DELAWARE — People of all ages grieve, and recognizing, coping with and eventually overcoming that grief can be tough.
That’s why the Delaware County District Library (DCDL) recently teamed up with non-profit Cornerstone of Hope to make the process easier. Children ages 0-8 can now borrow “grief kits” at all five of the county’s library locations.
Cornerstone of Hope secured grant funding from the Delaware-Morrow Mental Health & Recovery Services Board for the kits, and handpicked items designed to help children ease their minds after a tough loss.
“Every child processes through and expresses their grief differently,” said Jaclyn Ford, Youth Bereavement Coordinator at Cornerstone of Hope, in a press release. “It is helpful to use this kit with an open mind regarding what may be most helpful for your child.”
Ford told Delaware Source she was once a teenager who grieved the loss of a parent, and that she came to this project of making grief support accessible in a “personal way.”
“I wanted to meet the needs of grieving kids and families in more than just a support group,” she said.
“If families aren’t ready to come through our doors to attend a support group or to seek individual counseling, I want them to be able to have access to things at home, in an environment that feels safe and secure.”
The kits include books that appropriately explain the dying process, fidgets and games designed for people to reuse and encourage their children to express their emotions.
Ford said some of the inspiration for the items in the kits came from the non-profit’s Cleveland location and their work with the Cuyahoga County libraries on similar kits.
“We often talk about reading literacy, but emotional literacy is just as critical,” said Kelly Cochran, Youth Services and Programming Coordinator for DCDL.
“These kits, created by experts in the area, give children the vocabulary and creative outlets they need to understand big, complex feelings like grief at a very young age.”
How to recognize grief and borrow a kit
Signs of grief in young children can include regressive bathroom behavior or being extra clingy to a parent or guardian, Ford explained.
“Potty training may have been successful when the child was 2, but maybe now, as an 8-year-old who may be grieving, they’re having accidents at night,” she said.
“Or maybe they were developing a sense of autonomy, but now they’re especially clingy to a parent, a guardian or another trusted adult in their life.
“Those aren’t bad things,” she explained. “This is just how their mind, that’s not fully developed and emotionally intelligent, is trying to process something difficult.”
DCDL Communications Coordinator Nicole Fowles said one kit will be available at each branch of the DCDL system, which includes Delaware, Liberty, Orange, Ostrander, and Powell locations.
Families can find the kits in the children’s area, or place one on hold by searching “Children’s Grief Kit.” DCDL cardholders can check them out for up to 14 days.
Fowles said this isn’t the first time DCDL has put non-traditional items on its shelves: memory care collections, physical items like a board to practice shoelace tying/motor skills, and flashcards/workbooks that feature dry-erase pages for children to practice math are also available at the libraries.
She said all these things, and now the grief kits, are “niche needs that if you don’t need it, you don’t know we have it, but if you do need it, you’re grateful that we do have it.”
“This is just the start of our partnership with Cornerstone of Hope,” Fowles said. “These kits are great for that young age of 0-8, and we hope that we can continue to expand that.
“Grief doesn’t know an age, and this is a really great start of a partnership that we hope will continue in the future.”
