Preparing your child for their visit

With any new referral to Crocus Highland, we offer an introductory visit. This gives you and your child a chance to meet us and find out more about the service. The visit also enables us to provide some reassurance, advice and resources, and to assess whether we can provide appropriate further support. During the session, we usually split so that one of us does an activity with the young person, and one of us gets more information from the parent/carer/s. The session normally lasts around 40 minutes.

It may be more beneficial to your child to visit without siblings present. However, we understand that this is not always possible or that sometimes support is being sought for more than one child in the family. We can be flexible to accommodate your individual situation.

Before coming for your visit, it is very important that your child knows what they are coming to. They should be prepared and included. You can explain that Crocus Highland is a charity that is here to support young people after someone important to them has died. Lots of children and teenagers come here, and it is a space to be able to share questions, thoughts and feelings, but they are not made to share anything they don’t want to. They choose what they participate in. If your child does not want to visit, we are happy to start by meeting with you.

After the visit we will get back in touch with you with our support recommendations. Sometimes one visit is all that is needed and can make a big difference in helping you to feel confident about supporting your child through their grief.