Support group launched for grieving families

No parent prepares for the death of their child. When the worst of all tragedies happens, it’s common for parents to find themselves lost and confused with no idea where to look for help – and that’s exactly what Dave and Kristi Collins are aiming to prevent.

The couple has launched a local chapter of The Compassionate Friends, a group that aims to provide support for family members who have lost a child. The group honors Lil’ Dave, the couple’s young son who sadly passed away in March, 2014 due to a vehicle accident.

“When we lost our son, we wanted to talk with other parents who had been there. After finding the Compassionate Friends, we were linked with other parents who had walked in our boots,” they say.

When Lil’ Dave passed away, says Dave, the couple was lucky to have good support from family, friends, church and neighbors, but something was missing.

“Probably the fourth or fifth day into it, we realized that we wanted to talk to someone who had been there – to see what ‘normal’ was, because our world was upside down. We had some family who told us about Compassionate Friends and got connected with them and, by being able to talk to other parents who had been there, it really helped us ground ourselves,” he says.

“We remember what it was like when we went through the loss of Lil’ Dave and we want to be there for others.”

The Compassionate Friends as an organization was founded 50 years ago when a chaplain at Warwickshire Hospital in England brought together two sets of grieving parents and realized the support they gave each other was better than anything he could ever provide. They were joined by a bereaved mother and the chaplain himself, Simon Stephens, and the society was born.

The Compassionate Friends was established in the United States and incorporated in 1978 in Illinois. Each of the 600-plus chapters across America commits to helping every bereaved parent, sibling or grandparent who makes contact.

“Compassionate Friends is a large organization with a lot of connections to parents worldwide that you have the opportunity to network with,” says Dave.

After relying on Compassionate Friends to help them through their own loss, the Collins are hoping to pay it forward by offering assistance where it’s needed. Both Kristi and Dave are ranch-raised, they say, and thought they could tough it out through the loss.

But once they spoke with other parents about their experiences, and heard advice on what worked for them and what didn’t, they found it was invaluable to them both individually and as a couple.

“Just by taking on the suggestions and experiences of others, it really helped us – especially as a couple, because unfortunately the statistics of parents who go through that and get divorced afterwards is very high,” Dave says. “We not only learned through talking to them how to cope with the loss, but also how to cope together as a couple and a parenting unit.”

While always the deepest of tragedies, no two losses are ever exactly the same. The size of Compassionate Friends has become its strength, says Dave, because it gives parents the opportunity to connect to other parents who can strongly empathize with their situation.

“One of the advantages to Compassionate Friends is the networking,” he says. “If someone wants to talk to not only a parent or couple who has been there, but someone who went through a similar loss with a similar scenario, that network allows the connection to happen.”

Dave and Kristi stress that there is no time limit to the support available through the group. Grief following the loss of a child is something that lasts for life.

“It’s hard for someone to truly understand the depth of a loss of a child, because it’s so unnatural. In a perfect world, parents aren’t supposed to bury their children – their children are supposed to bury them,” says Dave.

“People who haven’t been through the loss of their child don’t understand that this will affect you for the rest of your life. One thing I’ve always told people is not to just be there for parents who’ve lost a child during the first year, the first month, the first birthday etc., but to be there for the long run, because the 25th year on their birthday or Christmas or the day of the loss will hurt just as much as the first day.”

The Collins also want to make clear that there is also no limit on how much or little support a parent can ask for from the group.

“There’s no obligation for them to call us one way or another. They’re welcome to call and talk with us as much or as little as they want,” says Kristi.

“If we reach out to them, they don’t have to call us back. It’s just that we want them to know there is someone out here who has been in the same situation.”

Though many choose to do so and find it therapeutic in its own right, there is also no obligation for someone who reaches out to Compassionate Friends to later offer support themselves. The Collins opted to do so due to the unfortunate beginning of their own experience with the organization.

“When we went through our loss, we were unable to contact [Compassionate Friends] for a short period of time and that was an emotional gut wrench. You’re thinking you’re going to get a phone call, you’re going to be able to talk to somebody, and that didn’t happen due to the chapter leader having health conditions,” Dave says.

“We remember what it was like to want to talk to somebody but not be able to get hold of somebody immediately and we want to make sure that, when someone goes through this, they have someone they can pick up the phone and talk to.”

The group is open to anyone who suffers the loss of a child, no matter their background or situation. Though the Collins describe themselves as very religious, for example, Compassionate Friends deliberately avoids identifying itself as associated with any one religion or creed.

“They want to make sure everyone who has lost a child feels comfortable being part of the group,” says Dave. “They want to make sure no one feels out of place because we are all, when all is said and done, broken families that are going to spend the rest of our lives hopefully trying to heal.”

The Collins are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year to offer support. To contact them, email [email protected] or call Dave or Kristina at 307-685-6629.