Solace House Center for Grief and Healing

Often it helps to talk with someone outside your family or friends. Our staff are skilled, caring, non-judgmental listeners. We can discuss your unique grief experience, explore ways to reduce suffering, and promote healthy coping.

You may be overwhelmed, realizing that life may never be the same. We can support you in adjusting to your loss and understanding common reactions to grief. Support groups can help you feel less alone, providing education and peer support.

Following a death, you may be occupied by the details of the estate, busy at work or with family, and possibly needing distractions from grief. Delaying feelings of grief does not make it go away. When ready, processing grief in the way most unique to your situation can help lessen painful emotions.

Some fear the stigma of therapy, or may feel asking for help is a sign of weakness. Grief is a difficult but natural and universal part of our human experience. We believe seeking support in difficult times is a sign of strength and commitment to healing.

Grief support is available to additional, interested family members. We can also assist out-of-town family with finding support in their local communities.

Solace House, Kansas City Hospice & Palliative Care’s center for grief and healing, was founded in 1998 by two grieving moms who were unable to find support for their children.

Other centers for grieving children and their families – like the W.A.R.M. Place in Fort Worth, Texas, and the Dougy Center in Portland, Oregon – provided guidance through their well-established program design. However, the Solace House model is uniquely its own. As the number of families  quickly increased, it became clear that the opening night of Solace House programming would include full groups for all ages of children and their parents.

Solace House volunteer training included many modules, some of which were: characteristics of human development, creative expression for children, tasks of grief, confronting personal issues of mortality, invisible losses, group theory and facilitating skills, and a field trip to a funeral home. The first volunteer training took place with paint cans still lining the walls, furniture being delivered, and a donated copier clunking along in the background like a mimeograph machine. Yet, our volunteers were amazing; they knew this place would be special. Some came with their own experiences of childhood loss, but they all came with a heart for service and a fundamental belief that personal triumph and healing from grief can occur best within the context of a caring community of support.