Shared experience

To an outside eye, the children and teens who are members of Kate’s Club look like your run-of-the-mill, rowdy after-school group or day camp. They cheer loudly and fill up on junk food at Atlanta Braves games, get messy with arts and crafts, take on community service projects and look forward to their next get-together.

Kate’s Club, says founder Kate Atwood (Sociology ’00), is above all “a celebration of life.” The members are, just as they appear, normal kids who love to make new friends and have fun. What makes Kate’s Club different is that all the children share one common experience: They are all coping with the death of a parent or sibling.

Atwood was inspired to found Kate’s Club by the intersection of two major events in her life: the death of her mother when she was 12 and her work as a counselor at a children’s bereavement camp in Richmond.

“At age 19, I had never done any kind of counseling, never been put in any kind of forum where people had shared my same experience,” Atwood says. “The camp director approached me to ask if I would ‘open camp,’ which meant standing in front of 250 people to share my story.”

With no preparation, she “just started talking” about losing her mother. Afterward, a young girl approached her and without any prompting said, “I lost my mom and my dad.” She told her story to Atwood, who later found out that the child had not spoken about her parents’ death in 18 months.

“It was such a gift to realize how much I could have a direct impact on someone just by sharing and communicating,” she says.

Atwood continued to volunteer at the camp throughout college and after moving to Atlanta after graduation. With her father’s help she began brainstorming ideas for founding a support group, and Kate’s Club began to take shape in early 2003. “I wanted to get kids together to share with each other, but have them drive the communication instead of counselors. And I wanted it to be fun, to give them an alternative outlet for their grief.”

Though she had a clear idea of the purpose she wanted the club to serve, Atwood faced the challenge of finding kids to participate. Armed with a mission statement, resumes and references, she met with prospective parents and kids so that they could interview her before deciding to join Kate’s Club. But she learned from her first family interview that the mother had not come to check her credentials on paper.

“I offered her all my information and she said, ‘You know what, I don’t even need to see that. I just want you to tell my girls your story,’” Atwood recalls. “It was enough credential that I had lived that experience.” The three girls eagerly agreed to become a part of Kate’s Club, and with the addition of two more families the club officially launched in June of 2003.

Today, all three original families  remain active members. Kate’s Club has grown to include 24 kids, 37 trained “buddies” and many more community volunteers who assist with the monthly outings and events. In the fall of 2005 the club opened its own community center, which offers mentoring programs, support groups for parents, children and buddies, and expanded social programs.

“The Clubhouse will be the first community center for grieving children that focuses on ongoing social support,” says Atwood. “We’re really going beyond the short-term clinical  bereavement support we currently see throughout our society.”