While Blessington, then 22, was living in New Zealand at the time, her father was living on the remote island of St Helena in the south Atlantic, an island only accessible by boat.

The only boat that serviced the island was stuck in a dry dock for six weeks.

"I got the phone call from him saying 'I love you, I don't think I'll be able to see you again'," Blessington says.

"Thankfully he managed to get on a passing tanker and I was able to meet him in South Africa, but my mum couldn't join him because it was an all-male tanker, so she only had half-an-hour to say goodbye, not knowing whether she'll see him again."

Blessington's father died just after the pair's meeting in South Africa, less than two months after his initial diagnosis.

Now 27, Blessington said the news of his death was too much to fully comprehend at first.

"He was so determined to live that I didn't really believe he was going to die ... and then he did," she says.

"I think somehow the imminent death of someone who you love is too big a concept to grasp entirely."

While the Canberra resident received counselling through the organisation CanTeen, she became ineligible for support from the group once she turned 24.

However, after being in contact with the Canberra Grief Centre, Blessington helped to set up a support group last year for people aged between 16 and 30 mourning the death of a parent.

Meeting every month at a New Acton cafe, the group of 10 come together for a 90-minute session, which involves group counselling as well as a chance to catch up over coffee.

Blessington says the group has been beneficial in being able to connect with other young people experiencing the same range of emotions.

"It's valuable to be able to talk to people who have shared a similar experience, and it's reassuring to know what you've been feeling is a normal part of the grief spectrum," she says.

"When you lose your parent, you also lose your imagined future together, and to be able to reflect and laugh and cry and have a whinge with other people who get that on some fundamental level is really liberating."

The support group has remained free for those attending thanks to a $1650 grant from the ACT government last year, which covers the cost of a professional counsellor as well as coffee.

However, the funding is set to run out at the end of the financial year, leaving an uncertain future for the support group.

Melina Andrew has been attending the group since July last year following the death of her mother in 2015.

The Canberra resident first heard the news about her mother, who was living in Argentina, through a Facebook message in the middle of the night saying that she had died two months after a serious stroke.

"Things happen quickly in Argentina, and she was buried in less than 24 hours after her death, so I couldn't get back in time for the funeral," she says.

"I think I went numb when I first heard the news. It took me several hours to process it."

The 30-year-old was already seeing a counsellor to help come to terms with the death of her parent, but came across the support group through a Google search and has been attending ever since.

Andrew says the group has been therapeutic in allowing her to speak about topics she wouldn't talk about with a counsellor or family and friends.

"It helps because there aren't a lot of places in my life where I can talk about these things, because most people don't understand what it's like to lose a parent," she says.

"Sometimes I feel like I'm not grieving as intensely and I think in a way I'm weird, and I go to the group and I'm reassured that it's ok.

"There's no baggage in a group such as this."

Among the topics discussed at the support group during the counselling component include how grief intersects with how other people grieve, as well as how to prepare for significant anniversaries.

Grief counsellor Mandy Cox, who runs the sessions, says over time, people have become more confident in sharing their personal stories.

"One of the main things about the group is it normalises their experiences and validates their experiences of loss. It also gives them the supportive environment to talk freely about the unique challenges that they face," she says.

"It removes the sense of isolation from young people ... and they receive support through the knowledge that there are others who are experiencing losses in the community."

Adele Tyson doesn't remember a lot about the immediate aftermath following the death of her father from a sudden heart attack.

While she says she was able to push aside the grief while she was overseas on a gap year or living in Melbourne, upon moving back home to Canberra in 2015, the feeling of loss became harder to ignore.

She started attending the support group in November, and says it's helped her to confront her feelings.

"It makes me talk about it, otherwise I would push it down and ignore it, and I think it's been really helpful for me to process," she says.

"We had a whole session on how people grieve differently a couple of weeks ago, and it's been interesting to see how different people feel about it and to know that I wasn't doing it wrong."

Following her father's death, Tyson says many people wanted to help but didn't know exactly what to say or what to do.

"Usually they would say nothing and ignore it, which can be a bit isolating," she says.

However, she says being in a group of other young people who have gone through similar experiences has made it easier speaking about death.

"Being among people who have experienced the loss of a close family member, it's easier to talk about it because it's not as taboo in that sitiation."

Louise Blessington said the group's small network of people have become closer in the time that it's been running and has been able to provide vital support to people at different stages of their grief.

"Your grief doesn't disappear entirely, it changes. Maybe it gets easier to carry but it's definitely changed over that time," she says.

"Being able to reflect on that to other people has made that even clearer to me."