Puppets Help Young People Deal With Grief

NEW PORT RICHEY -- Being a child isn't all fun and games. It's also about learning, in and out of school. For young minds, life's lessons can be harder to comprehend or cope with than anything they face in the classroom.

As bereavement counselors with Gulfside Regional Hospice, Sonia Quinones, Debbie LaBouef and Kristen Kern help children to get through one of life's most intensely unpleasant experiences, grief over the loss of a loved one. They have found one of the best ways is to approach the subject with well-crafted fun and games.

Puppets, jellybeans, goodie bags and Beanie Babies are all part of the Mending Hearts Program, an interactive presentation the group performs at locations throughout the area.

"We go to the elementary schools, libraries," said Quinones, the hospice's director of bereavement. "We go anywhere there's need and we're requested."

The hospice has had some variation of the Mending Hearts presentation for about eight years, but it is only in the past few months they've taken the show on the road, as it were. Instead of reaching 25 to 30 children a month, they now reach about 90.

"Children learn from stories, and they learn through games," Quinones said. "Especially kids under 13, and they learn through play.

"This is an interactive kind of situation, where the kids can participate. They can ask questions. We felt this would be a nice way to teach them about loss, and to express their feelings."

The centerpiece of the presentation is a puppet show. The show's main characters, Rhonda the Rabbit and Tommy the Turtle, tell a story that explains grief and loss and opens the door to input from the children in the audience.

"We have a great system," said LaBouef, who provides the voice of Rhonda. "Kristen stays on the outside and she's the hostess, and there's two of us in back."

Before the puppet show, the presentation opens with a storytelling session. The group uses three different books, depending on the age of the audience.

The storytelling session has the dual purpose of giving the children a sense of what the presentation is all about, while giving the presenters a chance to size up the audience as a group and as individuals.

As the one engaging the children face to face, Kern can cue LaBouef who, as Rhonda, asks the children the pertinent questions and guides the flow of the presentation.

Presentations are also varied depending on the makeup of the audience.

Sometimes, the children are there specifically because they have recently lost a loved one.

In other situations, like school visits, the program is a little more generalized and educational in nature.

But even if they haven't had a loss, the program helps them learn how to talk to their classmates who have.

"Lots of times they might not have talked about it before because they might not have known what to say to this child who just came back to school after grandma died," Kern said. "You would be surprised how compassionate the other kids will be to that kid while they're watching the show. That we found just amazing, the compassion they showed."

Using animal puppets to represent various feelings puts the children at ease, and establishing discussion among their peers opens them up more.

The third part of the presentation, the jellybean game, is where the children are most free to express themselves.

Children take turns reaching into a plastic pail and pulling out laminated cardboard "jellybeans." The color of the jellybean dictates the emotion that will be discussed.

With groups in which all the children have had recent losses, the conversations tend to veer toward their real-life experiences. In a classroom setting, the focus stays on the puppet show.

"In a general class, it's more of an educational thing," Kern said.

"'What did we learn about anger?' 'Is it OK to be angry?' 'How can you make yourself be happy?' 'What is grief?'"

A Mending Hearts program will be presented 11 a.m. Wednesday, July 25, at the new Port Richey Public Library, 5939 Main St.

Call 727-853-1265 for details.