Crown Princess Mary becomes Patron of National Care Centre

Crown Princess Mary becomes Patron of National Care Centre

On 29 August, Crown Princess Mary attended the official inauguration of the National Care Centre in Copenhagen. The National Care Centre was created at the initiative of the Children, Youth & Grief Foundation of which Crown Princess Mary has been the patron since 2013.

Crown Princess Mary visited the centre and gave a speech, at the end of which she announced she had accepted to become the Patron of the National Care Centre: "It is a pleasure at the opening today to be able to tell you that I have agreed to be the Patron of the National Care Centre. I am looking forward to following the important work of Children, Young & Grief and now also of the National Care Centre."

The centre aims to ensure people in mourning have the best care available, with professionals having the best expertise, competence and knowledge in order to help these people as much and as best as they can. The centre aims to break taboos about mental health, grief and death and to bring knowledge about how to help people in mourning. It also aims to offer better education and formations to professionals.

The Children, Youth & Grief Foundation - who received the 2016 Crown Prince Couple's Social Award last year - focuses on psychological help and treatment for children and adolescents. The National Care Centre adds to their abilities and services for adults.

In her speech, Crown Princess Mary talked about the people she met during her various visits to Children, Youth & Grief centres. This is obviously a very important matter for Crown Princess Mary. Indeed, she lost her mother when she was 26 and revealed during one of those visits last year that she had struggled with her grief and how to best deal with it: "I was 26. It happened too early … It's so hard to see when it is so close and so personal, but as you get older, you learn to appreciate the time you had together as a gift. And the loss offers something that you wouldn't have otherwise. It makes a strong person."

This is how she concluded her speech during the opening: "Even if we lose, we must not lose hope that the joy of life will come back."

This new patronage brings Crown Princess Mary's total number of patronages to twenty-nine.