The Center for Good Mourning at Arkansas Children’s Hospital provides information about local support groups in Central Arkansas and around the state. Though this is offered through the Arkansas Children’s Hospital website, many of these programs work with people of all ages.

Another excellent resources is UAMS’ Bereavement Support Group Directory, which is sorted by city and offers many options for grieving support around the state. If you are grieving the loss of a child at any age, Compassionate Friends offers groups in several locations throughout the state. This organization is dedicated to helping families who have lost a child.

If you have lost a loved one through suicide, there are also a number of support groups around the state that serve families experiencing this particular kind of grief and loss.

Here are a few programs in which donor families have participated that you might want to look at first. While we don’t endorse any particular group, program or approach, these are groups with which our donor families have had some experience, and we share them in the hopes that they will be helpful:

  1. In Central Arkansas, hospice organizations offer grief groups that are open to the public and are often free of charge. See their websites for group times and locations.

www.arkansashospice.org
www.hospiceoftheozarks.org
www.hospicehomecare.com

  1. If you are interested in a religiously-based Christian program, we have had donor family members report positive experiences with Griefshare. GriefShare is a 13-week support group program offered in churches that includes religious content from the Christian tradition. For a list of GriefShare groups, click here.

Central Arkansas

You might also consider Walking the Mourner’s Path, another program with religious content, hosted at:

St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church
20900 Chenal Parkway,
Little Rock, AR 72223

Call Joanna Seibert at 501.753.4281 for a schedule. This program offers eight weekly sessions with a sliding scale fee for participation.

  1. For a program geared toward parents who have lost a child of any age, you might check out Bereaved Parents of the USA – Central Arkansas Chapter. Contact Debby and Kevin Hunsaker at 501.847.4102 or email: kevdeb91@aol.com. Contact the Central Arkansas chapter at 501.944.9007 We hope this list offers you a few places to get started in finding a community in which to express, share and finding healing in this difficult place of loss. If we can be of any further support, please do not hesitate to reach out to us directly at 501.907.9125 or aftercare@arora.org.