“We
call it PTSD, and I don’t think that’s a stretch,” she admitted. “As
soon as the winds start … you start getting really worried.”

O’Brien,
who is now retired, said she has spent $100,000 trying to fortify her
property on the edge of Lake Erie. Her backyard is guarded by a steel
barrier, many of her windows are permanently boarded up and sandbags
surround the foundation of her home.

But every storm betrays
the cruel futility of her efforts. As the winds pick up, so does the
water, as four-metre-high waves slam into cottages already gutted by
nature’s wrath. The lake takes over O’Brien’s backyard and gushes around
to the front of her home.

“We used to have sand and beach,” she said. “This year has been like a nightmare.”