For four days and three nights in mid-August, seventy-five kids from the Eastern Shore converged at Camp Pecometh near Centreville to share the grief of losing a loved one and discover pathways to healing.
For almost three decades, Compass Regional Hospice’s Camp New Dawn has hosted this unique retreat for children, teens, and families as part of Compass’ mission to provide grief support in a healthy environment staffed by dozens of volunteers, many of whom have attended the session as campers.
“It’s such a privilege to be able to do this for kids of all ages and encourage them while they feel pretty much debilitated by a loss that they’re going to survive this, heal, and come through the other side of it,” says New Dawn Director Rhonda Knotts.
Now in her twelfth year as Director and 22nd year involved with Camp New Dawn, Knotts is quick to praise the spirit of volunteerism at the heart of the grief camp. She says donors and individuals, many of whom have lost loved ones, recognize the healing power of the camp and step up annually to ensure it succeeds.
“Kids don’t take their grief to school. They don’t take it to social gatherings. Grief is isolating on a natural level but when they show up here, they are all of a sudden in this amazing community of people on a similar walk, so one of the most important things we do as a team is to validate every single feeling they have. We normalize,” Knotts says.
At Camp New Dawn, each child and teen is assigned a volunteer counselor or “Buddy”, who, along with former campers, “PALS”, provide a supportive network during the day’s busy schedule. Divided into groups, campers may spend an hour in a physical event like yoga, swimming or fishing, and next in an age-specific grief support group or in an art class where they can explore visualizing and expressing the pain of their loss. At the end of a busy day, campers retire to Camp Pecometh’s cabins. Adults and families can also participate in an overnight retreat to share and learn to navigate and cope with their grief.
The Spy visited Camp New Dawn on camper arrival day and talked with Director Rhonda Knotts about the importance of healing after the tragic loss of a loved one and helped define Compass Regional Hospice’s mission to provide a wide array of bereavement services.
This video is approximately ten minutes in length. For more about Compass, go here.
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