The Des Moines Register – Mackenzie Ryan
“Chelsie Omvig’s eyes tear up as she speaks about her father’s suicide. The memory is still vividly raw: Wondering why the preacher was in her living room, the overwhelming emotions when she learned he had died, and the steps her family took to avoid the room where it happened. She was 6 years old, and what the adults told her didn’t make sense. When one said her father was in a better place, and she wondered: Aren’t I a better place? The worst comments, though, came from other children. She still recalls the humiliation of another kid pointing at her and saying: ‘Ha ha, you don’t have a dad.’ Now a seventh-grader at Robert Blue Middle School, 13-year-old Chelsie is using her experiences to help classmates who’ve also lost a loved one. As part of the school’s character education program, which was recognized this year by the nonprofit Character.org, she and a friend are teaching other students how to support each other through grief.”(more)