In the darkness of cabin 13, squeezed onto beds and scattered across the floor with sticky fingers from Sour Patch Kids and Takis crisps, a group of girls share secrets. They joke with dark humour about being in the “dead parent club.” Furthermore, they discuss how loss has shaped their lives in quiet, relentless ways.

These are children of overdose victims, brought together at Comfort Zone Camp’s Overdose Loss Camp in Wingdale, New York. The free weekend retreat serves youngsters aged 7 to 17 who’ve lost a parent or sibling to drug overdose, offering them something rare: a place where they don’t have to explain.

Breaking the Silence of Stigma

Daisy Talbot was three years old when she found her father, Luke, dead in his sleep from an opioid overdose. Now 14, she says the camp provides instant understanding. “People just instantly got it without me ever having to explain anything,” Talbot explains.

Later, on the cabin’s rickety porch, after younger campers have gone to bed and the Milky Way emerges overhead, older children of overdose victims begin sharing fears they’ve seldom told anyone else:

I want to go on medication, but I’m afraid of getting addicted.

What if I lose someone else to an overdose?

I’m terrified of ending up like my dad.

These conversations represent the core purpose of the camp, launched in 2022 as the first overnight programme of its kind in the United States. Indeed, Comfort Zone Camp created it after seeing a 30% spike in overdose losses referenced in their general grief camp applications between 2021 and 2022.

“When you isolate that loss and bring them all together, that’s when the real magic happens because the stigma just kind of disappears,” says Krista Collopy, the organisation’s Northeast Senior Regional Director. “We’re not curing them, we’re just setting them up to leave with a different toolbox of coping skills.”

The Hidden Toll of the Opioid Crisis

More than 321,000 children in the United States lost a parent to drug overdose between 2011 and 2021, according to federal health researchers writing in JAMA Psychiatry. Moreover, today over 100,000 people die from drug overdose annually in America, with nearly 70% of deaths caused by synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl.

Notably, many children of overdose victims attending this camp are teenagers whose parents fell victim to the prescription opioid boom of the 1990s and early 2000s. In fact, some campers are now older than their parents were when they started using substances.

The camp addresses this reality head-on. Held from 12th to 14th September this year, the weekend brought together 28 campers and 46 volunteers at Camp Ramah in the Berkshires. The programme receives funding through a partnership with childhood bereavement charity A Little Hope.

Creating Safe Spaces for Grief

Allie Haufler, 15, lost her father Kevin when she was nine but didn’t discover it was an overdose until two years later. She brought photos of them mid-laughter, sticking out their tongues. However, now she watches friends experiment with drugs and feels paralysed by fear.

“I have friends who are doing drugs, and I don’t know how to feel about it,” Haufler says. “You see the possibilities of what could happen, and it just hurts. I don’t want to lose them, too.”

Unfortunately, her concerns reflect a dangerous reality. Young people today encounter counterfeit Oxycodone, Xanax, Percocet and Adderall accessible through platforms like Facebook, Snapchat and Telegram. The Drug Enforcement Administration warns that six out of every ten fake prescription pills contain a potentially lethal dose of fentanyl.

Understanding Complex Emotions

The camp’s approach centres on storytelling and peer support. Volunteer Jenn Harris, a clinical social worker, shares her experience of losing her younger brother to opioids two weeks before graduating from university. She tells children of overdose victims something many need to hear: it’s acceptable to feel conflicting emotions about the people they lost.

“I loved my brother, I loved who he was, but I hated who he was when he was using,” Harris explains. She’s volunteered for 15 years, helping children understand their complex feelings.

Throughout the weekend, campers participate in age-specific support groups called healing circles, each led by facilitators with clinical experience. Additionally, every camper pairs with a “Big Buddy” volunteer who stays by their side.

Wally Brown’s eight-year-old “little buddy” Miles lost his sister to overdose four years ago. “This relationship, it’s the magic ingredient,” Brown says. “We had the same connection. He lost his sister, and I also lost mine.”

Confronting Difficult Truths

Some children’s only memories involve finding heroin needles in the bathroom, discovering empty prescription bottles, or being asked for cash. Yet the photo books many pass around tell different stories: laughter at Disney World, splashing through beach waves, playing in parks.

“People have this image of what an addict looks like, and for us, an addict looks like our sister, our brother, our mum, our dad,” Talbot says. “They made bad choices, but they loved us.”

Therefore, teaching children of overdose victims that anger, guilt, regret, or even relief are normal reactions forms a crucial part of the camp’s mission. When one camper in the high school-aged healing circle expresses guilt about mentioning his father because it makes his mother cry, Harris interjects: “It’s not you making them sad, it’s the grief they experienced.”

Building Resilience Through Activity

Beyond emotional support, campers participate in high-energy activities like ropes courses and team challenges designed to build trust and resilience. Younger groups brainstorm coping skills for each letter of the alphabet, writing down healthy self-care methods: talking with friends, listening to music, journaling.

Meanwhile, grief emerges at unexpected moments during sandy beach volleyball games or whilst eating ice cream sandwiches in the noisy dining hall. “Grief is like a big hand right in your face, and every time you share your story, or you hear someone else’s story, the hand moves further and further from your face,” Collopy explains.

Preparing for the Real World

The camp deliberately lasts only three days. “It’s three days on purpose, because we’re setting them up to leave the whole time,” Collopy says. Consequently, the goal isn’t to eliminate grief but to provide tools for carrying it.

For teenagers navigating secondary school whilst confronting the same substances that tempted their parents, this preparation proves vital. Thus, the camp helps young people understand the dangers whilst processing their loss, equipping them to make informed choices about their own lives.

The stark reality facing children of overdose victims extends beyond personal grief. Indeed, they witness peers experimenting with substances, potentially unaware that counterfeit pills might contain lethal doses of fentanyl. At the same time, they carry the weight of knowing how addiction destroyed their families whilst trying to build normal teenage lives.

A Community Beyond Camp

Come Sunday afternoon, with bellies full of hot dogs and hamburgers, campers exchange hugs and phone numbers. They dread returning to their respective states, schoolwork, and being the only pupil in their class who lost someone to overdose.

Talbot’s mother, Lydia, observes her daughter’s transformation each time she attends. “There isn’t a need to explain. There’s already this shared unspoken understanding,” she says. “She’s come back each time, just feeling certainly grateful, but nervous to jump back into a world where she doesn’t have that anymore.”

Campers travel from across America, including California, Florida and Virginia, for this specialised weekend in New York. Some return for their third year, eager to reconnect. In contrast, others arrive nervous, forced into cars by parents, dreading 48 phone-free hours filled with discussions about feelings.

Yet by 4 p.m. on the first day, all 28 campers sprawl across a grass field, playing ice breakers with volunteers. Remarkably, the judgement disappears the moment they close car doors, replaced by open arms and understanding.

The Long Shadow of Loss

“Having lost someone at such a young age makes you mature a lot faster than other kids,” Talbot reflects. She grieves not just her father but the opportunities missed growing up without one: daddy-daughter dances, Father’s Day, simple dinners with friends’ families.

The camp acknowledges this stolen childhood whilst providing hope. As a result, children of overdose victims learn they’re not alone in their pain, their fear, or their complicated feelings towards the family members they lost.

Their grief doesn’t end at camp, but now they know how to carry it. Ultimately, they return home with coping strategies, peer connections, and perhaps most importantly, the knowledge that others understand their unique burden without explanation.

The rising number of children of overdose victims reflects America’s ongoing substance crisis. Each statistic represents a young person navigating loss, stigma, and fear whilst trying to build a future different from their parents’ past. Comfort Zone Camp offers these youngsters three days of understanding, but the tools they gain last far longer.

Source: USA Today