Towards a soft landing

WHEN Ben Cowen, 50, died in a paragliding accident while holidaying with his family at Fairhaven on Victoria’s Surf Coast in 2017, his loved ones were devastated.

The son of the late Sir Zelman and Lady Anna Cowen, husband of Lahra Carey, and father of Charley, Alex and Mitch, was taken by a cruel twist of fate – but a support group in his memory, launched this week, has transformed his family’s grief into an abiding legacy.

Conceived by twin sisters Charley and Alex, Parachute is a not-for-profit NGO that awards micro-grants to traumatised children in financially challenged families, so they can continue to take part in enjoyable activities.

Parachute is well underway, but an official launch, previously delayed by COVID, took place in Melbourne on Sunday. Welcoming guests to the Justin Art House Museum in Prahran, Carey, president of The King David School, recounted the traumatic January day Ben died. “His chute needed just two more seconds to reinflate, but the winds were so strong – that didn’t happen.

“So many times, I’d looked up from our beach house, seen that orange parachute, waved at it, knowing that its passenger was happy doing something that he loved. But after he died, watching the paragliders over Aireys Inlet made me sad and angry at the chute that didn’t have time to open.

“So you can imagine how confronting it was when Charley and Alex decided to call their charitable brainchild after the very equipment that failed their father. But they didn’t see it that way. For my twins, this entity both represents a way to honour Ben’s memory, while providing for kids that have experienced trauma with a bit of a soft, protective landing.”

Joining the Cowen family at the launch were some 30 guests, including Parachute supporters Josh Frydenberg, former Australian treasurer; his mother, education psychologist Dr Erica Frydenberg; and King David School principal Marc Light, who had encouraged the sisters, his students, in their dream of ­establishing Parachute.

Paying tribute to Parachute’s many supporters – and to co-directors Dean Cohen and Liora Miller – who had all helped Charley and Alex in their venture, Carey emphasised that “taking it from simply an idea when you’re just 13 years old to a fully compliant entity isn’t done alone”.

In conversation with guest speaker Andrew Fuller, a clinical psychologist and therapist in children’s learning and family resilience, Alex and Charley, Parachute’s co-CEOs, related to the gathering how their organisation was conceived.

Describing the aftermath of her father’s death, Alex recalled, “It was the most difficult point of my life … I was very, very close with my dad. And I felt isolated. I felt alone … angry at the universe, and that translated within me to a lot of depression and a lot of anxiety … I struggled with my family, I struggled with my friends, I struggled with my school … I was really at the lowest point of my life.”

But one day, riding on her school bus, Alex “realised something. I felt normal. And I hadn’t felt normal in a while … So I thought about this idea. How do we make other kids who have gone through a similar situation feel normal again?”

Charley outlined Parachute’s strategy – to provide eligible youngsters with an individual grant of $500 “so they can continue to do the activities that will make them feel normal”, such as buying equipment for school sports or attending holidays.

Fuller said grief-stricken children “get angry … and sometimes they get obnoxious”. They need to respond to the challenge of emerging again. “It’s a journey of transformation from a painful event into something that makes a gigantic difference.”

For more information, visit parachute.org.au