Photos courtesy of Brighter Days Family Grief Center
Rendering of campus-style Brighter Days Grief Center, flanked by lilacs and walking paths
Rendering of future building
“In some other life
We are standing
Side by side and
Laughing that, in
Some other life
We are apart.” —David Jones
You don’t understand your capacity for resilience until life sends you into a skid. Either your malleability makes itself abundantly clear, or you learn you’re the person in need of someone to keep you upright. When tragedy tried to flatten her, Carolyn Kinzel learned that she belonged to the former.
She spent her 20s shouldering the blessings and burdens of caregiving, from watching her grandmother slowly fade away (“she was the love of my life”), to looking after her ailing fiancé, who, only two months after their engagement, was diagnosed with a fatal heart and lung disease. Kinzel became intimately aware that the grief space was narrow and one-note, devoid of resources or opportunities that extended beyond a typical referral to a therapist or support group. Then, in her thirties, tragedy struck her business partner who lost his wife and son in a helicopter crash, generating a sense of internal urgency for her.
“He went from a family of four to a family of two, and his 3-year-old kept asking where his mama was all the time,” she says. “I watched his life spiral—no one knew how to support him. I just kept thinking, how is there not something out there? I tried to find a place for him and his daughter to go to—physically.” A single mother, Kinzel decided to pursue her master’s, taking night classes to inch her toward her goal of being a counselor (or doing something psychotherapy adjacent). “As I was going through school, I was researching grief support in the state and realized we [in Minnesota] did not have a grief center. And I felt like with every person I met, there was a reason that I met them, and the grief center thing just kept hitting me,” she says.
She sat with the idea of getting a grief center off the ground for a few years, talked herself out of it, and then two days after verbally expressing doubts to her now-husband, she heard a knock on the door—and what came next would send her to her knees. “There were two guys standing outside saying, ‘Can we come in’? I thought, well this isn’t good. They told me that my 12-year-old son’s father had died by suicide,” she says. “[My son] and I were both sitting on the kitchen floor and sobbing, and that was the stage for me in which I went, ‘I have to figure this out, I need to get him help—how do I do this?’” This experience, she says, is what formed the impetus for Brighter Days Family Grief Center, a welcome space in Eden Prairie that serves grievers of all walks of life.
Signed, Sealed, and Remembered
Grievers know that those intense feelings of sorrow and anguish don’t come with a start/stop button. Kinzel took her son to three different bereavement counselors, where she left appointments with more questions than answers. “They’d say, ‘See you next week!’ and, you know, there’s a lot of life that happens in between those counseling sessions,” she recalls. In those early days, she lost her child support, her son’s health insurance was terminated, and she had no clear-cut path forward. The acuteness of loss can hinder our ability to think straight, form coherent thoughts, or even read a few lines of text. That’s why Kinzel conjured a place that would approach grief in a holistic way—incorporating financial, logistical, and psychosocial support for families with varied needs.
"We are the ones that come in and say, you don’t have to file for social security alone … you don’t have to get groceries, let us do that. How do you deal with credit cards or getting a probate attorney when you’re heartbroken?” Carolyn Kinzel, founder and president of Brighter Days Family Grief Center
“That experience was when I learned I was supposed to be the bulldog. We [at Brighter Days] are advocates for that reason. We are the ones that come in and say, you don’t have to file for social security alone … you don’t have to get groceries, let us do that,” she says. “How do you deal with credit cards or getting a probate attorney when you’re heartbroken?” One of the most overlooked yet triggering aspects in the aftermath of loss is getting mail with your loved one’s name on it. Or having to deactivate social media accounts. Or delivering the devastating news to their workplace. That’s why the approach at Brighter Days is two-pronged: the staff takes care of the emotionally charged paperwork and legalities so you can focus on taking care of yourself.
The first touchpoint usually involves a referral—Brighter Days has 85 partners in their network, including the state’s major hospital systems, most hospices, several non-profits, and cancer/caregiver/ALS-related organizations—where callers will either be matched up with a grief counselor, get directed to Hennepin County for crisis situations, or, Kinzel says, they can help excavate the top three immediate needs if the caller is experiencing decision paralysis, a very common side effect of grief. “We will determine who the next best person is for them to talk to or, if they’re in need of some financial help, we’ll go get them groceries [or fuel up their car] and then set up a time for them to come in and sit on the couch.” Those individuals will also receive a tailored plan with information laid out that feels “very doable in the moment.” The bereaved know all too well that reading or taking instruction can only be accomplished in manageable chunks.
Aside from these foundational services, Brighter Days is invested in the younger generations, connecting youth to a quarterly grief series and two annual bereavement camps, and young adults to weekend retreats, social events, internships, and monthly support groups. There’s also the Embrace-A-Family program, which allows the organization to provide grocery cards, pre-made meals, mortgage payments, medical bills, and other forms of personalized financial assistance to families rocked by loss.
Future’s Looking Bright
Brighter Days has touched 7,000 people in almost six years and, with a future build backed by a 6 million dollar capital campaign, is bound to reach that number again in just half the time. The sprawling, horseshoe-shaped campus will be anchored by two entry plazas—one, a dedicated grief center and the other, an auditorium reserved for lectures, training, and teaching. Kinzel says the architect has built the floor plans, now it’s just a matter of finding land somewhere within the Twin Cities that feels a bit removed so traffic noise won’t be a factor.
Carolyn Kinzel [second from left, white top] and board members at Brighter Days Family Grief Center's annual gala.
Group shot of board members at Brighter Days Family Grief Center's annual gala
“Families can come in with their kids,” she says. “Dad can go and have coffee with other dads, mom can go to grief yoga, and the kids can go and do crafts. And if they want to hit one of the events we have, or check out a talk in the auditorium, there’s a place for them to come to.” The center, which serves all ages and types of losses, will include a butterfly memorial garden, movie room, library for quiet reading and resources, yoga studio, meditation lounge for journaling, children’s expression rooms, and more. Kinzel says the vision for the building is to serve as a refuge when grievers are feeling down and want the opportunity to celebrate their person. *No appointment needed.
"We don’t have a tangible mission—we’re not a cancer organization, so when we ask for money, we’re not doing research for a cure," she says. "There is none. For us, it’s about hope: How do you provide something that is intangible and yet creates the ability to move forward in a life that no longer looks the same? We strive to be the Hazelden of grief.”
I toured the space this week (the future build, Kinzel says, is slated for a few years out yet), which was bathed in daylight and warm colors, and felt instantly at ease as I met eyes with accepting gazes. When you're having what I refer to as "a bad grief day," an understanding look is sometimes all you need. "There are no empty platitudes here," I was assured. Kinzel sent me home with a stack of "A Simple Act of Kindness" cards, where you can pay it forward in your person's memory, and later sent an email telling me about a gesture she made in name of my brother. "We won't forget about him, Jamie. I promise." If there ever was a living embodiment of compassion, Kinzel and her colleagues are it.
Brighter Days Family Grief Center, 15764 Venture Lane, Eden Prairie, 952.303.3873, brighterdaysgriefcenter.org
*Brighter Days accepts walk-ins during business hours without an appointment for any logistical needs, but getting in with one of their grief counselors does require an appointment.
