Hurricanes & Grief Conversations
- doulanowplease
- Oct 9, 2024
- 3 min read
Our family has been talking a lot about grief & loss lately due to some personal losses around us, then hurricanes and such this month. If you're looking for a way to get involved and don't have the ability to just pack up and go there and help (I tried - my hubby told me I couldn't do that today!) here are a few ways our family is talking about and taking action in response to these storms & a strong desire to help.
Pray! Re-enforcing to our children that praying isn't lesser action but primary action. To keep praying! To prayer for specific people, places and needs as they come to your awareness.
Talk! about it and answer questions they might have about the situations. I like to give a little information and then see what questions they have. Sometimes in hardships and difficult situations our adult brains understand way more than children. Different ages of children have different questions and concerns. I try to let their questions guide my information sharing - I don't want them to be in the dark about current events. But I also don't want to outline all the horrible things for them that they aren't even concerned about or imagining.
Action! When someone we know is going through a loss whether related to these storms or otherwise here are some actions we sometimes take:
We like to send a message or cash or food. Messages that express love, support & prayers, but that don't require something in return. We will also send a card/money. That's universal and always helps with something eventually. Again, nothing required in return. Everyone needs to keep eating, regardless of the situation. So a meal is a great thing to do if you're local. I try to be aware of efforts underway and plug in to that system. Or just send/drop a meal that is in containers that need no return. My cousin did this for us last year after a loss. Soups in disposable containers. She didn't ask or get our preferences, she just left them at our door. It was so lovely.
As far as these current hurricanes besides praying we also reached to people we know in those areas affected by the storms and checked on them. Our friends are ok. Hallelujah! Then we asked if there were immediate needs around them & sent some funds through Venmo to meet whatever needs they find. They are on the ground, serving their communities and we know them and trust them implicitly.
If you don't have a relationship with anyone in those areas that you could give directly to or through there are lots of good organizations that are going there to serve. Some of my favorites:
Send Relief: A national group made up of teams of local volunteers at local organizations, trained and ready to respond to disasters in their areas. We worked with the Illinois team when we had flooding here a few years ago. I was so impressed with every one of them that we met! I love that it's fueled by volunteers. They came to our community after a flood, slept in our church on cots. Brought shower trucks and food storage with them. Rallied local volunteers and cleaned up so many homes in our area!
Cajun Navy: This is newer to me, but the more I learn the more I love. They too are local groups of volunteers who train and stay ready to respond rapidly when disasters happen. They have a wishlist on amazon. It's a little tricky to navigate. You have to actually put in their address into your addresses & choose that when you check out. If you try to use the default wish list address it's been kinda glitchy. But we got it to work. They update the list very often as needs are changing daily. You can also just make a donation.
Big and well known: Samaritan's Purse
If you have other ideas about how you respond in times of loss or crisis I'd love to hear them. If you've had a first-hand experience good or bad with any of these organizations I also love to hear about that. Blessings!
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