After the sudden loss of her beautiful son to suicide, Sangeeta lost all sense of self. Nothing made sense in this world of the ‘After’ she had been unwillingly pushed into. Nothing carried any value. Not even her own life.

Despite being a doctor, she had no clue how to carry on until she found purpose. That was the key to her survival despite the darkness of her grief.

Nearly 6 years on, she shares her big challenges and little victories on this rocky road.

Dr Sangeeta Mahajan is a Mental Health activist and educator and a Trustee of the national charity for prevention of young suicide, PAPYRUS. She dreams of a world where everyone lives with hope. Aside from individually supporting parents and young people, she has been a keynote speaker at various national conferences in the UK and in India. She also works as a Consultant Anaesthetist at a major teaching hospital in London.

Sangeeta has also spoken at retreats and weekend events run by The Compassionate Friends. Her words are always honest, moving, inspiring, helpful and hopeful for anyone who has suffered deep loss. We are truly delighted that she has agreed to begin, what we hope will be, a series of talks for bereaved parents and their families.

This event is free to attend online but we ask you, if you can, to help us to fund our services for bereaved parents through a voluntary donation when registering to attend.

Our charity's income from people running, walking, cycling and swimming for us has, of course, dropped off by around 70% this year due to coronavirus . Currently, we are seeking funding for our national helpline. Staffed by volunteer bereaved parents, the helpline is the essence of TCF’s peer support. Open every day of the year, the helpline is there for bereaved parents and family members who may have been bereaved for just a few weeks or months, or two, five, ten, twenty years or more. Everyone’s loss and way of grieving is unique, so bereaved parents are encouraged to call the helpline whenever they feel the need. Our volunteers answer nearly 1,000 calls a year from bereaved parents and receive 600+ email requests for information and local support. We need funds for this telephone service, for training and support of volunteers and for the information we send to bereaved parents.

"The grief of losing a child is so maddening, so desperate and so raw that like many people, I often did not want to share it with those closest to me, especially family who were grieving themselves. This is why the TCF helpline is so important".A donation of:

• £10 provides a set of printed and online training materials for one helpline volunteer

• £20 meets a quarter of the costs of recruiting one bereaved parent volunteer for the helpline, including DBS checks.

• £30 is a fifth of the amount per year to offer ongoing support and training to one bereaved parent volunteer on the helpline, including some external helpline training.

Please do consider supporting us with a voluntary donation when you book for this event. Thank you.