Andrew Voelke admitted to being a bit nervous the first time he went to a Good Grief Camp for children of the fallen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I am usually very shy,” the 12-year-old said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But then he met his mentor Kailie, an Air Force pilot at the\u00a0camp, held as part of the annual Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors Memorial Day gathering of families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“She was a really good mentor and helped me through my first year and talked about my loss with me,” Andrew said. “Then she gave me one of her Air Force wingman coins I still have to this day. After that, I definitely wanted to come back.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Andrew\u00a0is one of more than 7,000 children of the fallen who have been connected with military mentors over\u00a0the past five years alone at Good Grief camps through TAPS, held throughout the year around the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Andrew spoke at a TAPS celebration recognizing the 20 years that the organization has been providing mentors to these children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The goal of the mentor program is to help children build lasting relationships that reconnect them to the military life they once knew. The children\u00a0also develop\u00a0coping skills and support systems as they build\u00a0friendships with other kids who understand what they are living through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Andrew was 8 when his father, Maj. Paul Voelke, was killed in Afghanistan in 2012. He and his dad were very close, he said;\u00a0he recalls sitting on the couch when his father came home from work, waiting for him to change out of his uniform and play catch with him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Even though nothing can replace the hole in my heart, I am so grateful for the experiences that I have with TAPS and my mentors. … I never feel alone. …\u00a0I know my mentors are just a phone call away,” Andrew said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It is nice to have one-on-one attention with someone who understood what my dad did for a living and why he did it. Even though we don’t live on a military base, my mentors give me a connection to the military that I miss.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although Andrew’s first mentor was transferred to Seattle, she returned to be his mentor at the Good Grief Camp when he returned for his second visit. When she was unable to return the third year, TAPS found Andrew another mentor, who has inspired him\u00a0“to be what I want to be when I grow up:\u00a0a Marine.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Andrew noted that his new mentor also has taught him some really good plays in their pickup football games, and he wears his mentor’s sergeant pin on his backpack to school every day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
TAPS also has a partnership with Big Brothers Big Sisters to provide mentors at the Good Grief camps, expanding the number\u00a0of mentors available around the country.\u00a0Like TAPS, the Big Brothers Big Sisters program engages active-duty, reserve, retired or recently separated service members, as well as civilians, as volunteer mentors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The BBBS staff carefully matches adult mentors with children in long-term, one-to-one friendships, and provides professional support for the volunteers, children and families throughout the life of the match.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the children aren’t the only ones who benefit from these relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Robert Rice\u00a0first became a mentor in May\u00a02001 while serving in the Air Force Honor Guard in the Washington, D.C., area. He began with one-on-one mentoring, then moved to being a group leader, shepherding groups of up to 25 children and their mentors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“When I was at the honor guard, some days we did up to six funerals …\u00a0we’d get into a rhythm where we’d go from one funeral to the next,” Rice said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Working with TAPS, he added, showed him that a funeral, in and of itself, “is one step in a long journey of loss and grief.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“TAPS is there for them, and I’m proud to be part of it,” said Rice, who was named 2015 TAPS Mentor of the Year at the Nov. 17 event..<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Helping reconnect with the military community is an important part of the mentoring process for the children, but Rice said he has benefited, too:\u00a0“For me, since getting out in 2006, this has served as a big connection to that military community.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2002, his second year as a volunteer, he mentored a child whose Navy father had been killed on 9\/11\u00a0at the Pentagon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It was such a raw time for the military community,” he said. “Just to be there for him was very memorable. We’ve stayed in touch throughout the years, and he’s almost finished his master’s, he’s engaged \u2026 and he’s become a mentor, too.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rice noted that he initially became a mentor when his boss told him that he “was going to be a volunteer.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“He said I would volunteer for TAPS because it would change my life … he couldn’t have been more right.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Andrew Voelke was a bit nervous about going to a Good Grief Camp for children of the fallen, he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":61693,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":83,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[83,15],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3302],"class_list":["post-30191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-military-benefits","category-pay-benefits"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"NGF4WDPJQRGXLDA4CZAOYHNEDE","arc_canonical_url":"\/pay-benefits\/military-benefits\/2015\/11\/18\/mentors-help-children-of-the-fallen-cope-with-loss\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n