A place for kids to grieve loved ones
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Camp Erin in Frankfort provides fellowship and coping skills
Laura Cottrell will never forget the words she heard at the end of camp this year.
The words were, “I don’t know what you’ve done to my sister, but there’s a light in her I’ve not seen in a long while.”
Cottrell is a bereavement coordinator for AMITA Health and director of Camp Erin in Frankfort, now in its fifth year. The speaker was Amarily Falcon of Chicago. Her sister Lydia Garcia, 16, attended the weekend camp.
Leonel Garcia, Falcon’s and Lydia’s father, had died suddenly in August from internal bleeding. Lydia had been depressed, but returned from camp as “a ray of sunshine,” Falcon said.
“She wants to go back next year,” Falcon said. “And she wants to be a counselor when she’s 18.”