Finding healing in grief with Canuck Place

Canuck Place Children’s Hospice holiday fundraiser, Light a Life is running from now until December 31, 2024. Learn more about the impact your donation can make on children with life-threatening illnesses and the families who love them.

At just 14 months old, Tristan Rempel was diagnosed with ependymoma brain cancer after his brain tumor erupted. While he made a miraculous recovery, his cancer came back when he was three years old, and his parents, Jenn and Matt, received the agonizing news that their son’s cancer was terminal.

It was at this time that the Rempel family was introduced to Canuck Place, the only pediatric palliative care provider for children and families across B.C. and the Yukon. Canuck Place services include in-hospice medical respite and family support, pain and symptom management, a provincial 24-Hour Clinical Care Line, music and recreation therapy, education and art, grief, loss, and bereavement counselling, as well as end-of-life care. All at no cost to families.

After their initial meeting with Canuck Place clinicians, the Rempels immediately felt a sense of relief in identifying their care goals for Tristan and how they could work with Canuck Place to achieve them.

“Canuck Place nurses supported our desire to stay at home, outside of William’s Lake, for as long as possible and the team was available to us by phone, email, and video chat whenever we needed them,” says Jenn. Canuck Place nurses also arranged to have in-home care nurses visit the Rempel family several times a week, to manage Tristan’s medical appointments, organize his medications and show Jenn how to administer them.

In addition to care coordination for Tristan, the Rempels also received Canuck Place counselling support, helping them navigate their complex feelings of grief. Like many families, their grief began from the moment Tristan was diagnosed—anxious about what the future held.

“For me, the question became how do I process my grief while Tristan is still alive without letting that steal what I have with him in the present,” says Jenn.

Matt and Jenn found an unexpected beauty in their grief. It allowed them to be intentional with the time they had left. “Knowing that time is something you will never get back, presented us with the opportunity to spend quality time together as a family,” Jenn explains. “Together, we poured a lifetime of memories into two years and made the most of every minute that we had with Tristan.”

The entire Rempel family would travel from their small town near Williams Lake to Canuck Place for medical respite care, giving Matt and Jenn some much needed rest and renewal, while their other children could enjoy various activities together with the recreation therapy team. Counselling support while they were at the hospice allowed each member of the Rempel family to navigate the complex journey of grief.

At Canuck Place, hope and heartbreak are intertwined. And if you love deeply, you grieve deeply.

“I did a lot of grieving before Tristan died,” Jenn shares. “And when he did die, I saw that as a continuation of what was already happening. I was able to find healing in grief and learned that grief goes hand-in-hand with heartache, but there is also a lot of peace in it as well.”

Tristan, and all the children at Canuck Place, leave a legacy behind—one of love, light, and hope.

From now until December 31, every gift received this holiday season will be matched, dollar for dollar, thanks to generous partners. Light a life. Give today at canuckplace.org.