Teenage campers share bereavement bond

Washington: The teenagers trekked through the woods on a mission to master the Wall, a 10-foot wooden obstacle that was the most difficult of several tasks they had completed on the Initiation and Confidence Course.

Some of them hugged, some chatted, but others walked alone -caught up in thoughts deeper than the beautiful scenery.

It was the first full day at Phoenix Rising, an unusual summer camp nestled in the woods near Millersville, Maryland, 15 miles south of Baltimore.

Instead of learning to kayak and sail, the campers had come from across Maryland to cope with grief over the death of a loved one.

A programme of Hospice of the Chesapeake, Phoenix Rising was established to help teens deal with the adult issues of death and loss.

Trust

Early Saturday, the teens tackled the Peanut Butter Pit and the Tandem Line Bridge and for a while focused on something other than their heartache as they balanced on tiny platforms and swung on ropes.

Then, to drive home the need for trust and cooperation, camp organisers put them in front of the giant wall.

"Put your foot here!" fifteen-year-old Daniel Spokely, who lost his father to cirrhosis of the liver, told his brother, David, 16, who was the first to attempt the feat.

"Help him up!" said Jonathan Burks, 17, who came to camp with his brother, James, 19, because of the recent death of their father from prostate cancer.

"Push him up! Help him get up!" A dozen hands sent David over the wall as other campers grinned and applauded.

Over three days, the teens worked with counsellors, learned about grief, shared their feelings, dealt with the effects of the death on their lives and met people their own age who were also grieving.

"The best part is getting to talk to people who are your age who know what you are going through," said Margaret Doyle, 14, who lost her 7-year-old brother, Thomas, in February when he apparently stopped breathing in his sleep.

Margaret said that immediately after her brother died, her family was surrounded by support, but as the weeks wore on, people didn't come around as much. When she returned to school, her classmates didn't mention her brother.

"You knew that people were still thinking about you, but they weren't by your side any more, even though sometimes you really needed to talk," she said.

"I sometimes talk to my mum about it, but she usually wants to talk about it when I don't feel like talking, and it seems like I want to talk when she doesn't want to."

Phoenix Rising Director Karen Frank said dealing with grief is especially difficult for teens.

"Everything with teen-agers is about trying to fit in with their peers, and then something like this happens and it makes them feel so different," she said.

At a time when they are so protective of their privacy, they feel the need to share but are unsure whom to trust, Frank said.

"They might tell a friend something because they need to talk, and that friend might tell someone else and the [grieving] teenager is devastated because they feel like everybody knows," she said.

The activities at Phoenix Rising were designed to help participants open up to one another, Frank said. Next month, the group will run a camp for children aged six to 12 .

"Wait! Don't do anything yet!" Holly Coffeil, 18, yelled to her partner as they made it to the halfway point on an exercise, walking on an elevated triangle with ropes attached to a pole as a guide. Now, it was time to switch places and trade ropes, without taking a spill.

"I'm going to lean back and you come in front of me," said Holly, who recently lost her father to a heart attack.

Her partner slowly walked in front of her, stepped over and handed her his rope. She handed hers over, and the switch was a success.

"What was that like?" asked counsellor Chris Gilmartin after each pair of campers had taken a turn.

"Hard!" one boy yelled.

"Why?" Gilmartin wanted to know.

"Because you have to work together, or you will fall!" Jonathan Burks said.

The Burks brothers said they initially refused to attend the camp when their mother first approached them about it. Their father, James Senior, had become ill in November but assured them he would get better. He had treatment for the prostate cancer, but his health declined and they realised he was going to die.

Time

"I would come home one weekend and he would be doing OK, but I would come back the next week and he would be out of his mind and couldn't say much," James said. "I couldn't spend as much time with him as I wanted."

Jonathan was getting ready for school one morning in April when their father died.

Activities such as the giant wall are designed for just that purpose: to teach teens that it is often necessary to let others help you to deal with your grief so you can move on, organisers said.

After several young people had conquered the wall, a girl who tried to climb over alone failed.

"What happened?" counsellor Gilmartin asked the group.

"She tried to go over before she had the support she needed," said one youth.

"She tried to do it by herself, and she had trouble," a girl added.

"That means you should let others help you when you need it," said David Spokely. "Sometimes you need others to help you. Everybody does."