Colin and Julie Cooper paid a visit to Teesside Hospice’s Children’s Bereavement Service ‘Forget-Me-Not’ where they presented staff with a cheque for £5,000 on behalf of the Finlay Cooper Fund.

The much needed donation is going to be used to subsidise the running costs of the service and to purchase creative play resources for the new family therapy room.

This has extended the service so that the Hospice can offer specific family work to those families who need a more complex intervention.

The room is equipped and furnished to enable counsellors to deliver interventions that focus on the interaction between the families.

The resources purchased from the donation will centre around helping children through their grief journey and to think about different aspects of their grief and understand the painful and sensitive issues that they may be experiencing.

Maureen Thompson, Chief Executive of Teesside Hospice said “We can’t thank The Finlay Cooper Fund enough; we were blown away by their generous donation.”

She added “Creative play is an extremely effective counselling tool especially where children are involved as it takes the pressure and focus off them and onto the activities - this donation will enable the delivery of such care.

It is only through the support of other charitable donations such as The Finlay Cooper Fund that we can sustain this valuable service for local children who need it the most.”