At Hope for HIE, we keep our grieving families close to our hearts every day. In recognition of November as Children’s Grief Awareness Month, we want to remind you that you are not alone.
Grief can be overwhelming for anyone, but for children, it can be especially challenging to understand and express. That’s why providing compassionate and developmentally appropriate support is so important. With the guidance of Annie Gunning, our child life specialist and grief counselor, we are committed to helping families create safe spaces for their children to process loss, find comfort, and begin to heal.
Consider using the resources and activity below to support your child in grief and build a foundation for resilience and hope.
Grief responses in children are wide-ranging and unique to each situation. Consider using these suggestions as a general guide to support them.
You can also download, save, and share this resource.
Making a tangible item that’s repetitive and calming can be a powerful tool for children to process and cope with grief. This activity gently encourages children to share memories and celebrate their loved one in a safe, positive way. Introduce the activity as something that can be done independently, with family, or in a group.
You can also download, save, and share this resource.
Hope offers a range of resources to support, honor, and remember loss.
Annie Gunning, our on-staff Certified Child Life Specialist and Grief Counselor, is trained to provide coping strategies and suggestions for making memories through the bereavement and grief journey for the whole family—parents, siblings, and extended relatives.
We are able to connect you to resources worldwide, tapping into additional individualized and local programs to support your whole family along the way.
The HIE Loss Support Group is a worldwide peer support network designated for parents who have lost a child to HIE to express their feelings, support one another, and share their stories.
Hope’s Peer Support Mentor program matches up families new to HIE loss with experienced, compassionate, trauma-trained peer parent leaders who provide emotional peer support to families through a 1:1 or on-call mentorship experience.
Led by Hope for HIE’s social worker, HIE loss families come together through a video support group that takes place on the second Thursday of every month to find community and discuss their journey with others.
Connect with families, read inspiring stories, and get helpful resources delivered right to your inbox.
Connect with families, read inspiring stories, and get helpful resources delivered right to your inbox.
Haley Thomas, our on-staff social worker, provides families with a compassionate and caring starting point by connecting them to various resources for bereavement, grief, and loss.