“It is impossible to fathom losing a child. Whether the loss of a child was expected or not, the anguish that follows is likely to feel crushing and eternal. My name is Jovanna Marc. In 1984, I attempted to remove my son’s body from King County Hospital morgue in Brooklyn, NY after he died in a New York City daycare facility. I spent many years in and out of psychiatric hospitals. And just when I was beginning to feel like things were turning around, I lost my second son in 2015 at a correctional facility.
The death of my boys had a profound effect on my well-being, both mentally and physically. There was major anxiety about the heightened suicide risk. I went through a series of physical changes that couldn’t be prevented or remedied. Despite the passage of time, the crushing sorrow I felt after the loss of my firstborn son and then my second never faded. The death of my sons was devastating and has left an enormous void in my life. I experienced sadness, numbness, and sometimes guilt and fury. I still have a hard time getting over my grief and moving on with my life because the negative feelings linger. Eventually, I stopped trusting other people. I struggled to complete even mundane tasks. I even cut myself off from friends and family.
After years of receiving mental health services from numerous providers, I completed the Howie the Harp Peer Specialist Training Program, and I am now a Certified Peer Specialist. As someone who has faced and overcome similar challenges in their own lives and who has trained to provide services to others in need, I am able to help others achieve greater levels of independence and self-sufficiency through facilitating their own recovery, strengthening their own capacity for resilience, and facilitating their own successful community integration.
Ms. Leslie Robinson is someone I met during a community outreach event. Ms. Robinson, after hearing my story, introduced me to the Remembrance game and explained that she created this for individuals like me. Curious, I went home and played the game with my children. The soft guided conversation questions, comforting quotes on grief, and art ideas for group discussions are all included in Remembrance. Ms. Robinson learns via her game Remembrance that just as every life is different, so, too, is every person’s experience of loss.
By creating an atmosphere of trust and acceptance, Remembrance is able to tap into profound states of soulfulness that promote healing for everyone who takes part. Remembrance is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to reflect on the life of the departed, remember the many ways in which they touched your own, and speak openly about the many ways in which their life changed your own. Ms. Robinson has learned the hard way that healing can take as long as it takes. To bring you through a hard patch, I used what I learned about the power of memory. The soothing guided conversation questions, healing quotes on loss, sketching suggestions for group interactions, and activities in Remembrance have helped my children and I grow closer to one another. To take advantage of these rare occasions to reflect, communicate, and discourse on many facets of my boys’ lives, we have agreed to keep playing the Remembrance game.”
Jovanna Marc, Founder, Multi-Assistance Resource Center, Inc.