Calm in the Storm: Local nonprofit offers Oklahoma students free grief support groups

In dozens of schools across the Oklahoma City area, students aren’t alone.

Once a week at varying points throughout the semester depending on the school, students dealing with loss are able to attend free grief support groups through Calm Waters, a local nonprofit that allows peers and counselors to meet and open up in trying times.

The program’s impact is a wide one, in place in over 70 elementary, middle and high schools in 20 local school districts, said Brook Ross, one of Calm Waters’ directors. Last year, she said, the groups served over 2,500 students. The groups offer solace to students working through an array of difficult situations, Ross said, ranging from death and divorce, to a family member’s incarceration or deployment, to living in the foster system.

“It’s important to know people are going through the same challenges that you’re going through, and it’s important to feel that you’re not alone,” Ross said. “A lot of people going through grief, they don’t realize that the feelings they have are normal, and so when you hear someone else going through the same thing, it can help you realize, ‘I’m not alone. This is normal. I’m not crazy.’”

Calm Waters, now entering its 24th year of free grief counseling, reaches beyond the schools, offering similar groups to children and families at its center in Oklahoma City. There, it fosters free group therapy for everyone from toddlers to high schoolers, as well as several programs for adults dealing with similar issues.

“We start each group with saying your name, why you’re in group, and how you’re feeling today,” Ross said. “So I would start out ‘My name’s Brook … I’m here because my mom died, and I’m feeling happy today.’ Feelings are really hard to talk about, and a lot of people aren’t in touch with their feelings because they don’t feel like it’s safe to talk about them … It’s important to know they have that voice and that they can talk about that if they need to.”

Calm Waters leads its groups in packages, offering outlined grief therapy programs for six to 16 weeks at a time. The goal, Ross said, is twofold, encouraging clients to find peace and move on, and also develop a support system that can last beyond the sessions.

The sentiment is especially relevant at the school programs, where students meet with groups of classmates to work through their emotions in light of tragedy or hardship. School counselors suggest the six-week program to kids dealing with loss, checking in with teachers on who would most benefit from the sessions. Once the groups are formed, the Calm Waters facilitators take over.

One of these facilitators, Ann Parsons, has worked with groups ranging from preschool to eighth grade for several years. The groups are often fairly small, ranging from about nine to twelve kids each session.

Like the center groups, students start off each meeting saying why they’re there and how they’re feeling, opening the group from a place of vulnerability. From there, Parsons said, the groups move through the curriculum assigned to the age groups. Younger students play games, such as a version of Jenga where they answer a question with each block pulled or build towers to emphasize the importance of letting others help you, Parsons said. Older students go through more advanced exercises, further expanding on the curriculum’s focus on self care, support, and dealing with change, feelings and anger, she said.

The program’s great success, Parsons said, was how much the students genuinely enjoy it. Many of the activities are lighter, balancing the tougher emotions with simple games and exercises. For the kids, the groups aren’t a chore, but something to look forward to.

“That’s the old thing: laughter is the best medicine. And I will say, eight times out of ten we are laughing in there, because someone will say something so funny,” Parsons said.

However, the sessions often delve into more serious waters, Parsons said. The games and discussions allow students to open up about the emotions and experiences weighing on them

“They love it, but it’s not always a fun time. Some of these kids come in so traumatized. I had one little girl in a school where I started that I had just lost her father … and was not even at a place where she could say (that he had died) … She was raw…” Parsons said. “There are some times where kids are totally undone. I had a middle school kid whose brother had been killed in a drive by and his brother committed suicide and he found him. And that is incredibly traumatic … The things they face are beyond imagination sometimes.”

Though the groups are mostly contained to their six-week periods, Parsons said she often sees kids come back year after year, each time dealing with a new situation: a lost grandparent, then a divorce, then an incarcerated parent. For a lot of the students, loss is more of a cycle than an instance.

While the programs are set to a fairly consistent weekly lesson plan, Parsons said she and other facilitators do mold the groups to the kids in them.

“It’s more specialized. After the Moore tornado, we went into Moore and had a special curriculum for those children, because their loss issues were different…” Parsons said. “If I have a group where most are dealing with one who has died, then there are ways to make it more in their wheelhouse.”

Other schools have gone through similarly specific situations. After a student’s suicide at Edmond Memorial High School, dozens of students poured into the groups, trying to find a way to manage the shock, guilt and grief, said the school’s counselor, Dawnetta Russell. The impact the groups made was clear, she said.

Parsons also has noticed a change in her students year after year, she said. Over the course of the program, she said the kids build relationships and confidence, relying on each other for support even after the final week.

“They start to feel real safe there,” Parsons said. “Kids go to school together, but maybe they don’t know each other. But by the time those six weeks are over, they have found that they have other people they can talk to that have shared, maybe not their experience, but a similar experience. They bond in that group, and there is a lot of fun in there. It’s more fun than it’s not.”