Carle Health hosts camp to help children and teens process grief

MONTICELLO, Ill (WAND) -- Helping children and teens cope with the death of a loved one.

Dozens of kids and teens took part in Camp Healing Heart at Allerton Park in Monticello Saturday.

For the last 20 years, the camp has been working to give campers the tools they need to help cope and greave.

Campers were able to take part in several activities including therapeutic healing sessions.

"We're really here trying to help them with, healing their hearts with the losses that they have experienced. Having, like, methods and ideas and how you should deal with things that you didn't like and representations of, like, how, you know, bottle up your emotions. If you don't know how you might express them too quickly." said Elizabeth Rieke, lead coordinator of Camp Healing Heart.

There were several traditional camp activities including a hay rack ride, and arts and crafts.

Overall, the goal is to make sure that participants know they are not alone in the grieving process.

"I think as a society and culture, we often just want to brush it aside and pretend that it'll go away. And so for our most vulnerable population that sometimes just left not knowing what to do and how to deal with these things. We want to give them that space to do that so that they can stay with them for their life." said Rieke.

Thanks to a generous donation, the camp will continue for the next few years.