The Cove, which helps grieving kids, holding annual fundraiser
Kayla DeLuca was 9 years old when her mother died in a car accident. DeLuca’s sister was 6. Besides the grief, DeLuca said the experience was “lonely and isolating.”
“Most of my peers had not experienced such a significant life change, such a loss of innocence, at such a young age, the realization that the world is not always fair,” DeLuca said.
DeLuca’s father took the girls to The Cove Center for Grieving Children. At the Guilford office, near their North Haven home, they attended family sessions, with kids their own age who also experienced loss.
“I felt a strong sense of comfort having a community of people to go to who were peers who knew exactly how I felt. I wasn’t the only person stuff like this happens to. A lot of people experience things like this,” said DeLuca, who now lives in Boston. In later years, she worked as a volunteer at The Cove.
The Cove, founded in 1995, now has five offices statewide, in Guilford, New Haven, Meriden, West Hartford and Stonington. Allison Gamber, executive director of The Cove, said in 26 years, the program has helped about 3,000 families deal with unimaginable loss. The Cove’s services are free of charge.
“Back then, there was no support, no books about grief in children. The mantra at the time was, ‘Children are resilient. Keep them busy and let them move on.’ That’s very not true,” Gamber said.
Two families
The Cove was founded by two families who had experienced loss. Jim Emswiler’s first wife had died suddenly, leaving behind three children. He later remarried. He and his wife, Mary, met therapist Renée McIntyre, whose husband’s first wife also had died, leaving behind four children.
“Here was a total of seven children grieving the death of a parent. These kids needed help. There wasn’t anywhere for them to go. So Jim and Mary and Renée created The Cove,” Gamber said.
At the twice-monthly family meetings DeLuca attended, she and her sister were separated from the adults, and put with kids their own age.
“They do fun crafts and workshops and work in conversations about death and feelings around death. They ask you, ‘Are you angry about it today? Are you sad about it today? What happy memories do you have?’ They work all that talk into fun activities that feel light to kids, but get them talking,” she said.
After two years, the DeLuca girls stopped attending. “We had a new skill set to learn how to cope, and we would always have our Cove family there if we ever needed them,” she said.
Isolated and alone
Adam Schwartzman of Deep River recalls the days when there was no support for grieving children. His mother died when he was 10. He remembers all of his father’s friends coming to his home to sit shiva.
“It’s done so adults who experienced the loss don’t need to lift a finger to care for themselves or for other people in the family,” Schwartzman said. “All these strangers were in my house, and nobody was really there for me. It was a disconcerting feeling. I realized at that point early in my emotional development that I didn’t expect anybody was going to be there for me. That was a damaging reality that stuck with me a long time and probably chases me now.”
Years later, Schwartzman’s wife died of breast cancer, leaving a 12-year-old daughter, Hannah, behind. Remembering his childhood, he sought out The Cove.
“I told her from moment one that she was going to get more support and guidance than she could possibly want. I was going to make sure she didn’t feel way I did, isolated and alone,” he said. “At first she went kicking and screaming. That’s common for the kids for the most part. That shifted after two or three meetings because of the depth of the work.”
In the end, Hannah loved the program so much that, like
DeLuca, she became a volunteer. “That says a lot about the helpfulness and healthy structure of this group,” he said.
Tracy Lotko of Cheshire also experienced loss as a child. Her father died when she was 14. So in 2018, when Lotko’s husband died of cancer, she “pre-emptively” took her 12-year-old son, John, to The Cove.
“John is not the most talkative kid. You can’t shut him up when he talks about Minecraft, but talking about feelings is something he’s not interested in doing,” Lotko said. “But I knew what he was going through. I knew he was going to need it. It would have been nice to have this when I was young.”
John enjoyed the activities, she said, and befriended a girl who went to his school. “After that, she always made sure she said hi to him in the hallway. She would always be very nice,” she said.
Lotko was so impressed with The Cove that she recently joined its board of directors.
Restarting lives
DeLuca said The Cove helped “restart our lives at the pace we had before.
“When someone in a family dies, for that family, the whole world stops. But it doesn’t stop for everyone else. It may stop for a week, when they bring dishes over, go to the funeral or the wake. But then they restart and continue,” she said. “It’s harder for the family that experiences the loss.”
Schwartzman said at The Cove, children meet peers whose loss experience may be different from theirs.
“People who supported someone who died after going through a protracted illness, they’ve had time to process it. It’s more acceptable in our culture to go through that kind of loss. It’s different for people who lost someone through suicide or drug overdose. They don’t get the support of the community. There may be embarrassment on their side. They don’t want to reach out and grieve openly,” he said.
“It’s different, too, for people who lose someone through an accident or in some cases police who are killed on the job. They’ve had
no chance to prepare themselves for the loss. It’s interesting how they all end up on the same side, having lost someone. The circumstance affects the way we process it and the way our culture and communities process it.”
Fundraiser
The Cove is volunteer-driven and has an annual budget of about $450,000. Gamber said money is raised by corporate and foundational grants, donations and an annual fundraising walk.
“We try to raise $100,000 with the walk,” Gamber said.
Until 2019, the walk was held at Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison. In 2020, it was a virtual run. This year, the live run returns, with a second run on the same day, at Winding Trails in Farmington.
“Not a lot of families in the West Hartford and Farmington
area were driving down to Madison to join us at that event. People don’t want to drive that far to have an opportunity to participate,” Gamber said.
Lotko and her son will participate in the walk for the first time this year, in Farmington. Their team is called the Jack Rabbits.
“He outgrew the need for The Cove. He is doing very well in school, and he’s active outside of school,” she said. “We were very lucky.”
The 24th annual “Run for the Cove” will be held and Oct. 17 from 9 a.m. to noon at Hammonasset Beach State Park Madison and Winding Trails in Farmington. Registration for the 3-mile run is $25. Runners also can raise donations from other sources. A kids’ fun run is $8 to register. covect.org.