When Lynne lost her husband of 52 years, she had good support from family, friends and therapists, but it wasn’t enough. “They want to make you feel better,” she recalls. They wanted to “get things back to where they were.” But she knew that wasn’t the process of grief. So, she sought out HOPE Connection. In the Spousal Loss group, she found what she needed: a safe place to fall.
The HOPE healing community is “a place of support for every aspect of your life during a time of grief,” she says. It is “a place where you can be however you are. You’re with other people on the same journey. You have wonderful, caring human beings running these groups.”
Which is why, when her two years were complete, she joined our New Beginnings alumni group. “HOPE is big in my life,” she says. “There is no other organization like it. There are a lot of good professionals, but when you find a professional who has heart and soul… they are there because they know.”
We do know. Which is why, as HOPE Connection turns 44, we acknowledge the amazing therapists and board members who sustain such healing spaces as our Spousal and Parental Loss groups, the New Beginnings alumni group, and our newest group — Spousal Loss: Delayed Grief. With their hard — and heart — work, we have maintained communities of hope in West LA, Encino and Agoura, even during the transition to Zoom three years ago.
Of course, we can’t do any of this without you. HOPE Connection doesn’t have a major funder, so it is only the sponsorship of individual donors that gives us the strength and funding to build a better community. Your referrals help hurting hearts find us, and your contributions help us to help them walk a healthy journey through loss.
Please take this opportunity to become a HOPE angel by sending a contribution today. You may conveniently donate online here.
Hope is one of the most powerful words in the English language. Gratitude is another. Thank you for helping us bring hope to more hearts on the journey from grief to life.
Jo Christner, Psy.D.
Executive Director
HOPE Connection is a 501(c)(3) organization, tax ID 95-3551421.
Your donation is tax deductible to the fullest extent of the law.