Remembering loved ones who have passed and raising awareness on the grief process will be the focus of a hike held by the Cochrane and Area Hospice Society this weekend at Mitford Park.
“Ultimately, the focus is awareness and education so that people come out, especially people that have lost loved ones go out and celebrate those lives and pass the word to other people as to what hospice and palliative care is all about,” said Hospice Society chair Ozzie Sawicki.
The annual hike is a way to share with locals what the hospice society provides, including grief supports.
“We do various things in the community,” said Sawicki. “Aside from The Night for Hospice every Tuesday, we have a non-professional priests support walk that we do for people who have lost loved ones over the past two years that join the walk.
"We try and run various speaker series throughout the year and a lot of it is really focused on education and preparing people for what to be expecting as an end-of-life journey.”
The five-kilometre hike will start at the Mitford Park stage at 10 a.m. and then loop back to park on the walking trails. Volunteers will be on the path to guide hikers.
A barbecue will be held afterwards. No pre-registration is necessary.
The hike will also raise funds for the society’s work and goal of opening palliative beds in Cochrane.
“We are working on partnering with one of the organizations in town the Optimal Living property, the Hawthorne," Sawicki said. "We're working on trying to get some palliative beds into their building so that Cochrane can have some hospice beds in the community [instead of] Cochrane area residents having to go into the hospice settings in Calgary as their only alternative.”
Keeping people in the comfort of their homes in their last days is another way the hospice society wants to support people in the Cochrane area, in the absence of a dedicated hospice facility.
“We (want to) collaborate with home care in Cochrane to try and keep people in their homes as long as we can, where they can be in their homes,” he said.
For more information, visit the Hospice Society’s website.
