Balloons 4 Healing Project

[MartyT]

Sent to us today by Love Never Dies author Sandy Goodman, who received it from Natalie Blakeslee:

Balloons 4 Healing Project

As I was speaking by phone to Denise Platz, the bereaved mom of a precious son named Aaron, I realized that she was now living too far away to visit her son's grave. She had moved from the Fairview-Girard PA area to California.

We spoke about the upcoming sixth anniversary of her son's passing. She had just visited home a couple of months earlier and couldn't come back again this soon. I asked myself how I could help her make the day less stressful for her, as she would be missing and grieving her child even more on that day.

And so I told Denise, "You can still lay flowers, balloons, gifts, whatever you wish, at your son's grave. I would be more than happy to do it in your place."

With her imagination as her only limitation, she was free to get her feelings out, knowing that someone who truly empathized would stand in for her and present her gifts to her son.

She called a shop near my home and placed an order for the kinds and colors of flowers and balloons that she wanted, with a yellow rose accompanying her special note.

On that Saturday I picked everything up and went to her son's gravesite. With Denise on the phone, Dr. Steve Hodack and I took pictures and made a video recording, as we released the balloons and placed the flowers on his grave. Scissors and markers were left behind the tree for any members of the family that might visit. As it rained, tears flowed. We shared stories of our children and I listened as she told me about Aaron. I had lost my eldest daughter Carrie almost a year earlier. It turned out that we were not only joined in our grief, but that our children had both passed from the same illness, leukemia.

Dr. Steve ventured out in the rain one more time to grab a few photos, one of which included the gravestone of Denise's husband, which she hadn't yet seen. Her husband, Aaron's father, had passed just one year prior. We laid balloons at his grave with a note asking him to give Aaron a huge heaven hug for her. As we drove away from the cemetery, Dr. Steve said, "I think you have developed something here that could help bereaved parents all around the world."

And this was the start of "Balloons 4 Healing".

WE ARE MOMS HELPING MOMS THROUGH THE GRIEF....

"Keeping our child alive through the memories we share and the balloons and butterflies we release" is our slogan.

Group Name: Balloons4Healing

E-mail Address: Balloons4Healing@yahoogroups.com

For information, please e-mail nataliemedium@adelphia.net

[STARKISS]

Hi Marty T,

What an great ideal, If I ever lost a child I would certainly try and connect to someone with in this group to help me if I needed the help... Thanks for sharing the information with us... Take care Shelley