Bereavement &Loss

I believe that grief is a natural process, part of being human. We bond, open our hearts to love and connection and when someone close to us dies, in the place where there was once love, there is now pain.

It is a distressing time for most people, one that isn’t very well understood in our society, and this brings with it expectations and pressures from many directions.

With the help of family, friends and the passage of time, many people come through this. Grief doesn’t go away but our relationship with it changes; it settles and finds a new way of sitting within us.

People who seek out the help of a counsellor for bereavement, may:

be looking for connection and support, in order to grieve
be confused or overwhelmed by the strength of their feelings
feel left with things they wanted to say
be supporting or ‘being strong’ for others but recognising that they need support too

Grief can bring up feelings that are difficult for some people:

sadness may be experienced as ‘wrong’ or ‘weak’
anger e.g. about what happened, or at being ‘left’
guilt e.g. not being there, not having done enough, or said the right things
relief e.g. that a long period of illness is over

Everyone’s experience is unique; there is no model or blueprint of how to navigate it. This means that my work as a counsellor isn’t to guide or advise, but to be open hearted and stay present with my clients.

Whilst bereavement is very final, loss can be too, for example when a parent or partner leaves . This can be experienced as too much to process by children, who can then carry this wound into adulthood. Seemingly unconnected experiences in the present can trigger this unprocessed experience in the past, which can be both overwhelming and confusing.

The loss of a prized personal resource can also be very unsettling; like losing a part of yourself. This painful adjustment can be part of the recovery from operations or injuries, or it can be part of ageing e.g. the loss of fitness, resilience, energy or youth.