Practical help to cope with loss

By REBECCA WALSH health reporter

In the weeks after her daughter died, Harri Tricker worried she was going "off her head".

The North Shore woman had just spent months in and out of hospital as her 3-year-old daughter, Lowri, underwent chemotherapy to fight the cancer which eventually killed her, days before her fourth birthday.

"I started thinking some weird things," Ms Tricker remembers.

"I wanted to go back to hospital. I thought I was just being strange but apparently that's normal with parents because your whole routine just stops. You want to go and talk to those people who were supporting you while your child was fighting for her life."

Although the family took up offers of counselling support, which were helpful, Ms Tricker says the information available in a new information pack developed by Starship and Skylight (an agency to support children and young people dealing with grief) would have been invaluable to her and husband Tim van der Werff.

"If I had that right from the start I would have known how I felt was normal. The first time I read it I said that's all common sense stuff, but I realised it had taken me eight months to get to that point."

The information pack, which includes a booklet for grieving families and a series of coloured cards with practical help for siblings, is being launched this week.

A counsellor and coordinator of Starship's bereavement service, Andrew Thompson, said that in the past families would get a letter or phone call offering help. Doctors would sometimes follow up to see how a family were getting on. In the past 12 months the service had been in contact with 76 families.

But Mr Thompson, who co-wrote the booklet, said not everyone wanted counselling and there was a lack of basic, written information.

The booklet enabled people to read about others' experience of grief and provided more information about access to other resources.

It also included helpful ideas for children and younger people who might be faced with the death of a sibling or other close family member. It might be as simple as writing a letter about the person or creating a "memory box" filled with reminders.

"Children are often the invisible mourners. They appear resilient and strong but often they are protecting their parents," Mr Thompson said.

* For copies of the booklet from Skylight call 0800 299-100.

How to cope

Key points from a new resource being launched for families who experience the death of a child.Talk about your child with family and friends.

Give yourself time and space to grieve and know that everyone grieves differently.

Talk to other bereaved parents.

Create a "memory box" or book of special things to remember your child by.

If it gets too hard to handle, seek help.