Services
Immediate Crisis Support
Survivor Resources advocates for and supports families with a wide variety of immediate problems. Crisis support services include:
- Support during the viewing of the body
- Explaining autopsy procedures
- Help in notifying others who need to be told
- Special help in telling children about the death
- Crime scene cleaning resources
- Providing a link between the police and the survivors for the exchange of information
- Debriefing or processing the events surrounding the death
- Assisting families in dealing with the media
- Arranging for families to meet with police investigator to learn facts about the case
- Filling out forms for the Crime Victim Reparations Board
- Helping with resources and referrals as needed
- Continuing grief support
Beyond the immediate and concrete things that need to be done, Survivor Resources can connect survivors with individual and family counseling. Survivor Resources also offers weekly grief support groups led by trained facilitators for:
- Adult survivors of suicide
- Adult survivors of homicide
- Adult survivors of accidental death
- Young Children
- Teens
Survivor Resources understands that each situation presents unique issues and that each person needs support for their individual issues as well.
Spiritual Support
Survivor Resources leads remembrance ceremonies twice each year to continue to recognize and support survivors' grief and honor their loved ones.
Volunteer police chaplains assist law enforcement with death notification and will stay with families to help in practical ways and offer emotional and spiritual support.
Education, Training, and Consultation
When a group loses a member, the whole group suffers. Survivor Resources provides consultation and education to organizations that lose fellow employees, students or church members. Survivor Resources helps members understand their grief and teaches them how they can offer support to the victim's loved ones. For professionals working with survivors of traumatic death, Survivor Resources provides training for:
- Clergy
- Medical personnel
- Law enforcement
- Mental health professionals
- Educators
- Victim service providers
- The community
This training focuses on the unique issues of grief as they relate to a violent death. Training content and length is tailored to the needs of the organization requesting the training.
Issues of Traumatic Death
The death of a loved one is always traumatic, but when the loss is the result of murder, suicide or accident,the impact is...well, profoundly different. It may be so different that a survivor experiencing it might not understand what they are going through or feeling. This misunderstanding can lead to even greater problems including chemical use, domestic violence, absenteeism from work or school, family breakdown, or loss of health. Post-traumatic stress disorder is not an uncommon result. Not many people can deal with police, courts and news media while suffering from the shock of the traumatic loss of a loved one.
Survivor Resources is committed to serving families of St. Paul, Minneapolis, Ramsey and Hennepin Counties, but never refuses support to anyone in need. Survivor Resources offers immediate practical help, resource referral and emotional support to the survivors of homicide, suicide and accidental death. Appropriate intervention soon after a traumatic loss helps survivors face trauma and address grief.