Death can be tough for adults, let alone for children. Confusion can be a part of the sadness, but David-Donehower Funeral Home, Detroit Lakes, is trying to help work through that confu-sion.
In it's second week, the funeral home is offering STAR, or "What is a funeral anyway? A Special Time to Always Remember." Last week, program director Michelle Johnson helped explain what a funeral, hearse, eulogy and more is to six kids. This week, she talked with four kids.
Kids start with a coloring book, telling the story of Grandpa Amos dying. The fu-neral home provides literature featuring traditional and cremation funeral, depending on which service is taking place for that family member.
The half-hour program takes place during the visitation for family. It is geared toward kids 3-18, but can be helpful for people of all ages, Johnson said, basically anyone who hasn't gone through the process of losing a loved one.
It can also be good for parents to observe to know how to talk to their children about death.
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Funeral Director Dave Karsnia said he learned of the program and "thought it would be good for people in Detroit Lakes," he said. "It's something I wanted to do for quite some time."
After a couple years of trying to get the program to this area, it finally came together with Johnson on staff.
"Dave was aware of it for the last two years and wanted to im-plement it," Johnson said.
Johnson also serves with the aftercare program at David-Donehower.
"After the funeral is over, every family gets personal contact," she said. She follows up with a phone call, a visit, lets them know of support groups in the area or whatever they may need.
With her knowledge of helping adults, she's also been able to help kids as well. Besides what a funeral is and what in entails, she said she touches on grief -- "what that is and what those feel-ings can be" -- although not in detail because everyone is differ-ent.
The program is designed for one meeting only, when the fam-ily is participating in visitation.
"It seems logical to identify terms and what children will see over the next week," Karsnia said. If certain things about death or a funeral are hidden, he said, kids might be reluctant to talk about death.
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The program is free, and is just an option for the family and parents to have the funeral home present.
Besides reading through the coloring book on death, Johnson gives each child a keepsake pic-ture of their loved one that they can write or draw a message on and remember their loved one forever. The children also receive a star they write a message on and can put in the casket with the deceased.
Karsnia said because it's done in private, most people don't realize it's completely acceptable and not all that uncommon for people to leave notes and photos in caskets.
So funerals don't have to be sad or confusing, but rather "a special time to always remember" loved ones and a time to celebrate their life. And the STAR program can help with that process.
