They used to be inseparable, Colleen Szalka and her daughter did everything together.

Today, Szalka’s daughter Destiny is 16 and living on the streets or in shelters. She struggles with a mental health issue and has turned towards drugs and away from her family.

Photo: Jennifer Zielinski

Colleen Szalka looks at photos of her daugher

“Destiny comes from a good home, she comes from a two parent home,” explains Szalka. “She comes from a home where her parents have been there every step of the way, and still are supporting her.”
 
Szalka says her daughter was an avid writer, with dreams of becoming a fashion designer; she loved Harry Potter and family vacations,  but now that has all changed.

“She had some kind of mental break at 13, and since then she has run away, she’s tried to take her life… she’s not going to school and at this point we haven’t had contact with her for a few months.”

As Destiny slips away from her family, Szalka is turning to others who are in similar situations – parents who have lost a child to the streets, to drugs or to mental illness. She is asking other parents to come together and meet in a support group she’s created called ‘A Different Kind of Loss’.

“It is a place for them to get together to support each other, because it is a different type of grieving. It’s like you’ve lost your child but they are still alive, so you have the grief and you have all the worry on top of it.”

Outreach Mental Health Clinician, Amanda Donaldson says a support group like ‘A Different Kind of Loss’ will offer members a safe space to bond and come together

“It sounds like this group, of parents or caregivers, will already have this shared experience, so there is already a sense of understanding, bonding, vulnerability,” explains Donaldson. “They are looking at ‘how are you handling this’, ‘what’s going on for you’, what’s normal, what’s not.”

Donaldson says support groups normalize the behaviours of the members and validate their feelings.

“I think it’s important for people not to feel alone.”

Szalka says she hopes many topics will come up during the meetings, but the group will focus mainly on support for one another.

“Unless you’re in this situation, you don’t get it and people need to be there for each other.”

To contact Szalka email [email protected] or go to the group’s Facebook page to find out more about the initiative. Meetings will be held at the West Kelowna Yacht Club.