SeeSaw: the charity helping people to cope with loss as a community
Losing a loved one under any circumstances is a devastating and often lonely experience: it can feel as though everyone else is moving on with their lives while the bereaved are left to grieve and find a path back to normality by themselves.
For children and young people, this journey can be especially harrowing as they navigate extremely adult emotions and situations they may never have encountered before. Fortunately there are some wonderful charities that enable those who have lost someone, and particularly children, to join a community of people facing the same struggles.
How SeeSaw can help
One of these charities, with whom RWK Goodman have been extremely proud to fundraise for previously, is SeeSaw. Based in Oxfordshire, this charity provides support to children, young people and their families both before and after the loss of a close family member. Their assistance comes in many forms, including advice and/or training for parents, carers and professionals; a range of resources and literature available to anyone, tailored one-to-one grief support for children where required, and pre-bereavement support for families when it is known that a parent is dying.
SeeSaw also organise family activity days, which provide an invaluable community for young people and their parents who often just need to feel part of a wider circle. These range from coffee mornings to group work for younger people and more besides.
How you can help them
As many other organisations in these strange times, SeeSaw have had to cancel several of their upcoming events, but they recently held a business breakfast hosted by Paul McVeigh, ex-premiership footballer, who uses his experience in football’s top flight to inspire others to excellence. They are also hoping to run a three peaks in three days challenge in August, Coronavirus permitting, but there are a great many other ways in which to support SeeSaw, both big and small.
If you are stuck in self-isolation and relying on online shopping to get you through, you can even donate to SeeSaw every time you shop on Amazon by making them your chosen charity on Amazon Smile.
During this period of enforced distancing, we have all seen how important it is to look out for each other, particularly while we are vulnerable - charities such as SeeSaw and others like them recognise that the loss of a loved one has the same effect, and do everything they can to make us all feel less alone if it should happen to us.