My name is Robyn Posen Young,

I know that in the past, you’ve heard about the wonders of the Grief program that your dollars support. I’d like to tell you about what happens without such a program.

My daughter Samantha was suddenly diagnosed with an aggressive brain stem brain tumour when she was 4 ½ years old; she had been perfectly healthy, happy and beautiful until just before her diagnosis. Samantha died a horrible death 11 months later.

Her death was horrible for many reasons; besides the obvious…no one can imagine the agony of losing their only child. Samantha died horribly because of the absence of palliative and grief support. Grief support is VERY different from physical, palliative care.  Grief support deals with the crux of our souls and our hearts …the parts of us that allow us to be social, functioning human beings and when it comes to children, grief requires specialized care …for they are our babies…

We were left on our own for the most part to answer all of her questions and to guide her through all of her fears as her body deteriorated.
Questions like,
“What happens after a person dies, Mommy?” 
“How does a person die?” 
“Will you come to visit me?” 
Were excruciating to deal with as parents who loved their child more than life itself.

There was no one for any of us to run to when Samantha asked these questions; and so, I had to become my own grief specialist…for her, for my husband, for our extended family…and of course, for myself.  I had to come up with the answers and guide the way on my own, for all of us. The weight of this burden was grueling emotionally, psychologically, socially and ultimately, physically.

We were left alone in a black hole…I was alone in a hole and my poor child was searching for answers.

Had we been lucky enough to have had specialized social, emotional, psychological grief support, Samantha’s death would have been different and so would the rest of our lives. Maybe Samantha would have been willing to look at herself in the mirror, even though she was swollen and losing her hair. Maybe my husband and I would not have locked the world out of our lives because the load of exhaustion, dealing with supporting Samantha in living through her dying process would have been lightened. Maybe we would have heard more laughter and Samantha would have had quality of life at the end of her short existence. Ultimately, maybe my husband’s and my health would have been better as the exhaustion quickly took its toll on each of us physically after she passed.

This physical, psychological, social and emotional toll of having to have dealt with Samantha’s disease and death independently affects us daily. Proper, specialized grief support helps families live during the palliative process and the support received, allows families to live with lighter hearts, treasured memories and a little more breath after the death of a loved one because QUALITY and SUPPORT exist during the end…  They are not alone!

We would have treasured the blessing of grief support during the end of our baby’s life.  Samantha would have been able to ask all of her questions and we would have been able to hold hands with a specialist who understood more.

The Grief Program supports families, children and adults, and allows them to help the agony dissipate to some extent, because the families know they are not alone. With proper grief support, we could have helped our baby pass on to the other side with peace in her heart…and maybe, a little bit of peace in ours as well.

I thank you from the bottom of my heart, as a mother, for helping to make sure that children and parents are not alone anymore…I thank you for allowing children to have quality at the end of their lives.  None of this could happen without you.

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