PUT – Psychosocial Support for Grieving Children and Families

Project Psychosocial Support for Grieving Children and Families (Psihosocijalna podrška u tugovanju- PUT)  is a project that the Parents’ Association Step by Step conducts in collaboration with partner organisations, the Association for the Promotion of Healthy Lifestyle and Improvement of the Quality of Life “Luč” and the “Children First” Association, as part of the Call for the submission of project proposals “Expansion of the Social Services Network in the Community – PHASE 1”, code of the call for the submission of project proposals UP.02.2.2.06., published on 23rd January 2018. 

Currently, there are no organised psychosocial group support programmes for children and parents who have lost an immediate family member.

Project Psychosocial Support for Grieving Children and Families directly responds to this need by expanding the social services network in the community to several levels, the children, the youth, and the families affected by the loss of a parent. If we take global estimations that, every year, approximately 5% of children on average experience the loss of an immediate family member, in Zagreb County that amounts to 3400 children and youths, in Brod-Posavina County 2896, in Sisak-Moslavina County approximately 1644, in Karlovac County approximately 1180, while at the national level this amounts to 44,900 children every year.

This is the first programme for group psychosocial support in the Republic of Croatia that simultaneously empowers two target groups: children/youths who have experienced the loss of a person close to them and their parents/guardians who, along with numerous obligations, also have to deal with the loss and grief themselves. The project also includes experts who encounter this problem in the social welfare and education systems by sensitising and educating them to recognise and appropriately respond to an early loss, as well as paving the way for a sustainable national model by creating capacities in 4 local communities, Karlovac, Brod-Posavina, Sisak-Moslavina and Zagreb Counties.

Through the project, we aim to ensure psychosocial support through group counselling in the local community to children and youth who have experienced an early loss (death) of a parent, to ensure psychosocial support through group counselling in the local community to parents who have lost a spouse or non-marital partner, to educate mental health experts to lead psychosocial support groups, as well as sensitise experts who work with children in kindergartens, schools and Centres for providing services in the community, key stakeholders and the general public on the process of grief in children, youths and families. 

Start of the project: 7th April 2020

Project duration: 21 months

Total value of the project: 1,069,784.31 HRK