What is Rainbows?

Rainbows is a free, voluntary service for children and young people experiencing loss following bereavement and parental separation.

The Rainbows service is an inclusive service, supporting children and young people experiencing grief and loss resulting from bereavement/parental separation/parental relationship breakdown /divorce.

Attending the programme provides children with an opportunity to meet with other children of a similar age and loss experience, at a minimum of 3 months after the loss.

It does not provide an individual one to one support service and does not provide counselling or a therapeutic level of intervention.

The service is not and cannot be considered as a first response for a bereavement or loss that may be a more traumatic loss experience e.g. murder, suicide, car accident.

Rainbows Can

• Support a child to engage with their own individual grief– to identify, name, understand, express and share their feelings
• Provide a safe setting to tell and retell feelings and thoughts with trained listeners
• Support children to have a shared experience and identification with others’ feelings… “I’m not the only one”
• Acknowledge a child’s grief and loss
• Support a child’s self-esteem, trust, confidence and resilience
• Support emotional growth and a pathway to positive mental health
• Provide a model of coping and support

Rainbows Cannot

Rainbows can sometimes be perceived as a service as a ‘One Size Fits All’ service, that is “better than nothing.”

Rainbows is a limited voluntary service.  It is not therapy, professional counselling or clinical professional support.

Rainbows cannot,

• analyse or diagnose emotional or behavioural problems
• give advice or attempt to solve problems
• give opinions, pass comment, make judgements, take sides or criticise
• give reports, take notes, give feedback or evidence