Crown Princess Mary paid tribute to her late mother at the opening of a new bereavement centre in Vejle on Tuesday.
Upon arrival, she was greeted by the Centre’s chief executive and director and a teenager who presented her with flowers.
The National Bereavement Centre works throughout Denmark to support people who are experiencing loss and grief by providing them with opportunities to share their feelings with others experiencing grief through talks, social events, and a grief line.
The National Bereavement Centre said that around 50,000 people in the southern part of Denmark, where this new centre is located, are affected by grief annually, and that 10,000 of those people will develop a “complicated grief reaction.”
The Crown Princess praised how the bereavement centre incorporated nature into its design, saying, “Nature has always filled my life, and I enjoy it in all seasons. That is why I am also pleased that the National Grief Center focuses on nature and how it contributes positively when people are affected by grief. Both in relation to the design of the bereavement centre, but also in relation to the goal of establishing mourning communities in nature.
“The design of the new Bereavement Center is based on research into how the inclusion of nature in spaces can calm the nervous system and reduce stress.”
Among the many features to incorporate nature is the Memorial Tree, where visitors can write messages to ill or deceased loved ones as a way to process their grief.
Before she left, Crown Princess Mary added her own message to the Memorial Tree, for her mother, Henrietta, who passed away in 1997 following complications from heart surgery.
Crown Princess Mary has spoken in the past about how she dealt with her grief, telling conference attendees for the first-ever European Grief Conference in 2022, “I know from personal experience that losing someone close to you is one of the most difficult and lonely life-changing events to go through. I lost my mother when I was 25. I still miss her, and she is rarely far from my thoughts. Grief never goes away but becomes part of who we are as life goes on.”
Crown Princess Mary has been patron of the National Bereavement Centre since 2020.
