Children who experience the death of a parent, guardian or other significant caregiver suffer a great loss. However, their grief often is neglected and swept under the rug, according to the staff of Pillars.

The social service nonprofit, which serves 38 communities in the western suburbs, offers somewhere to turn for those children and their families. Buddy’s Place, a program of Pillars, was founded in 2000 by Linda Moran as a bereavement support program for children ages 4 to 18. Co-director Cindy Thelen said registration now is open for the program’s fall session, which begins later this month.

Q What is the mission of Buddy’s Place?

A One goal is to provide emotional support to grieving children and their families. It’s a family-based program, which makes it unique. When families come to us, they all come. ... We also want to educate the community and people who are influential in a child’s life, like school personnel. We often do presentations at school to increase awareness so a school social worker or counselor may see a kid (grieving) and be able to say ‘there’s a program (to help.)’

Q Why does this program focus on children?

A Most people think kids are resilient, or think because they’re not asking questions, they’re fine. But they need to talk about and process it. Grief is a natural reaction, and they need a family supported environment to grieve. Often they don’t get that because kids are often the forgotten grievers. That was one of the main reasons a program like this was started.

Q What impact have you seen the program have on children?

A The biggest thing we hear from the kids is that it’s so nice to come to a place where they’re not the only ones. At school, so often they’re known as the kid whose mom or dad died, and as a kid, it’s so hard to be different. When they come to Buddy’s Place, they walk in the room and know every other kid in there has experienced something similar, and that in itself is so healing. ... It decreases the isolation for these families. There’s not a lot of other places they are go where they see families that look like theirs.

Want to find out more?
To find out more about Buddy’s Place, or to register a child for the fall session, call (708) 354-5280, Ext. 3122, or send an e-mail to buddysplace@pillarscommunity.org.