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Byron Center for Loss and Healing |
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St.
Catherine’s Byron Center for Loss and Healing is dedicated to
providing support, education, and sanctuary to children and families
who have suffered significant loss. The Center is also committed to
creating awareness in the community about the needs of grieving
children and families. |
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Grief
and mourning
Everyone who comes to the Byron Center has
experienced loss. Grief, which
accompanies loss, is an inner emotional experience that is unique to
each individual. Everyone deals with feelings of grief through
mourning, the behavioral response to grief.
Grief is a normal reaction to loss, and a healthy mourning
process promotes healing. |
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Program
description
The
Byron Center provides a safe place where grieving children and
families come to learn about the process of grief and mourning. We
know that grief occurs when there is a death of a loved one, but we
also recognize the significant loss associated with disenfranchised
grief. The disenfranchised grieving child or adult is one whose
losses are neither recognized nor publicly acknowledged by society.
There is, for example, no funeral or ritual for a parental
relationship that has been severed. There is no place to mourn the
death of a dream, the loss of hope, or the sense of personal worth
and lovability. Few are the arenas focused primarily on healing the
losses inherent in incarceration, domestic violence, murder, or
addiction. Generally speaking, we don’t have rituals which
recognize, allow expression and help to heal the grief of our
children and families whose sorrows remain hidden. |
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Services
provided
At the Byron Center, we offer
services that address these needs. Individual and group sessions
are available, as well as various interventions specifically
targeted to meet the needs of children. These include mediums such
as art, games, ritual, music, and special activities that encourage
healing. In addition, the following services are available:
· Community
Education and Outreach
· Specialized
volunteer training
· Crisis
Debriefing and follow up
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Who uses our
services?
Individuals, both children and adults, can
benefit from the services of the Byron Center. The Byron Center also
serves groups, community agencies, schools, and other entities that
represent people who may be affected by loss. School violence,
neighborhood shootings and gang activities are just a few of the
situations that can create loss and a need for healing.
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For
more information
For more
information about the Byron Center,
call Micki Basal,
certified bereavement counselor,
at (518) 453-2515, or write to:
St. Catherine’s
Byron Center for Loss and Healing
775 Lancaster Street
Albany, NY 12203
Fax: (518) 453-2519
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