N.B. singer gets golden buzzer on Canada's Got Talent, has message of hope for abuse survivors

Katey Day-Reick took to the Canada's Got Talent stage with a simple message: to let other survivors of abuse know that it's OK to be happy.

Day-Reick, who uses the stage name Anica, sang Unstoppable by pop singer Sia, which she says resonated with her story.

"You have to be unstoppable, at least within yourself," the singer from Grand-Barachois, a small community between Shediac and Cap-Pelé on the southeast tip of New Brunswick, told Information Morning Moncton.

To her surprise, after her performance, audience members started chanting "golden buzzer."

That's when Canada's Got Talent host and country-pop singer Lindsay Ell walked out from the side of the stage and hit the giant button on the judge's table, telling Day-Reick that she, too, was a survivor of abuse.

Canada's Got Talent is a televised talent competition that is part of the Got Talent franchise. Day-Reick's episode was broadcast Tuesday night.

Each judge and the show's host can use the golden buzzer once, to automatically advance an act to the semifinals.

Day-Reick said that as she waited to walk on stage, she felt nervous — but in a good way.

She had previously been on America's Got Talent and made it to the quarterfinals but didn't advance.

"I don't think I was as nervous as when I got on America's Got Talent," said Day-Reick. "But Canada's Got Talent, I don't know, I just felt, you know, this is my home."

Sharing her story

She said she wanted to be an example during her performance and show a person can go on to live a happy and successful life after experiencing abuse.

Day-Reick went through nine foster homes as a child, including some that she said were not fostering for the right reasons.

She would wonder what she did to deserve the physical abuse inflicted on her, but as she got older, she realized she didn't do anything wrong.

"I was surrounded by a sea of dysfunctionality, and I could see the shoreline," she said. "You have to truly believe in yourself and believe in what you're doing in life and believe in your journey in order to reach the shore."

The family in her ninth foster home gave her a guitar.

When you grow up poor, Day-Reick said, kids at school can be cruel, but she found comfort in coming home and singing by herself in the woods, something her last foster family picked up on.

She said she would go to the woods and make up different versions of songs she heard or she'd pretend to be an actor in the Sound of Music — all of which was soothing for her.

"Music has always done that for me."