A new section has been added to this website.

RainbowsGB relies on donations to be able to continue its work.

So now people can make a donation directly via this website.

Just click on the "Make a Donation" tab on the left and click on the "Donate" button.

Thanks

Two new order forms for 2010 have been added to the Document Section of this site :

UK Order Form 2010 p1 & p2

The forms have been completely redesigned to allow for the amalgamation of religious & secular items. Also Vat has been changed, and some prices have been lowered and new items added.

What can Rainbows Do ?

John’s father asked him to cut the lawn but, being a teenager, he wanted to meet his friends and do the grass tomorrow. So John’s father cut the grass and had a heart attack, dying before John came home. For years, John lived, not only with his grief, but with a sense of guilt that he had caused his father’s death.

Six year old Katy puzzled her teachers by refusing to sit at the same table as another little girl. Her teacher could not see any reason and quietly questioned her. After a long silence, Katy burst out “She’s got my daddy!” Her father had left home and gone to live with another mother on the estate.

Chris had looked forward to the day when he would be old enough to go fishing with his father, like his older brother, but his father died unexpectedly and Chris felt cheated of the happy times that he and his father would share.

All of these young people were suffering from bereavement, from a life altering loss. Because the grown ups in their families were busy dealing with their own feelings, they did not have time to see the depth of suffering in their children. They were comforted by friends who assured them that children are resilient and would cope. Even if they had seen the extent of their suffering, they would not have had the emotional strength to deal with it. The young people themselves, seeing how upset their parent was, kept their feelings to themselves so as not to cause any further upset. John, Katy, Chris and thousands of other young people suffering loss, bottled up their feelings.

Sometimes, the feelings of hurt, bewilderment and pain show themselves in unacceptable ways such as anger, becoming withdrawn, getting into trouble, trying drink or drugs, doing badly at school when they had previously been model students. It can take years before the cause of the problem is identified and the person helped to come to terms with what happened and the way it changed their lives for ever.

What they need is the chance to talk about their feelings, to begin to accept what has happened and eventually move on with their lives. In the “old days”, when families were larger and lived close together, a kindly aunt or uncle or grandparent might have seen what was happening and offered a listening ear and loving support. In our contemporary world, families are smaller, live further away from one another and people lead busy lives.

This is where “Rainbows” comes in. Rainbows is an international, not-for-profit organization that fosters emotional healing among children grieving a loss from a life-altering crisis. Staff in school are trained to run support groups for young people who have suffered such a life altering loss. Two members of staff run a group for five or six children, following a structured programme that allows plenty of time for talking and coming to terms with the normal feelings of grief:

1. DENIAL                      This can’t be happening
2. ANGER                      Why me?
3. BARGAINING            If only… (I had cut the grass/ kept my room tidy etc)
4. DEPRESSION          What’s the use?
5. ACCEPTANCE        Beginning to leave the past and look to the future

 It helps children to know that they are not alone, that others are suffering in similar ways. It helps to know that they can say how angry or sad they are in a supportive, non-judgemental environment, without someone saying “You mustn’t feel like that”. The rationale of Rainbows is to come to terms with the normal feelings of grief, to understand the normal stages of grief and to go through the four tasks of mourning:

1. To accept the reality of the loss
2. To experience the pain of grief
3. To adjust to an environment in which the deceased is missing
4. To withdraw emotional energy and reinvest it in another relationship

As a teacher for over 36 years, 15 of them as Head of two very different schools, I have seen many children struggling with loss of one kind or another. I remember the 5 year old who kept looking in the kitchen cupboards for Daddy, who had died on the operating table while she was at school. She was stuck in “Denial”- it can’t have happened.

I remember the model Year 6 pupil, who changed personality completely when his parents went through a very messy separation and father moved out. He was eventually excluded from school at 15 because of his violence and I have no doubt of the cause.

I remember the seven year old whose mother died of leukaemia and who just “gave up”. He was stuck in depression.

I wish that I had known about Rainbows so that I could help these children more than I did, hard though I tried.

It was only when I retired and had spare time that I was approached and asked to train as the Registered Director for the Catholic Diocese of Southwark in order to introduce Rainbows to Kent. I completed my five day training in Hull and learned more about Rainbows. It was begun in the States by Suzy Yehl Marta, a Catholic woman     whose own three boys had told her many years after her separation from her husband that they had not coped with it, as she had thought. She realised that there must be thousands of young people, needing help and she trained in counselling and psychotherapy and eventually devised the Rainbows programme, which is now run world wide in Catholic and non-Catholic schools, using a Catholic or secular programme.

I have been going into schools, at their request, for three years now. It depends very much on whether a school sees the need for Rainbows and whether it has members of staff who are prepared to do this work on a voluntary basis. There are now 13 schools in Kent, where I have been to train the staff to run Rainbows. I have also trained family Liaison Officers to work in smaller schools where there might be only one child needing support. I have given staff meetings and staff awareness raising sessions.

The Rainbows programme runs for 13 weeks but it is possible to continue to support young people who need it after the 13 weeks are over. Parents of children in the group also say how much it has helped them too because the children come home ready to talk about their feelings and share ideas for dealing with them that they have learned at Rainbows.

The groups are for helping young people through the normal stages of grief, thus preventing problems in later life caused by unresolved grief.  Helpers are not trained as Counsellors but as sympathetic, supportive listeners. Some young people may need professional counselling and Rainbows can never provide that. What it does provide is friendship, support and acceptance at a time of life when there is a struggle to accept a complete change of direction. We are all faced at some time with something that changes the direction in which we thought our lives would go and how we deal with that will affect us for the rest of our lives. Do we become angry, bitter and closed in on ourselves or do we learn to accept and move forward, becoming more sympathetic to others in the process?

If you would like to know more or would be interested in running Rainbows in your school or parish, please contact me for further information without any commitment.

Lyn Coyle
Registered Director Rainbows GB

For all Regional Directors:

If you are attending the above event, please remember to bring your Powerpoint presentation(s) or OH'S used for your training as well as any handouts you may have.

Thanks

CPD Team

The Registered Directors & Trustees would like to extend their congratulations & prayers to Sister Philippa on her recent election onto her Leadership Team. This will involve a move to Leeds and Sr Philippa will therefore no longer be able to continue as a Registered Director. Sr Philippa has been a tremendous asset to Rainbows GB and will be greatly missed.

The Trustees of Rainbows GB have appointed a new Company Secretary.

The new post holder is Gemma Norris, a Registered Director of Rainbows GB. Gemma takes over the position from May 2008. The trustees have extended their welcome and thanks to Gemma for accepting this important role.

The Trustees would like to extend their thanks to John Lynch, retiring Company Secretary, for the excellent work and support he has given to the charity over the years. Thanks also to Pat Lynch for her invaluable support and help.

John has now joinned the Board of Trustees.

The new registered address for Rainbows GB is:

12 Cranleigh Road,

Pakefield,

Lowestoft,

Suffolk,

NR33 7EX

Please note the Resource Centre and Rainbows Office addresses remain unchanged.

St.John  Bosco primary school in Erskine, Renfrewshire, has set up a beautiful Rainbows Garden within their school precincts which was officially opened in the summer 2007. It is a remembrance garden for those who have suffered loss and is a colourful and peaceful place for children and adults to be.

The History of the Garden

The Rainbows group were helped to come up with the idea of refurbishing our courtyard garden as a Rainbow garden as a quiet place to reflect and socialise and remember all our loved ones.
They then discussed their idea of the rainbow garden with the Pupil Council and Eco committee and gained their support for its development.

We had a research group of pupils and staff go out to visit three other schools in various parts of Glasgow who had recent courtyard gardens.
We then drafted a questionnaire to go out to all pupils, families and staff asking what features they would like to be included in the garden.

The children in the school had been asking for some time for a mural and this was a very  popular idea and our first venture. We gave all the pupils a sheet representing the back wall showing the window and asked them to design the mural - this was a homework task and the response was terrific. We did the initial judging of  the competition by awarding prizes to each class. By this time with advice from a Greenspace coordinator we had identified a local artist who then using the children's ideas developed six suitable for the mural then the next stage of judging was done by all pupils and staff voting  from the six  and then the most favourite  from three.

This was then painted and work was set in train for the rest of the garden. One of our parents drew out the plan of the garden using the results of the pupil/families questionnaire. Minor adjustments were made in the light of pupil Council and Eco Group thoughts.  Funding came from a grant  from  Awards for All and also by bag packing at local supermarkets. Children were consulted on an ongoing basis re choice of water feature, activity tables etc and were involved in the planting of the garden. They also requested a blessing ceremony for the opening of the garden and this was a very beautiful occasion.

Josie Mackay