>> Unsupported grief is difficult for adults to manage and for bereaved children.

They can have trouble in school a tougher time regulating their emotions and experience a deeper and greater level of depression and anxiety which can carry with them for years.

They are not alone.

And for those suffering in measurable loss.

My there are you the Kentucky Center for grieving children and families provides a healing place for those in grief.

A conversation with the founder, Lila Sounds very now on connections.

♪ ♪ ♪ Thank you for joining us for connections today.

I'm Renee Shaw, one of the most common shared human experiences is dealing with death and grief yet those conversations are difficult to have an even in our circles of family and friends today, I have the privilege of talking to Leila Southbury, the founder of the Kentucky Center for grieving Children and Families and 2012 Leila's husband died by suicide.

The support she found from a group while living in Mississippi gave her the idea to start an organization and her home state kind of sort of Kentucky.

Leila sounds very joins me now on connections.

It's good to see you.

Thank you.

You know, I I do want to talk about you've got to this point, but I do want to mention, as you were sharing with me, this is the first center of its kind in Kentucky period.

>> That is solely focused on children and teens.

and that would seem odd because we think of all the the mental health type services that are available.

But none have this layers or focus on dealing with grief and healing from grief.

Yes, and in as I've done this work, I really have understood the deep connections between childhood grief.

>> And so many of the other things that we talk about and struggle within Kentucky, public health issues, mental health issues, juvenile justice involvement for substance abuse.

So, you know, if you start talking to people struggling with, you know, a number of these issues, if you get far enough back, there is often a grief story that connects into that and that is trauma, right?

We don't think of grief as trauma.

We think of trauma as events and grief.

Just the byproduct, all rent or their response to it.

But it is traumatic.

>> grief and one of the things we say and believe grief is a totally normal response to the loss of someone, you can grieve, Ananda I think, you know, I I think a lot about our during COVID, you know, and some of the things we see happening now is a society.

And to me a lot of that, we're having a heat.

We had a huge collective grief response.

We couldn't live life the way we had lived and our routines changed and we lost many things and experiences.

So, you know, that's another form of There's disenfranchised, grief, grief related to systemic things that law losses after losses that we can't change and eventually sort of build So we we do training and education on all of these things.

And then because the responses for children and teens can often be very similar.

But in terms of direct services, you know, we we also talk about the the the loss of an individual for kids and teens.

>> And the term posttraumatic growth.

Yeah, there is something positive or renewing that can come from a very substantial heavy loss, right?

Absolutely.

he's been often quoted in the media.

There's a national expert, David Kessler who has written a book.

I think it's what the 6th stage of grief, right?

And he talks about the meaning making.

>> So, you know, I am a huge believer in posttraumatic The things the losses that my daughter and I have had, I would have chosen any of them.

But I will say they have shaped me into a person who is happy here in the day today.

And then I think part of what last can teach us is to be more mindful of who and what is in our life.

It today in the You know, death reminds us that life is not infinite.

And so, you know, being grounded and what's happening, you know who you're connected to right now.

And I think there's a different sense of appreciation and connection that can come from that.

I want to come back to that point a minute.

But if you don't mind sharing me your grief journey.

Sure.

my daughter and I I might have a completely different working in academic publishing career.

I love for 25 Career start in Kentuckyian the take me to to Mississippi.

And when my daughter was 5, my husband died by suicide.

And so our family was here 11 hours away.

And immediately everyone there said, hey, there's this great center for kids.

You guys should go.

And after about the 5th person said that to me about, alright, I will check this out.

And that place became a lifeline for You know, we regularly over the course of a couple years.

And I will say despite the fact that it was a place organized around death I've never laughed so much as an adult.

Matt, you know, sometimes when your losses feel.

Big and isolating.

But when you're in a room full of people who get it and who don't the judge or have any expectations of what emotional responses you're having.

It's an incredibly peaceful and safe rating, perhaps.

Yes.

And it's and and very accepting.

And one of the things I appreciated about, you know, I think back on it, I'm like, why did that place feel so That was a place where it was probably the most diverse, consistent space I've been in in terms of race, creed, socioeconomic status.

You know, there is a family from one of the richest families in Jackson and some folks who are probably, you know, on public assistance.

But in that room, we all shared a similar set of challenges.

A similar set of emotional reactions.

And it was that was very healing, you know, with its it.

We were together in our common humanity and so, you know, I kept that thought in mind as we began to to do the work because, again, this is, you know, the death loss.

And our response to that is one of our most human responses, so much so.

You know, we found a healing space and then I found myself joking.

I'm going back to Kentuckyian then start this for for my home state and about the 5th time I made this All right.

Maybe maybe I'm actually not so funny.

Serious I was thinking about I look over my bedside.

My reading was the harbor child bereavement study.

And I thought, OK, well, it out.

>> I'm engaged with us on a number of level.

So we've gotten to know the folks here in the center there.

And I asked if I could come bollen So I'd love to see, you know what this looks like from the other And so it's been a year volunteering with the group of 8 to 12 year-olds and it was really transformative because what I saw, I think people I believe kids don't grief.

They're too young or they don't get that.

Our kids are resilient.

Kids can be resilient, but they need those supports too.

Go through and figure how to come out.

The other side of some of these things.

And I saw the most empathetic little set of human beings and there kids who thought very deeply about what had happened to them and what it meant to him for them and their families.

And I thought, OK, those you know it, it really echoed a lot of what I've seen with my own daughter in our conversations and And so I I've been chilly, came back to Kentucky a year or 2 later and we unexpectedly lost my mom when my daughter was about to start her 7th grade and though we know it's just a grandmother, everybody loses their grandmother.

I she you know, my my mom was my daughter's other parents essentially in many ways.

And so by this time I watch my daughter grieve as a teenager essentially without one of these centers.

And it was a far worse and more difficult experience.

Certainly, Anderson is older.

It was significantly worse.

And what she said as mom, there's nobody, you know, she didn't have a group of kids like her to to go be with this time.

It's said nobody Nobody wants to talk about it with me.

My friends get uncomfortable.

When I bring these things up in the messaging, she was getting, you know, it's cool.

We're just a grandmother.

There is grandmother dies.

You need to you need to get over it.

And that was a very long and tough year.

And it took a lot of advocacy for me to kind of get her through.

And at the end of the year, I thought if this was this challenging for us and I'm the person with access and education and and, you know, knowledge of what's if I could barely navigate this.

What is this like for the kids too?

Do not you know, their grief experience in school with any benefit of the doubt.

And that really was the moment where I said, I need to do the inciting.

Well, one point that really strikes me, that's kind of tangential is that in Kentucky, we know that.

>> Almost 100,000 grandparents are primary caregivers.

So it's it is a very intimate and personal first degree type of relationship, right?

Absolutely not.

I was a grand daughters daughter, right?

I was very close to my grandmother.

So, you know, I think society also has levels of judging what your level of grief should be relative to the close ties to the relative used it to cease.

You are so correct there's a term that has been coined for that called grief policing.

agree fully thing happens all the time that you say.

>> that somehow people outside of your sphere feel very free to judge or calculate how much grief, how much, how much time, how how much time.

>> What level of response you are allowed to have?

And I think that's why, you know, again, kinship carers we for some of the groups we did for kids during COVID kids who are in kinship care.

Anxiety levels off the charts because, you know, any child who has already lost a caregiver.

Is anxious because they it's like they are waiting for that other shoe to drop.

You know, their biggest fear.

We asked all the time, you know, you get a room full of teenagers who've lost a parent and say, you know, what is your greatest fear?

And they will all immediately say >> that my other parent is going to die and I will be an orphan.

So there's that anxiety take playing.

And then during COVID, these kids KET that their older caregivers, we're more vulnerable during It just added an additional layer of anxiety on top of what they were already struggling.

I love.

>> When you talk about COVID in that post traumatic growth, it dawned on me, although I didn't lose someone close to me that that 2 to 3 year experience really kind of transformed me and others in my circle about what we valued.

Yes.

Where is career and working always taken a priority when you weren't physically in your space and you found other things that you enjoyed and the time you could spend with those people who maybe work at occupy due to the point that you couldn't it, you realize how valuable that was.

>> Rights and again, I think that is absolutely typical grief response and a recalibration of what your personal priorities are.

My only have so much time on the search.

Am I spending at doing what I feel called to end with the people, you know who are dear to me?

So how much influence is your daughter?

Who sounds wise beyond her unfortunately it's the toughest and the hardest places we can be in our lives.

That force that growth and maturity.

She's beyond just natural maturation.

>> I mean, how does she influence how you approach the work?

I learned from her.

>> All the time.

And I will say in so many ways, you know, my experience with her was the genesis of the U.S. and she continues to teach me.

I will see.

>> Research studies and and there was one in particular.

I was that youth you know, after a death loss of appear, they reported an equal.

>> This mental distress to the loss of a caregiver.

And I said stunned that, you know, that doesn't quite make sense to me.

So I I went it How can this be?

And she just rolled her eyes and said, mom, well, think about it for teens.

Their peers are often, you know, in that breaking away from parents, caregivers, you know, the friend group becomes paramount importance to those kids.

So when one person and not only of they them, if they lose appear, that person is gone.

But each individual in that front group will often grief differently and often it's the case where it's too hard for them to grieve together.

And the itself well dissolved.

So child or teen is lost.

Not only that friend, but the entire group of friends and this whole piece of their lives.

So, you know, I turned her sights, right, upset only, you know, a person living that experience can can provide.

I I am so in awe of her.

And you know, to me when I talk about posttraumatic growth, a look at this young woman who has announced he wants to be an adolescent.

Psychiatry also writes, is one of our co facilitators of a teen grief group that we do.

We're doing a part of a pilot that's looking at teen led the supports and how.

>> It's based on an evidence-based curriculum.

But they flipped it to make it teen So we're looking at, you know, the team to listen to their a parent out there.

we'll hear something quite differently from the pier.

Then they will an adult.

So watching her do that and just connect.

She's got kids from these these groups who, you know, those And so with each other so, you know, she and I have really leaned into the U.S. in a in a bigger way.

And sometimes when I have ideas for new things, I want to try or, you know, say how with the steal and ensure really helped me think about what the program is going to feel like for a person participating in that.

And she has that insight that I'd I was going to ask you about technology being and of a better aid.

>> Toward helping people in their grief journey.

And you think that it would be both a barrier and a blessing?

I don't know which which Yeah, So RT live modeling something that because they got a grant to flip the curriculum to a team like curriculum.

But it happened also that they got this grant money during COVID.

So this is well also flip it to Islam.

So for me, the it's kind of this double of sort.

I love it because it extends the access to this program.

We have a group with young woman from Owensboro to Preston's for a while, and and places in between all connecting about these things.

And so it is it allows, you know, us from here in Lexington to serve kids, especially from the summit for this online teen group from all over the the mixed bag of it is you have to be willing to log on to that Sam Rye and sometimes it's easier to just look at your device and say, I don't know the things like it's going to be hard.

I just not going to log on tonight.

So again, there adding access.

But also, you know, that's a challenge.

There is something beautiful about the in-person experience and especially for kids.

So the in-person groups that we do a lot of that's their p**** play.

No part of it.

They these kids need to process things about their death process.

But they're also kinda, you know.

So I think people imagine, you know, grief support groups and they they envision everyone sitting around crying.

Yeah, it's all long faces.

If you showed up to one of our great trips, it's kids tearing around after each shooting basketball.

>> Played with musical instruments.

We did a program that whatever schools last night doing cardio drumming, it's like Zoloft arrest and does not.

Yeah, that's great.

So movement, you know, helping just, you some of these emotions through their body connect, do they talk or all?

But it is all is all it's it's a road.

And a robot cat.

Who did you vote for?

The cardio drumming were not necessarily part of the healing with that one.

And I participated last night and I thought.

>> I feel but I felt Bryan Station, Middle School that I don't.

I walked in that door.

You know, emotions, you know, emotions happening or head.

They also lodge in our body.

You know, anyone who said like sore neck and headache.

And, you know, in kids, speaking of, you know, grief somatic symptoms.

If you talk to a child is grieving, that school nurse will know who this child this because they are in that school nurse's office.

A lot.

Well, I had a stomach ache migrant.

You know, they often especially if they're younger, pre verbal, they don't know how to express.

And so their body will express what what they're feeling.

So it's kind of a combination of these things.

So last night was just about hearing the the and everyone, you know, you've heard of Drum Circle.

Yes, yes, you know, the for community connection and also therapeutic uses.

So with the rhythm of the sticks, it was like that we're all moving together in tandem kind of just letting this tension out of our bodies.

So that was fantastic, you know, in our community group, we might have because it's a hit again, hands on kinds of things.

We might build a memory where kids can decorate it and images of things that are special to the person they lost.

You know, and they'll talk while they're doing it.

You know, wind parents often will have like the her conversations in the car.

So you're not having to look at each other necessarily about a sensitive topic.

So it's a little like that.

You know, when your hands are engaged, are you doing something else?

The kids are able to open up a little bit and start some of those conversations to make those connections.

So it's it's a little above so that again, they or their kids, their their grief comes out in short bursts, some fits and starts over a long period of time.

So mostly we just want to give them a place where they feel comfortable except the.

And in those moments when whatever those needs to come out, come that they're there with us and that can happen another nights they can come.

You know, they're playing ball with us or the plan >> That's cool.

While I understand that sometimes it takes a child, particularly if they've experienced grief or trauma at an early age, it's not until age 9 that they start to reconcile or maybe even recognize that grief.

Talk to us about the recognition or the early stage in which a child can be really come to terms with the loss.

>> Children, the even very young children will grieve how that manifests isn't something we as adults may necessarily identify grief.

So, you know, children even at a preferred will stage recognize when a person is gone.

Underwent a routine has changed.

They could be can't necessarily explain it to you in a way.

So at what the thing that happens with kids between the ages 8, 9, 10, that's when the brain develops.

the understanding of the permanence of death.

So you may have kids that age if they lose somebody at age 5, you know, kill the kids have all kinds of magical thinking.

So we have parents who come and say.

You know, we had a big talk, you know, about their their parents had died and then she came home yesterday and said, you know, when one mom coming home, you know, it fly and the parents to deny not explain this correctly and understand why can't make her understand what's have them.

And that's literally because the child's brain is not yet wired for that kind of permanent.

So what will happen between ages 8.10, even a loss happened many years earlier, a child May's, you know, start crying.

That may become very angry, like it's like that person has decided to their brain.

If that has just happened because now they understand the finality of that.

So one of the things that I think is a big misconception.

About children's grief, children will re grieve every developmental stage.

And so as a as a parent, that is a tall order.

You know, this is an ongoing.

Parenting that will need to happen over time.

It's not.

You know, we've talked we're going to put behind us.

This is not going to be conversation.

We need to have a gun.

You know, unfortunately, it was a lifetime conversation because the other thing in addition to developmental milestones for kids.

They're the lifetime milestones.

You know, when I will say, I've gotten very good at anticipating what milestone triggers maybe, but my my 16 year-old recently got her driver's permit.

I was expecting in a balloon celebrations came home and she was really kind of sad.

My son, you know what's what's going on here?

And just looked at me said I thought I would have 2 parents teaching me how to drive, you know, so for kids and off in the sense, especially like leading up to high school graduations and weddings and all those.

Yeah, the numbers of children and I you know, I think it ends as people in our heads we have in the U.S. when we lose a parent that we have and a picture in our mind of what something is supposed to look like and who supposed to be in that picture with us.

And then when the reality of her.

>> Our moment is different.

You know, the feelings of loss come back They the the last response changes over time.

One of the things we try to just help both parents and caregivers and the kids understand.

These are normal feelings and it's better if you can air them and know that they're coming have some, you know, some coping techniques.

You can pull out your back pocket when when that wave comes and and then, you know, little little move on >> Home we think about, you know, recently at the time of our conversation, we were a couple of weeks out from a mass shooting in Louisville and then there were subsequent shootings after that in there shootings all the time and a lot of different places, right?

But we seem to be dealing with a lot more violence, right?

And there it gets a little closer to home.

It's I'm so how'd what would you advise like whole communities, right?

Who are grieving?

And then the children who were grieving and men, children not knowing lot, asked the parents of the parents too afraid to say the wrong thing.

Oh, yes, you read that.

You just described all of the things.

Yes, I think we you know, we see.

>> Children if they're afraid.

But if they see, the parents are afraid to children are trying to protect the parents and caregivers, caregivers are trying to protect the children, you know, but for better or worse in our age of connectivity, with access to smartphones, media kids will hear about these things and what I always say even in really difficult situations like this little shooting in a vacuum of information, a child will often make up a story that is worse than what is actually happening to.

So if you >> they may make up a that, you know is is not in any way connected to reality, but that makes them even more fearful than what it is that actually happened.

So I always, you know, recommend to parents and caregivers.

You know, I know these seem like tough conversations, but the easiest opener is often just.

So tell me what you've heard about this.

You know, that's it.

It opens it up to what the child is heard.

The caregiver can immediately sort of dispel any misinformation.

And and that's an easier place to start rather than thinking.

What is the perfect thing to say?

You know, I think that especially when a parent or caregiver is delivering news about lost that close to home and especially a loss at that, a violent loss or a overdose.

They don't know what to say.

So they don't say anything or they they'll change the subject.

And unfortunately, for the kids that just leaves them alone with a lot of scary thought.

So if you can just start with, you know, what do you know?

What have you heard?

What are you thinking?

What are you worried about?

You know, again?

The person on the other into this conversation for better or worse.

You can't fix what has happened.

>> you're being opend can.

What these kids know?

There's that you're safe right now with me and I'm willing to talk with you about this.

Well, it's been wonderful talking with One of the best conversations.

And I hope that maybe we can come sometime in some of these group sessions.

>> To show our audience like what this looks like, some maybe they can replicate that in their own community eyes welled.

Yes, I would love that.

gold treat for us and hopefully informative for our viewers.

So thank you to our station.

>> On a very difficult topic.

But, you know that this is a place where the hard conversations are had.

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Take really good care of yourself and each other all season.