Kaikōura psychologist Lisa Moffat is among the legion of mental health workers supporting the town post-quake - while still grappling with the aftermath herself.
There was a big jolt, an aftershock, recently and Lisa Moffat seized up.
“My heart went [gasp] - you sort of wait for the next thing and I don’t think that’s ever going to change for a very long time.”
The Kaikōura psychologist wasn’t in town the night of the quake - "I’d just drunk half a bottle of red wine having watched the entire series of The Crown in Melbourne" - so the first she knew something was wrong was her phone pinging with text after text from friends and family checking to see if she was okay.
As tourists scrambled to leave Kaikōura any way they could, Moffat battled her way back in, eventually hitching a chopper ride with her three-year-old in tow, to her partner Wayne Shanks and the remains of the gift and homeware shop she ran on the side.
“It was the heaviness of knowing what we had ahead and that it was going to take a long time to sort out.”
Since then she’s lived two interlocking lives: one of oppressive frustration, stuck in a town without reliable access, dealing with multiple insurance claims, the sole provider after the income from Shanks’ surf shop tanked with no visitors to buy anything, aftershocks occasionally punctuating the grind towards normality; the other as a listening ear for everyone else going through the same thing.
People in town were nervy at first.
“There was all that talk, ‘There’s going to be another big one,’ she says.
“I don’t know where that started or how that started but I think that really messed people up quite nicely for a long time - especially the kids … when really there were no facts or figures, it was just guessing.”
Kaikōura is still beautiful, Lisa Moffat says: "The dolphins are still here, the whales are still here." Photo: RNZ / Rebekah Parsons-King
The Ministry of Education funded Moffat, a trauma specialist, to work extra hours in the district’s schools, which she says have proved to be hubs of support for many families.
“That’s worked - there aren’t many kids that I would say at all that have got post-traumatic stress disorder, which is really exciting to see.”
Instead, everyone - Moffat included - is “absolutely, utterly, totally fatigued”.
“If you try and look for the positives from the negative, I’m going to be a much better therapist from this experience because I understand now how tired you get.”
As with Christchurch, hassles with rebuilding are wearing people down, she says.
One insurance company wanted to know how much perfume Moffat’s colleague had in each bottle before they broke in the quake, because they would only pay out on what had been left.
“You’re dealing with all of this shit and that’s what the question is? That can break a person,” Moffat says. “We decided to laugh hysterically … but [it’s that] kind of numbing stuff.”
The jobs created by the State Highway 1 rebuild have saved many locals from financial oblivion, and convinced others to kick their vices so they can pass the drug and alcohol-testing required to work on the road.
Moffat worries about what will happen when the highway is complete, though.
“There’s a lot of people that have got employment out of the earthquake and don’t get me wrong, it was needed, but within 12 to 18 months that money will be gone … and that’s when we’re really going to see what’s left.”
Many of the extra mental health services funded in town after the quake will be gone by then too.
“We’re very lucky that the Canterbury DHB … have added a lot of extra support to our mental health services,” Moffat says.
“But what’s possibly happened since, and what I’m always aware of, is a lot of these services will be pulled very soon, and because it’s gone on for such a long time I think they’ve possibly weakened the infrastructure of what’s actually here.”
Kaikōura will come around again, she believes.
"It's a beautiful place and the dolphins are still here, the whales are still, the mountains still look stunning.
“It will be better than before, but it’s getting to that place. It’s that self-care, and being kind to each other.”
Lisa Moffat and her partner Wayne Shanks have re-opened their retail businesses but have had to rely on Moffat's income as a psychologist after post-quake turnover plummeted Photo: RNZ / Rebekah Parsons-King
Main image: Lisa Moffat has continued working as a psychologist in Kaikōura while dealing with the aftermath herself (RNZ/Rebekah Parsons-King)
