By Abbey Niezgoda
aniezgoda@abc6.com
On the outside it looks like any other summer camp. There are arts and crafts and a slip and slide, but look a little closer, and you will find that these kids have all dealt with something someone their age should never have to.
"I lost my dad actually, but we all come here to kind of get over that," Forrest Ficke, 12, said.
It is called Camp BraveHeart, put on by the Home and Hospice Care of Rhode Island, everyone has lost someone. It is not so much about the word camp, as it is about the word cope. The activities are a sort of therapy for the 80 campers that attend.
"Seeing the conversations happen where there's that exchange like yeah I lost my mom too, that identification with each other is really powerful," Deanna Upchurch, one of the organizers said.
It is especially powerful for first timers like Kayla Demaire. She lost her grandmother last year, and a few months later, her grandfather went too.
"I was holding his hand so I could feel his pulse, and I didn't want to feel it stop so I was going to move my hand away," Demaire said. "But I actually felt it stop so that was really tough."
They are the kind of tough experiences that connect these kids, so at camp, they can finally get the chance to just be one.
"It just taught me to realize that they are in a better place," Demaire said. "And that you can't always be angry because one day we will meet again, and they will always be in my heart."
For more information on the camp please visit: http://www.hhcri.org/.
