Children's Grief Awareness Day: November 21st, 2013

Tuesday night, on my way home from volunteering, I was listening to the all-Christmas radio station and then BOOM suddenly I was crying.

I was not all that surprised.

Christmas music always makes me think of my grandma. Grandma died three years ago, on October 15th, 2010, a day that feels like both yesterday and a million years ago. Sometimes, in weak moments, moments when I'm tired or caught off guard because I see something Grandma would have thought was funny, I forget that she's gone, even. How is that possible?

I've been volunteering with Oak Tree Corner, a children's grief group, for six years now, so I understand that the the stages of grief are not something that can be charted. It's not like, OK, I will be in denial for a week and then angry for three weeks and I will bargain for just a few days, but I'll be depressed for three months, and then I will enter acceptance and will be done grieving for this person forever. CASE CLOSED.

I know that's not how it works. I understand, logically, that the grieving process is a dark and convoluted mess, a twisted timeline that loops back in on itself and starts and stops depending on mood or circumstance. And yet I'm still surprised when I find myself weeping quietly in the car along to the sweet sounds of Karen Carpenter singing, "I'll Be Home For Christmas."

And I'm lucky. With the exception of my younger cousin and a friend's brother from college, the deaths in my life have been due to old age or after a long illness. They've been grandparents and great-aunts and uncles, a beloved pet, sad still, of course, but not altogether unexpected.

So when I go to Oak Tree Corner and I hear some of the things these kids are struggling with, I realize just how lucky I am. My grandma was a twin, identical, and I remember how confusing it was, emotionally, when I saw her twin for the first time, just before the funeral. So when I hear a story of a child struggling with something similar, but like, times 100, it makes me wonder just how else I could be helping. Because if I was confused, how confused was that kid, you know?

These are the things I find myself thinking about today, on Children's Grief Awareness Day, and as we approach the holidays. The holidays are pretty much universally acknowledged to be the worst time of year for those grieving a recent loss. They really throw into stark relief just what's missing from your life, in a way that you might be able to ignore at any other time of year. Family traditions that the person was a part of no longer hold the same joy. It feels wrong or at least...off in some way to continue them without that person you loved so dearly.

It does get easier as the years go on, but it still hurts. The fresh slice of pain, blade-sharp, that took your breath away that first year fades to a dull ache as the years pass. It never stops hurting, though. It just hurts in a new way.

I spend a lot of my time thinking about Oak Tree Corner and the kids there. And yet I still always feel like there's more I could be doing. If only I thought about myself less, tried a little harder, gave a little more...yada yada yada. Everyone feels like that, though, like there's more they could be doing, because there IS always more we could be doing. So, today feels like a good day to renew my efforts a bit, to pledge to do more next year than I did this past year, and to look for new ways to help.

Join me? 

You can also find a list of children's grief support groups throughout the US on the National Alliance for Grieving Children's website.

why I volunteer

Yesterday, I took a different way home from work and drove past Oak Tree Corner. Oak Tree Corner is housed in a yellow Cape Cod, situated on a busy corner in Oakwood, the yard full of happy little trees and bright flowers. There’s a sign on the side that reads, “a place for grieving children.” This is my sixth year of volunteering there.

Oak Tree Corner was founded in 1996 as a place for grieving children and families to find some sort of comfort. Volunteers, or group facilitators, gather twice a month and lead groups of children in activities designed to facilitate discussion about their grief. I work with the youngest group, the Littles, usually aged 4-6, though there are also two other groups, the Middles and Teens. The parents meet in a separate group, led by another volunteer. All volunteers go through an extensive and, at times, emotionally exhausting training before leading these groups.

Whenever new volunteers start at Oak Tree Corner, they just observe on their first night. It can be overwhelming. Sure, there’s the training, but there’s always some anxiety, especially just starting out, when faced with a group of grieving children. “Will I say the wrong thing?” (Probably not, especially if you let the kids do most of the talking, which is what you’re supposed to do anyway.) “What if someone cries?” (Surprisingly, this hardly ever happens.) “I can’t do this.” (Yes. You can.)

After group, the volunteers gather to share their experiences from the night. On nights when we have new volunteers, the old volunteers take turns sharing why they decided to volunteer with Oak Tree Corner. I always say some variation of the same thing. I heard about Oak Tree Corner from a co-worker. I’d been looking for a place to volunteer where I wouldn’t be relegated to answering phones or stuffing envelopes, ideally working kids, and this seemed perfect. I was a bit nervous that I would be dealing with children in the midst of the grieving process, but it’s been life changing. It really has.

As I drove by Oak Tree Corner yesterday, I really thought about my answer to that question. How rote it’s become and how it’s the real answer, sure, but, since I’m emotionally closed-off with near strangers, it’s not the real real answer. It’s not the cheesy, gooey-center-of-my-heart answer.

I like my job but, most days, I don’t usually feel like I’m really making the world a better place. On the best days, I get to offer someone a job. That’s a good feeling. But, for the most part, I’m not changing lives.

Yesterday, some asshole blew up the Boston Marathon. I, like most people, followed along in horror, on Twitter, on Facebook, on the everlasting suck-cycle that is our news media, my stomach sinking as each new piece of information came in. Yet, in the aftermath of this terror, Patton Oswalt posted the following on Facebook:

Boston. Fucking horrible.

I remember, when 9/11 went down, my reaction was, "Well, I've had it with humanity."

But I was wrong. I don't know what's going to be revealed to be behind all of this mayhem. One human insect or a poisonous mass of broken sociopaths.

But here's what I DO know. If it's one person or a HUNDRED people, that number is not even a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a percent of the population on this planet. You watch the videos of the carnage and there are people running TOWARDS the destruction to help out. (Thanks FAKE Gallery founder and owner Paul Kozlowski for pointing this out to me). This is a giant planet and we're lucky to live on it but there are prices and penalties incurred for the daily miracle of existence. One of them is, every once in awhile, the wiring of a tiny sliver of the species gets snarled and they're pointed towards darkness.

But the vast majority stands against that darkness and, like white blood cells attacking a virus, they dilute and weaken and eventually wash away the evil doers and, more importantly, the damage they wreak. This is beyond religion or creed or nation. We would not be here if humanity were inherently evil. We'd have eaten ourselves alive long ago.

So when you spot violence, or bigotry, or intolerance or fear or just garden-variety misogyny, hatred or ignorance, just look it in the eye and think, "The good outnumber you, and we always will."

And I thought...THAT is why I volunteer. I want to be a part of Oswalt’s vast majority. I want to make the world a better place, in my own tiny way, even if it’s only by volunteering two days a month. It’s often difficult to measure our successes at Oak Tree Corner. It’ll most likely be years or, you know, NEVER before we know if anything we say or do benefits the children we work with. But I have to believe it does. I have to believe in trying to make the world a little brighter, in doing my part to tip the scales to Good. I have to believe that Oak Tree Corner, this small shining light, is really just one of many, a million stars brightening the night sky.