now because it's close to the water, but at the time it was the, the wrong side of the tracks would be another way to put it. Um, wherever we lived, and we moved just about every year, um, we were always near to the railroad tracks which carried the steel out of Hamilton to the far reaches of Canada and beyond. So my neighborhood in the north end of Hamilton was very industrial. It was very chaotic. It was very poor. And as a result of that, there was lots of gang activity in the area and there was lots of substance abuse in the area. And certainly my family represented all of that. So that's probably the background I could give you on that. That sets the stage.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 04:32
Thank you, Ian. Um, I've got a picture. You described that really well. I've got a strong picture in my mind and I've never been to Canada. So yeah, tell me what happened to you as a child then, as a child living in Hamilton, a family that experienced all these things.
REPLAY · 04:51
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Yeah, well, I guess my mom's, her own upbringing was a bit troubled. And she had me when she was 20 years of age. By that point, she had become estranged from her father. And so was living in the North End of Hamilton and had gotten mixed up with the president of a local outlaw motorcycle gang called Satan's Choice. And so that's who her partner was for all of my childhood. And because of that engagement and involvement with outlaw motorcycle gangs, as you can imagine, there was lots of chaos, lots of violence, lots of substance abuse. Like I've already mentioned. So one morning, I guess it was morning, probably early hours of the morning, I woke up. And as I came out of my bedroom, I noticed that there was a police officer at my bedroom door who was kind of guarding the door. And when he saw me, he said, son, you got to go get some— what's the word— sandals, bedroom slippers, slippers. That's the word I'm looking for. You get some slippers on. And so as I looked down to figure out why, there was glass strewn all over our living room floor. And so what I did not realize, and surprisingly did not wake up to the sound of, is in during the night, my mother's boyfriend, the outlaw biker, had actually shot someone dead in our living room. He and my mother and others, I guess, were together. In the living room and some kind of altercation happened and he pulled a shotgun out from behind the couch and shot this person dead. And so I woke up to this with police all over the place, with destruction all over the place. There it is, you know, that's, uh, kind of my life. Now it would be nice to say that that's where it all ended, but sadly it didn't because he obviously was arrested by the police and taken away and spent time in jail, although he was able to argue it was self-defense. And maybe it was, who knows? I wasn't there and I slept through the whole thing. But sadly, what happened was a week later, the family of the murdered man decided to enact their revenge and they set our house on fire. Now, he wasn't home, he was safely in prison. But sadly, my mother, myself, my brother at the time, and my dog, Buddy. We were all in the house. And so I again woke up to see my mother screaming at me from across the living room through the flames to get up. And so I went into the bedroom, tried to wake up my brother. Sadly, he wouldn't wake up. Couldn't, perhaps, is probably more accurate. I bolted out of my bedroom door across the living room to the kitchen to go out the back door. And luckily for me, I must have tripped, um, but actually banged my head on the door and knocked myself out. But the saving grace of all that is that meant that I was lying fairly close to the back door of the house where there was a fresh supply of air coming underneath the door.. And so I survived the fire, as did my mother, but sadly my brother did not, and neither did my dog. I don't know why I always focus on dog, but his name was Buddy, and he was a good dog, but he perished in the fire as well. So that's my childhood trauma, I guess you could say.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 08:31
Wow. How old were you at the time?
REPLAY · 08:33
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): I would have been around 4 or 5.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 08:36
Wow.
REPLAY · 08:37
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Now that's according to the the newspaper reports that I read later. That's the age.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 08:42
Yeah. Do you have a strong recollection of the event?
REPLAY · 08:47
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): I do, actually. Hence why I keep mentioning the dog. Yeah, I mean, the scene of waking up to the police officer, to the glass, then the scene of sort of running through the house to the back door. I mean, I can vividly visualize the whole thing right up to the point where I must have knocked myself out. So I don't, I don't recall hitting my head. That's what they described to explain to me later must have happened, but I can sort of see myself running through the house, through the fire, through the flames, back to the kitchen. And then that's it.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 09:27
Yeah.
REPLAY · 09:28
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Yeah.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 09:29
Wow. And how did you as a you and your mom get through the, I guess, the aftermath of that?
REPLAY · 09:36
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Obviously, we went to the hospital and we're treated for smoke inhalation. What had happened previous to this, I guess about a year or year, maybe, no, it must have been a bit more than maybe 2 years. I don't know. This is why the age of how old I actually was is a bit fuzzy. But regardless, she had attempted suicide and my brother and I ended up in foster care., and from what the story goes, I'd been in foster care for a year until she could clean up her life and get stable and get us back. So what happened then following the fire is, I mean, I don't know who suggested it, but I ended up going back to those foster parents and they cared for me. Um, I guess it would have been a week or two while my mother was in hospital because her like I said, because I landed in the kitchen, I had a fresh supply of air. Maybe the damage to her body was more extensive than to mine. I wasn't in the hospital very long at all, but she was there for some time. And so I stayed with those foster parents, lovely people, June and Harry Rowland, whose names won't be known to any of your listeners and watchers, of course, but they were very, very kind and generous people to to take me on even after their time as my foster parents had finished.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 10:59
And how long did you stay with them?
REPLAY · 11:01
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, I can only guess it was a week or two. I guess the, the, the, the resolution of this situation was because they had welcomed me back in. And I guess the way I recall it is I didn't know what to call them. I mean, they were my foster parents, right? They were I knew they weren't biologically related to me, but I was obviously spending time with them. And we settled on calling them my grandparents. So I would call her Grandma and him Grandpa. And so when I went back to them the second time, during that time, I asked if I could come back to visit them. And what ended up transpiring, I guess you could say, is I would visit with them for a week. During my summer holidays and then would go again at Christmas time, probably for just a weekend to exchange gifts and stuff. So from that time, you know, around by age 4 or 5, for the rest of my, well, not the rest of my life, up until I left Canada to come to Australia, in fact, I continued to visit with them and they continued to be a significant part of my support network. You know, if you've done any reading on resilience in children and the research of Katherine Werner, I want to say, with young people in Kauai, I certainly am a candidate. I fit the type perfectly. They became part of my support network. And from that young age further into my young adulthood, and because of my relationships with them, because of their generosity and their grace, as I met with them and spent time with them, they showed me a different kind of life. They became mentors to me, in fact, um, an extended family. And so they showed me that life could be better than the violence and the chaos and the substance abuse and the gang involvement, um, of my home life, but they gave me something to strive toward. They encouraged me. Not, not, I wouldn't say, never would I say and put any kind of pressure on me. It was more that living example and giving me that space and that place where I could talk about my feelings, my experiences, what I was going through, and they can encourage me in finding better paths through that. I mean, I never, they were never prescriptive at all. It was always more a sense of just support and advice. Which was wonderful. And they included me in their family. I became, I became their grandchild quite literally. And, and they showed me a better way to live, which hopefully I'm living that now. I mean, I'm certainly not. Well, I was about to say I'm not involved in any gangs, but in actual fact, the police would say I was because I am even to this day involved with motorcycle clubs, but more of the Christian variety than otherwise.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 14:03
But That's funny. What a gift.
REPLAY · 14:05
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Maybe I didn't learn my lesson.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 14:07
Yeah, well, or you've learned how to do it differently, shall we say.
REPLAY · 14:10
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Yes, exactly right.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 14:12
Um, Ian, could you take us back to, I guess, after the hospital? Your mum left the hospital and, you know, you guys got on with life. What was life like, and did it change?
REPLAY · 14:27
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Um, I'd like to say it did, but no, it didn't. Because she can, like I mentioned already, she continued to be the de facto spouse of this outlaw biker right up until about age 12. So the rest of my childhood continued to be marked by similar, not quite so difficult, not quite so dramatic, but similarly traumatic experiences. So you know, having our house raided by the police while I was in primary school, and them finding guns in our attic. And I mean, he wasn't— my mother got— was a drug dealer. His vice was alcohol and violence, obviously. But that was always around. So because my mother was dealing drugs to make money on the side beyond her welfare check. And he, the activities he was involved in and the people he was involved with, there was always scenes of, like I say, a police raid, which was probably the worst because everybody in the neighborhood knew what happened. So when I went to school the next day, all the kids are teasing me about it. And I got into fights over it. Called to the principal's office to explain what had happened. You know, another time, because he was a drunk, on payday, he would go out after work and get drunk with his friends, of course, and come home. And after vomiting into the toilet because of the ulcer that he had because of the alcohol, he would invariably end up beating up my mother, I guess you would say domestic violence. And on one particular occasion, I watched him as he waved a gun threatening to shoot her. You know, lots of situations like that just characterized my childhood. And I guess you sort of, you become numb to it and it becomes part of your normal routine. But luckily I had another place and other people who could show me that that didn't have to be my life. And so I had this very strong sense and commitment to I was not going to let that happen to me. Now, certainly was no angel. I had my difficulties too. But I kept a hold of this, this, this commitment to I've got to be better, I've got to be different. And so I committed myself to education as a matter of, you know, as one way out, and enjoyed school and did the best that I could. Certainly no rocket scientist and am not now, but these were the kinds of different behaviors and a different lifestyle that I saw in others, not just my foster parents, but also others too.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 17:22
Did you, through the years that you were with your stepdad and your mother, you said up until you were 12, did you live in a state of fear or were you, did you feel quite safe regardless of what was going on around you?
REPLAY · 17:38
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, the benefit of having a, we'll say, a father figure who's an outlaw biker, I guess there was never any sense of fear from external forces. There was fear inside the house, though. And particularly on Thursdays, payday. So yes, because he was such a volatile person. Due to the alcohol, due to his, just his nature. He was very volatile. There was, you know, lots of swearing, verbal violence, but also physical violence. I never felt it myself. As in, you know, he was never a father to me. He was— yeah, that's funny, because yeah, he was never a father to me. He was not my dad. He was not my biological father. My mother did have a son to him. So he was my brother Andrew's father, but he was never really my father, although we had a certain amount of interaction and I guess affection. But I didn't look to him for wisdom, advice, or encouragement or support. That was never required. But it was more the violence that he would perpetrate on my mother. That was the fear. And, you know, just the general chaos. You never knew what was happening and what was going to happen at any time or another. And I guess, I mean, I guess this is all about honesty, right? One of the ways that that expressed itself, that fear, that sense of chaos and instability was I must really like you because I've never admitted this to anyone else before, but I was a bedwetter for a long time, you know, right up into my early teens. And, you know, I got, when I came to Australia, actually, because I had to bring my medical records with me, I saw my GP's report about that and he'd linked it very much to the instability in my life. And there was just, there was just no way to to get me to stop doing this because I just had no control in my life. And, you know, the bedwetting was an example of that. Oh goodness. Now I'm embarrassed.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 20:04
No, don't be embarrassed. It's like, wow, so you're human. You're normal. Something, you know, it's how you responded to the situation. Good. So you are human. Okay. I'm listening to your story and I'm kind of almost my breaths held in, you know, as you're talking. It's like, oh good, you know, you weren't hurt. Obviously others were hurt around you, but for some reason you weren't in danger physically from him.
REPLAY · 20:35
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): No, not a physical danger. No, there was the, you know, because, you know, you go to school and your clothes are raggedy and, and like, you know, being in that kind of neighborhood Everybody knew your stuff. They knew your story. They knew what was going on. So there was, while I generally fit in at school and amongst my peers, there was still a sense of difference between us. You know, I wouldn't say I felt I was trash, but I certainly did not feel as worthy as my peers to whatever. It is that we felt we deserved, you know. So I don't know what I thought that should be any different, but that was certainly one of those emotional expressions, baggage, the wounds that, well, frankly, I mean, I guess I still carry that to this day. You know, I know all of us experience imposter syndrome to some degree or another, but I probably feel that more so, or as a result of that, you know, as I was very conscious as a child. And again, this is why my foster parents and other people who accepted me very generously and very graciously, I was conscious that they shouldn't, but was so thankful that they did. Because that gave me an out, that gave me a view of a different world and a different lifestyle that really did It made all the difference. Um, yeah.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 22:10
So take me through the, I guess, the journey from, I guess, the age of 12, because you've mentioned that the, your father, stepfather/father figure, um, president of the bikie gang, was with you until about that age. Uh, what happened after that?
REPLAY · 22:28
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, what happened after that is my mother moved on to other boyfriends. And so I'd like to say that life got better at home after that, and it didn't. It became a little less chaotic because we didn't have that sort of instability. But that's not to say that it necessarily got any better. You know, another boyfriend stabbed her in the stomach one night, which completely out of the blue. Anyway, you sort of get the idea. So what you're looking for is how did I get out of it? And so I guess the really was the example of those others. So one, so I've told you about my foster parents and how I ended up with them. The other, and I've referred to these other people. Well, the other people I came into contact with were, were church people, um, Christians. Now, what was happening at the time in Hamilton, and it doesn't exist to this day, is a lot of the large churches in Hamilton had the resources to send school buses around the neighborhood on Sunday mornings and collect kids, like their own member family children, but also others to take them to Sunday school. And, you know, it was, it was not, there was never any pressure about it. It was, you know, it's kind of like the Mr. Whippy van now, you know, if you can hear it coming and go out and grab an ice cream. Well, these buses would just travel the neighborhood and they would stop every so often. And if you wanted to go to Sunday school, you could jump on. So my mom would literally kick us out of the house on Sunday mornings so she could have the morning to herself, which is, you know, it's kind of silly, but doesn't matter because, and she would so kick us out of the house, get out of here and essentially put us on these school buses to go to local Sunday schools. And because we moved around. And so that's the other thing about the childhood, because of the instability, we tended to move just about every year to a new place, you know. So because we're moving a lot, I would end up getting on this school, Sunday school buses of different churches. And so throughout my childhood, until I could make a decision for myself, I went to a wide variety of churches. And, but here's the thing, you know, I was a rabbi, but at these churches and at these Sunday schools were people who were inhuman because they were so gracious and so generous to me and to my friends. They accepted us and welcomed us and allowed us to become part of the community. You know, so for instance, one Sunday school, at a Salvation Army church actually had a memory verse competition, which, you know, is a typical sort of thing. But for some reason, I got in my head, I really wanted to win this contest. And I did. And the prize for that contest was actually to go to the Sunday school superintendent's cottage for a weekend. Now, I wasn't the only one. I mean, we're not, it's not a bad situation. It was actually a whole event. At his cottage, in his family's cottage, and I was allowed to participate in that and to get a vacation that I could not otherwise have had or ever afforded. At that same Sunday school, I discovered that my school gym teacher went to that church. And because I talked so much and just wouldn't shut up, my gym teacher slash Sunday school teacher would pay me a quarter, 25 cents, 25-cent coin, if I could be quiet for 10 minutes. I don't know how good I was at that, but anyway, he would, you know, sit beside me and do what he could to try to help me to be quiet so I could settle down and participate in the activities. One time my friends and I were just so rough and rowdy that that church sent us down the street to another hall they had. Where we could burn off our steam and play floor hockey or soccer or whatever, because they had this— this building was destroyed eventually, probably by us, or demolished, I should say. But, you know, for the time being, we could run around and wreak havoc, and it was all fine and good. And my Sunday school teacher to this day swears that I broke his nose with a hockey stick, which I deny vociferously, but they still and that Sunday school teacher I'm good friends with now. So this is what I mean. And that, and those places, they were just so generous and gracious, gracious and welcoming to me that that along with my foster parents became a safe place where I could learn to be better, where I could learn to be different, where I could learn to make better, healthier choices. That would stand me in good stead for my future. And it was that vision and that faith that it could be better if I put the work in. So I can assure you, nothing has been handed to me on a silver platter ever. As a matter of fact, it'd be nice if it was once in a while, but never has anything come easy. I've had to work as hard as I can. To achieve whatever. And I mean, I haven't achieved much. I'm nobody special. But I'm far and away better than I would have been had I given in to the lifestyle that was being promoted, not just in my family, but in that whole neighborhood. You know, everybody was suffering because of that. You know, my childhood friends got their girlfriends pregnant, they committed crimes, they went to jail. And I was able to avoid all of that because I had this real grip on my heart and mind that showed me there was a better way if I stayed the path.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 28:32
Beautiful.
REPLAY · 28:33
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): I tried to the best of my ability and here we are.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 28:36
Here we are.
REPLAY · 28:40
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Sorry for the interruption. This is Ian Westmoreland, the founder of Kintsugi Heroes, and thank you for listening to this story for one of our amazing heroes. Our mission is for these stories to provide hope and inspiration to people experiencing life challenges and to also educate the broader community on how best to provide support. If you would like to help us to continue to produce more hero stories and cover more adversity themes, we would welcome all donations. These can be made via our website kitsukiheroes.com.au. Au. The donate function is at the bottom of the home page. We'd also welcome any feedback. You can email me direct using ian@kintsugiheroes.com.au. Now let's get back to the story.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 29:31
What was your relationship like with your mother through those teenage years and as you started to become like you've explained, more, I guess, connected with others and having that inner sense of, you know, knowing who you want to be. What was— how were you with your mom?
REPLAY · 29:50
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, funnily enough, I mean, my relationship with my mother was actually quite good and with my brother. So I guess what we, we, well, I guess we realized we were together. The three of us, we had to be together in this, you know, the biker, whatever her, whoever her boyfriend was, that didn't matter. We didn't, you know, they made promises that they never made good on. So we never relied on anyone else. It was just the three of us. And we were going to be in this together. So I guess in that sense, I had a very good relationship with my mom. You know, I loved her and I, encouraged her as much as I could. I supported her as much as I could being young. But the thing is, I didn't look to her for wisdom and advice necessarily. So while yes, we could easily talk and, you know, sit down around the kitchen table and have a frank and open conversation, she never ever put any boundaries on my behavior. You know, at the most she might say, that's not such a good idea. But really, she had absolutely nothing that she could say to tell me to stop doing something because she was herself doing worse. And so I didn't ever look to her for wisdom and advice. I was getting that from these other people. Um, but she was very encouraging and very supportive. She never ever Like I said, never put any boundaries on my behavior, whether that was bad behavior or good behavior. So when it got— obviously I became older and she couldn't force me to go to Sunday school anymore, but it became my choice. And I continued to go and to, you know, make my way to whatever Sunday school I was going to at the time. And you know, that, sorry, I'm hesitating because I remember a time where on, you know, I'd walk to this particular Sunday school and I discovered a telephone box, you know, a phone booth where, I don't know, really clearly there was something technically wrong with the phone because I could make a call, hang up, and then all the money would come out of the phone. So, so here I am making my way to Sunday school and robbing a phone box on the way. And stealing the money. So, you know, I was no angel. But anyway, your question was my relationship with my mom. So the relationship was good. It just wasn't— she wasn't an example. And she wasn't— didn't shape my behavior other than to be that sort of negative example, which I mean, you know, I obviously picked up bad behavior from that environment., but was able to curtail it through other behavior and attitudes I could learn elsewhere.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 32:52
How old were you when you left Canada?
REPLAY · 32:55
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Uh, so university, I'd say 24.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 33:00
Okay.
REPLAY · 33:01
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Okay. Yeah. So, yeah. So, so because of all this, you know, I did relatively well in high school. I moved out on my own during my last year of high school. Because, well, by that point, my relationship with her was not good. I don't— I was very, very, very angry in my later teens, you know, say 16 to 18. There was just a lot of anger at home. So I discovered that you could, if your parents kicked you out of the house, you could get welfare. As a student. So I left home and went and moved out on my own and could get what I was calling at the time student welfare, which was enough to, to pay for an apartment and transportation to and from school. And I got a part-time job. Oh, okay.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 33:54
Yeah.
REPLAY · 33:54
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): And so graduated high school relatively well. I mean, I didn't get any awards or anything like that, but, you know, I did okay. And that was enough to get me into university. And luckily Canada has pretty good student loans and grants kind of system. So I could go to university and live on campus. And so as I came to the end of my bachelor's degree, uh, at that time, I then started to apply for jobs and found a job in Australia. And which is just, to this day, it's, it's quite surprising because to me, because considering the environment where I was, to imagine international travel was just, you know, it was unimaginable. I just never had that thought, never had that dream. But then as the sort of circumstances all kind of fell into place and I applied for this job and got accepted, it was like, whoa, won't this be an adventure? And here we go. And I'm on the plane and sold my motorcycle at the time, which was a terrible tragedy, but it had to be done. Couldn't take it with me. And then, yeah, I ended up in Australia.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 35:09
And you never left?
REPLAY · 35:11
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): No, no, I did actually.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 35:12
Oh, you did?
REPLAY · 35:13
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Okay. So after a couple of years, I got married, but I still had planned for further education. And sort of that included going to particular university here in, in Canada. Sorry. So my wife and I, because she had always dreamed of marrying Gilbert Blythe, so she was looking for a Canadian that kind of looked like Gilbert. Do you know who Gilbert Blythe is? Anna Green Gables?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 35:37
Oh, okay. Yes, yes.
REPLAY · 35:39
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): So she found her Gilbert. And so we ended up moving back to Canada where I lived and worked and studied for about 6 years. And then we settled, decided to settle in Australia in 2004. And but the deal was I would be allowed to buy a motorcycle again. And so we shook hands and here we are now permanently. And I have my motorcycle and I'm in a Christian motorcycle gang, but we're not beating anybody up, I assure you.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 36:15
Oh, that's wonderful. I got a question. At what point in that journey, I guess your late teens right through to getting the job in Australia, at what point did you maybe get a sense that I'm, I'm out of the woods, I've, I've shifted out of that, you know, your childhood environment and all of the chaos around you and the, the claws I could imagine that would be, you know, potentially trying to pull you back into that world, and there's a lot of people around you in Hamilton. What point did you feel that you'd escaped it or survived it?
REPLAY · 36:52
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): I'd have to say it would be the moving out of the house, you know, because, um, yeah, because it, it was, it was starting to boil over. So my, my mother and I were really fighting a lot I was fighting with my brother a lot and, you know, getting borderline violent. And, but I didn't really understand why. So I can really only explain that as the trauma was really starting to simmer, you know, and to start to bubble and boil over. So when I moved out of the house, it really changed everything for me because Even though I was getting welfare and, you know, to be honest, the government was paying my way, I was working part-time. I was learning how to cook. I was making my own friends and I was making decisions for myself, for my future. And all of a sudden, I, you know, my relationship with my mother completely changed. Um, and, you know, I felt at the time that she was then finally starting to see me as an independent adult, even though I was, you know, probably only 18. We do an extra year of high school in Ontario. I don't think they still do that. But so I believe I was 18 when I graduated, but she finally was starting to see me as an independent adult and treating me with that kind of respect, which is what I felt. And so our relationship changed. And so now I'm making those decisions and I can choose who I hang out with and what cultures I get involved with, you know, I mean, I can pick my hobbies, I can, you know, go to art house theater, I can kind of funny, but, you know, drink Russian tea, which is really just a black tea is no big deal, but I could do things and go to places and start to experiment with a different kind of lifestyle. And, you know, work my way up, I guess you could say. It felt like that, you know. You know, I wasn't just a beer guzzling, you know, I want to say sausage eating, but you can't really. Well, have you ever seen Bob and Doug McKenzie from— what's that show? No, you wouldn't know it anyway. No, it's very stereotypical backwoods Canadian. I could make different choices, you know. And live a different kind of lifestyle and not be that stereotype. So yes.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 39:23
Yeah.
REPLAY · 39:24
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Yeah.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 39:25
Wow. Um, you've, you've explained so much already and typically here is where I'd be, you know, asking about how you got through. You've already explained how you got through this, this journey and, and what pulled you through, you know, your, yeah, your faith and I guess the faith in yourself, the, the people, the amazing people in your life and the foster parents. You were— I want to use the word blessed. It feels to me like you were quite blessed by having these opportunities and these people that welcomed you and enabled you to feel worthy and valued. It's really important. Yeah.
REPLAY · 40:03
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Really important. Yeah. Blessed by them, but certainly not, you know, I mean, I'm still kind of angry about the opportunities. You know, there hasn't been a lot of opportunities, but it wasn't easy. So that was the difference. And that's okay. You know, I learned I had to work hard and I had to make choices and I had to, you know, suffer the consequences. But I could see why I was suffering those consequences because of the choices I made. And, you know, I could still grumble a little bit about, you know, by, because I was born in a sort of poor, lower-class family and neighborhood that I, I always felt like there were certain barriers in my life, but I, that still provided certain opportunities and choices I could make so that I could make some kind of progress, um, in which I have, you know, um, so Yeah, that's good.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 41:07
Um, do you— I'm going to ask a personal question.
REPLAY · 41:10
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): I mean, everything you've said, I've admitted I was a bedwetter, so you go right ahead. You couldn't possibly get any more personal than that.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 41:23
After you came to Australia and, and the couple of decades, I guess, since you've been here or moved here permanently with your wife, Have you had to go look back on your childhood and do some trauma healing? Has it— has the trauma stayed with you to some degree? Have you had to face it? Can you share that with me?
REPLAY · 41:45
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, that's— I'm not sure that's a question I can answer, but I have to admit I am starting to wonder a bit more about that. I'd like to say no, but now I'm not so sure. You know, so I think that the path that I took and the healing along the way was very beneficial. However, I do recognize that, you know, even— oh goodness— even on the drive this morning, I found myself laughing at a memory, and my daughter was in the car, and I couldn't share with her that memory because She would not think very nicely of me if I did, but that keeps happening. So I just, I keep having these recollections of memories and events and activities that just come out of the blue. Now they could be good memories and they could be bad memories. I just don't quite understand why it's so random. And then when I look at the content of those memories, I'm surprised at how rarely those memories are actually from my childhood, from that side of my childhood, I mean, from my family life. So obviously the memory of the fire and the shooting, that never comes up randomly. You know, I think intentionally about those things and have for a long time. So I think in a sense, I've healed of those memories. But given all the memories I could be having, having, I'm starting to get a bit surprised that I'm not. So I wonder whether or not maybe there is a latent trauma that I've not dealt with.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 43:37
Yeah.
REPLAY · 43:37
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): So I don't know. But I mean, you know, my life is, you know, I'm I'm doing okay. Thank you very much. I'm gonna, it's not awful, but could it be better if I looked into that more? Perhaps. So I'm not sure. So maybe that's not a good answer. I recognize that there could be some ongoing effects. But it hasn't, they're not impacting my life in such a way that it's I never have to deal with.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 44:10
Sure. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And that's a very authentically open and honest answer too, because you're saying, well, you know, I'm not saying that I'm perfect and that everything has been sorted and dealt with because, hey, we are multifaceted beings, aren't we? And we don't know what has been suppressed or still lays latent there. To be come out at some point. But I'm pleased that you have been able to create a healthy life, a happy life, and you've got your motorbike, more to the point, as an adult.
REPLAY · 44:48
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): And give back. Yeah. You know, now because of the mentoring I've received, I'm able to now pass that on and, you know, through mentoring them in Australia., to mentor others and hopefully be a support, encouragement, a friend to others in need. And I'm always looking for other opportunities to be able to support men and young people who could need it. So, you know, it's fabulous.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 45:20
Looking back on all your, your very colorful, interesting journey, um, and What's been, I guess, a silver lining or a gold nugget that you've gained from everything? You've shared a lot already, but I'm just wondering, is there a standout thing that you can look back and go, you know, this is what I have taken away from this, or I'm grateful for this reason?
REPLAY · 45:47
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, finding meaning and purpose. Absolutely. So, you know, having people share with me wisdom for life and seeing how that wisdom, that faith made a difference in their lives, even though, you know, many of them, you know, lived in a social stratum class that I felt like I had no access to, but it was authentic. They were very real with me. And I never ever perceived them to be putting on a show, which was, maybe they were, I don't know, but it certainly didn't seem that way to me. So they were teaching me, but they were also providing me a good, solid, genuine example that helped me then to discover the power of that wisdom and that lifestyle and that faith that gave me a meaning and a purpose. Not just for myself, but that I could then have a family and hopefully support my family as a husband and father to the best of my ability. And then to be able to do more even beyond that, you know, through my workplace, through my volunteer activities, trying to be a good person and to share that meaning and purpose with others. So I would not, I would not have had that. If I had given in to the lifestyle and the worldview that was being promoted and perpetuated in my neighborhood. Absolutely not. You know, so many of my childhood friends never found that for themselves and it's just really tragic. But I have and I'm very grateful for that and hopefully can live up to it and be a good example of it myself.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 47:33
Well, just being here, you know, and sharing your story is giving back and being an example and that's why you're here.
REPLAY · 47:40
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): And yeah, absolutely.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 47:42
It's really powerful. And one last question for you. If there's someone listening to this who perhaps is younger or has gone through, you know, childhood trauma, violence, any of the things you've talked about, is there a piece of wisdom that you'd like to share with them?
REPLAY · 48:00
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Absolutely. Find good mentors. Be it your school teachers, be it the sports captains, Any other, any significant adult that you can access in your life, who you can see from afar, has a wisdom and live that wisdom. And you know that you can see their lifestyle. I mean, if it's, it's not just about emulating someone else, but you can see that there's a genuineness about them and integrity that you would like, then seek them out. And I'm sorry, you can bleep this out, but I'm going to say, try not to be a little shit about it. Be humble, approach these people, and try to build relationships with them. And I only say it that way because I was, I was an absolute ratbag, but somehow I was able to put that aside and come alongside others. So, you know, teachers in my school, really encouraged me, gave me opportunities, these adults in churches, et cetera. While it was hard, I was able to put that aside and actually listen to them. And it was only because I paid attention that I was able to see and to get the wisdom and get the advice and to find the opportunities. And that's hard to do when you're in the midst of trauma, but it's not impossible. You have to make that decision for yourself and determine to be better. And then find those people who are better and learn from them. Follow their example. Yeah, that's probably the best way I could put it. Yeah.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 49:38
That's beautiful. Thank you, Ian. Thank you so much. I appreciate you sharing all of your story today and your wisdoms, your learnings, and the advice as well. Really powerful, beautiful story. I'm really grateful.
REPLAY · 49:52
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Well, other than being too honest, it's been my pleasure.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 49:58
Good. It's been mine as well. Thank you. We hope you've enjoyed this episode of Kintsugi Heroes. Please like and share the show to your friends so we can get this out to even more people. If you have a story you'd like to share with us, please reach out using the contact details below. And join us next week for our next hero's story. Until then, keep being you, and remember that we are all heroes in our own unique way.
REPLAY · 50:49
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): You rise only when it's broken. Only when it's broken. Take pride in those cries. It's only for tonight.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 51:02
And then you rise only when you're broken.
REPLAY · 51:10
Ian Forest-Jones (Guest): Only when you're broken. Only when you're broken.
You don't have to be in crisis to call.
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