As part of the BBC Children in Need ‘take over day’ on Friday 19th November, St Clare Hospice which covers West Essex and East Herts, had a selection of songs played on the Radio 2 Jeremy Vine show. The songs, which were chosen by children who had been supported by the Hospice Patient and Family Support Team, as well as hospice staff, spanned different decades and each music choice had a personal story behind it.
BBC Children in Need wholly funds the St Clare Hospice Echo bereavement project. The project gives children and young people the tools and space to talk about their loss, improving their ability to cope with their situation and helping them to feel less isolated.
Over the last year, the Echo Project directly supported more than 80 children and young people, in addition to training teachers and supporting parents.
One young person that has benefitted from the project is Amy. She was just five years old when her father died suddenly in his sleep. She has been accessing bereavement support from St Clare since March 2021 when she started seeing our Adult, Child and Family Therapist, Sara Nicholson, on a 1-2-1 basis.
“I felt a bit suicidal sometimes,” Amy recalls. “I just didn’t know how to control all of my emotions at once. Sara came into my school and we talked about things and we did some pictures and drawings.”
One of the big things that Sara and Amy discussed was that she ‘felt quite alone because she didn’t know somebody else who felt like that.’ So Sara suggested she join one of the Hospice’s Children’s Therapeutic Bereavement Groups.
“Every week on Monday for a couple of months I’ll go to this group and do some things to remember my Dad,” explains Amy. “We do stuff that involves arts and crafts and we talk a lot about grief and how to handle it, and coping strategies, but really we just do lots of arts and crafts and stuff. In a way, it’s been really helpful because I get to meet other children who feel the same as me, and it means that I’m not alone anymore.
“If I hadn’t had these sessions and meetings I would have still been in one of those situations where you feel like you can’t do anything to make yourself feel better so it’s really changed my life really. It’s had a really positive impact on me and how I cope.”
Amy hopes that by sharing her experience she will be helping other children to access the support they need to help them cope, she adds: “It’s only a tiny bit of support but it helps just so, so much. Because it helps so much, it helps me so much in how I live. Since I started this, I’ve been quite positive and I just won’t let anything stop me.”
Cover Photo: Amy showing St Clare Therapist Sara Nicholson her memory box.
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St Clare Hospice is a charity providing specialist palliative care for people living with terminal or life-limiting illnesses across West Essex and East Herts border. We care for patients and their families, providing physical, emotional, social, psychological and spiritual support, and ensuring they have timely access to skilled, compassionate and sensitive care in a place of their choice. Our services are free of charge to those who need our care, but cost around £5 million a year to run. With limited NHS funding we need to fundraise the majority of this each year through donations and other voluntary sources.
stclarehospice.org.uk /stclarehospice @hospicestclare @stclarehospice
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