Mending Hearts & 25th Anniversary Socks
At Lost & Found Grief Center, we are dedicated to healing hearts broken by the loss of a loved one.
Our Mending Hearts Monthly Giving program provides the steady support needed to offer our therapeutic grief groups free of charge to the families we serve.
As a token of our gratitude, every Mending Hearts donor who commits to a recurring gift of $25 or more will receive a limited-edition pair of Lost & Found Grief Center 25th Anniversary socks—a small but meaningful reminder of the comfort and connection your generosity makes possible.
Thank you for helping us mend hearts and bring help, hope, and healing to those navigating grief.
Lost & Found Grief Center Commemorates 25th Anniversary
SPRINGFIELD, MO — The year 2000 marked a significant change for society as people looked forward to the dawn of the new century and millennium. That year was also an important milestone for grieving families and individuals in southwest Missouri. In 2000, Lost & Found Grief Center became the first organization in southwest Missouri to provide no-cost, professional therapeutic grief support to children and their families.
In 2025, Lost & Found Grief Center commemorates 25 years of providing help, hope, and healing to bereaved children, families, and adults through therapeutic grief support groups.
“We started Lost & Found because there is such a tremendous need,” said Dr. Karen Scott, co-founder and former executive director. “Most families who experience a death do not have the funds to pay for counseling. Lost & Found was a way to provide a much-needed service at no cost to families.”
Founded by Scott, a former school counselor, and local attorney Shawn Askinosie, Lost & Found held its first group sessions in Askinosie’s Springfield law offices. The need for grief therapy grew, and by 2006, Lost & Found moved to the Conor House, named after Conor Foster, who died at the age of 4. In the Conor House, Lost & Found expanded its offerings to include adults, not just children and their families. In 2015, Lost & Found continued to grow when it moved to its current location at 1555 South Glenstone Avenue.
Lost & Found started with a group for children and a group for their parents. Those first two groups had fewer than 20 people in total. Over a quarter-century, the number of people Lost & Found served through groups, individual counseling, grief education, and other services is well over 25,000.
Lost & Found provides bereaved people the opportunity to grieve in a supportive, understanding, and non-judgmental environment and is guided by the following principles:
- Grief is a natural reaction to death for adults, as well as children.
- Within each individual is the natural capacity to heal oneself.
- The duration and intensity of grief are unique for each person.
- Caring and acceptance assist in the healing process.
“Lost & Found employs a forward-moving model of grief,” said Melanie Blair, Lost & Found assistant executive director. “Rather than viewing grief as something to ‘get over,’ we approach grief as a process, where the goal is to move forward and live a meaningful life.”
In addition to no-cost therapeutic grief support groups, Lost & Found also offers fee-based individual counseling.
Contact: Mark Miller, Lost & Found Grief Center, Executive Director, (417) 839-2886, mmiller@lostandfoundozarks.com
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About Lost & Found Grief Center: Founded in 2000, the Lost & Found Grief Center strives to improve lives in the community by providing help, hope, and healing through professional grief support services. The Lost & Found Grief Center works with those who are suffering to provide education and support as they face life without their deceased loved one.
Continuing My Journey
I am pleased to announce that I have recently accepted the promotion to Assistant Executive Director at Lost & Found Grief Center. Since July 2021, I have been employed at the center as a Program Coordinator. My experience at Lost & Found has been an exceptional opportunity for me to apply my personal meaning after the loss of our son, Charlie.
My husband and I received individual counseling with Dr. Karen Scott at Lost & Found in the months following the death of our son. Dr. Scott played an instrumental role in my journey and continued work here. She has been a beacon of support, providing me with guidance and helping me understand the grief journey that I was, and still am, on. Her unwavering belief in me has been invaluable, and I am grateful for her ongoing assistance.
Today, I have the privilege of supporting numerous individuals on their own journeys, and I see this role as a calling rather than a job. I take great pride in my work, and I am confident that I am meant to be here serving our families alongside so many talented and compassionate individuals.
I am excited to be a part of the next 25 years of service at Lost & Found and eager to take on the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.
– Melanie Blair
Assistant Executive Director
Finding Meaning
Hello, and thank you for allowing me to spend a few moments with you. My name is Mark Miller. I am the new Executive Director for Lost & Found Grief Center.
I am honored to join Lost & Found and its extraordinary staff of therapists and administrators in our mission to support those in our community who are hurting.
People grieve for many reasons — perhaps most profoundly for the loss of a loved one. I feel this daily, as my family and I lost our beloved son and brother, Luke, in 2019.
Luke, an accomplished college student and distance runner, was just 20 years old when he died due to complications from epilepsy.
Walking into our first therapy session at Lost & Found, my wife and I wondered how we would survive his loss. In the weeks and months that followed, thanks to Lost & Found, we found the solace we needed and wanted. Today, I can talk about Luke with a smile and try to live a life worthy of his memory.
I came to this role at Lost & Found following a decade of work in marketing and communications at Ozarks Technical Community College. At OTC, I participated in all aspects of the college's public relations and marketing strategy. In addition to my time at OTC, I worked in higher education communications at Drury University and the University of Colorado.
Before shifting into public relations, I had a 15-year television career as a news and sports anchor in Nebraska, Kentucky, and at local Springfield television station KOLR10.
I will use my communications experience to raise Lost & Found's profile so that more people may experience grief therapy's healing power. Ultimately, we will all suffer a loss, and grief will impact our lives.
The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche said: "To live is to suffer. To survive is to find meaning in the suffering."
Taking on the Executive Director role at Lost & Found Grief Center is finding meaning in the suffering — an opportunity for which I am deeply grateful.
Best regards,
Mark Miller
Executive Director