A NEW snowdrop garden was planted in Alloa last week.

Following on from a previous event at Gartmorn Dam, Strathcarron Hospice and Clackmannanshire Council planted a set of flowers in front of Alloa Family Centre on Thursday (6 November). The hospice hopes to raise awareness of the vital work they do while creating a place in the local community where people may go and visit.

Children from the Family Centre were on hand with tiny shovels and brushes to take part in the planting alongside provost Tina Murphy, Angela Gillies, from the hospice, and Morag Cantwell, an early years and family worker at the centre. Morag, who decided to organise the event, said: “I’ve received a leaflet from Strathcarron and it explained about the snowdrop garden, they were looking for businesses to give a piece of land where they could build a snowdrop garden and I thought it would be really good for the Family Centre to get involved.

“There is a number of staff and the families we work with here who have been quite closely affected by cancer. So we thought it was a really nice community thing to do. We also have a collection for Strathcarron ongoing as well.” Strathcarron is the only hospice available around the central belt providing important palliative care. Angela Gillies, marketing and communications manager at the hospice, highlighted that she is hoping to change popular opinion about hospices in general saying: “I think its about letting people know that the hospice movement is not just [about providing] a place where people come to die. It’s about living each day. It’s about saying to people: ‘Don’t think the hospice is this terrible place, because it’s not.’ 43 per cent of our patients actually come for a visit, have their medication sorted and then go home. They may come back to the hospice to die, but it is not the horrible, terrible place everybody thinks it is.” The hospice also aims to help children dealing with the thought of death. Provost Tina Murphy explained: “It also teaches the children not to be afraid of death. It is a natural thing that does happen. Children have a different way of dealing with death. It is important not to hide it from them, because then they think it is far worse – it shouldn’t be shut away, that’s my feeling anyway.

“It should be talked about so that they are not afraid because then they get afraid for the ones that are still left, in case they are going to lose all of them.” The provost also shared some of her personal experiences in order to convey the importance of the work the hospice offers: “I lost my parents to cancer, albeit it was a number of years ago now. The hospice gives that special time with your loved ones when you are not so involved with the mechanics of looking after them, because they are doing the caring so that you can have those precious memories which are so important not only to the person that is dying, but the family that is left.

“And it is a very precious time, when you can say all the things that you don’t have time to say or you thought you had plenty of time to say.” The Family Centre raised over £70 in a short time for the hospice. Retiring deputy manager at the Family Centre Liz Breingan also donated a bench for the garden.