Young Family Support

As well as caring for our patients, at St Margaret’s Hospice Care we support their families and carers during the patients’ illness, and our care continues into their bereavement.

The demands of caring for someone close can affect the whole family and make the loss even harder.

This is all the more difficult when the patient has a young family and sometimes it can be so hard to support the children when you are struggling yourself.

Family Support

Our Family Support Service aims to offer the support a young family might need when faced with the life-limiting illness of a parent or guardian. Every family is unique and we work in different ways to meet individual needs.

We support parents and carers to talk to children and young people about their parents’ life-limiting illness, so that they understand what is happening.

At the family’s request we can link with schools, professionals and others involved in supporting the children and young people.

Working with the family, we can help children and young people to explore their emotions and develop ways of coping when things are confusing or difficult.

We provide opportunities for several families to come together and support each other.

Samsara Groups

There is a lot of evidence to support the benefits children and young people find in sharing their experiences when they have been bereaved by the death of someone close to them.

Our groups for children and young people of school age have a high ratio of adult professionals to children, ensuring each child has the support they need.

Using a variety of indoor and outdoor activities the aim of the group is to:

• Meet others with similar experiences
• Remember the person who has died
• Explore difficult and mixed feelings
• Find resources and ways of coping
• Build resilience
• Have fun together!