YORK COUNTY— When you’re young and the worst happens — a parent or sibling dies — life changes in all sorts of ways. There’s the grief and the loss, and often there are other changes — a new school and sometimes a new family.

It can be a lot.

Mike Hickson knows about that — he lost his mother to cancer when he was 7 years old.

For young Hickson, the loss of his only parent meant moving to Maine from Massachusetts to be with his aunt and uncle, Mike and Ruth Hickson, new friends and a new school — Kennebunk Elementary.

One summer, the family learned of a new camp, called Experience Camp, that is designed specifically for kids like Mike, who have lost someone close to them.

“It helped me understand I am not alone,” said Hickson in a telephone interview from another camp he is attending in New Hampshire, before he goes back to Experience Camp in Oakland later this month.

Boys and girls from across New England will come together Aug. 20 to 25 to spend a week at the Manitou Experience for Boys in Oakland and the Somerset Experience for Girls in Smithfield. This is the first year of the Somerset Experience Camp for Girls; and the fifth Experience Camp to be launched in the United States — the two in Maine and the others are in Georgia, California and Pennsylvania.

Founder Sara Deren said Experience Camps provide free, one-week camps for children who have experienced the death of a parent, sibling or primary caregiver. Transportation is provided.

Along with swimming, arts and crafts, and team sports, the kids take part in bereavement activities where they are encouraged to talk about their grief.

This year will be the fifth Mike will attend the camp. He enjoys all the water sports that lead up to a marathon in the latter part of the week, with the winning teams getting bragging rights and a plaque on the wall in the camp cafeteria.

And then there are the conversations in the cabins where young people talk about what happened in their family.

Michael and Ruth Hickson said the camp experience has been good for Mike, who will be 14 later this month.

Ruth Hickson said Mike not only lost his mother, a few months later, he lost his grandmother as well. He left his home, his friends and his school.

“They were very good at Kennebunk Elementary School,” said Ruth. “He worked very hard, and we got to a point things are going really well.” She said she was apprehensive at first, wondering if they should “open the box,” by sending him to camp. But they gave it a try and are glad they did.

She said when Mike came home from camp after his first week there, he told his aunt and uncle he had been able to talk about his mother.

“He said ‘I am with people like me, Aunt Ruth,’” she recalled.

“He looks forward to the camp and he’s created a bond with the counselors, most of whom have lost people themselves,” said Michael Hickson.

Ruth Hickson shared a piece she had written about the camp:

“It’s a place that rebuilds a child’s confidence not only in themselves but in the world around them,” she wrote, in part. “(It is) a place that lifts a child up when they are feeling discouraged or even hopeless.”

Deren, the founder, said she’d never been to camp as a child, but that her husband is an owner and director of Camp Manitou, the boy’s summer camp where Experience Camp is held.

“The week at camp is truly transformational for the kids who attend,” said Deren. “As soon as they get off the bus, they are welcomed into an environment of support, warmth, and understanding. Everyone there gets it.”

She said the young people are encouraged to share their stories and feelings.

“At home they might feel uncomfortable doing that because it will make their friends or family members uncomfortable or sad,” said Deren. “At camp, they are given permission to laugh and be kids, where at home they might feel that they are expected to act sad all the time because they’re grieving. Mostly, they can look around at every single kid there and know that they’ve been through something similar.”

For more information about Experience Camps, visit http://www.experience.camp.

— Senior Staff Writer Tammy Wells can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 327 or [email protected].