When the death is tragic and untimely, as when a significant person dies by suicide, overdose or fatal accident, grief can be particularly complicated by a gamut of challenging emotions, ranging from horror and helplessness to anger and incomprehension.  In such cases, grief therapy needs to adopt a carefully tailored approach that recognizes the role of trauma in impeding the mourner’s integration of the loss.  In this 2-day workshop, we will begin by considering how we can quickly assess our clients’ needs in terms of the 4-dimensional model of Meaning-Focused Grief Therapy in bereavement, featuring obstacles to processing the event story of the death, accessing the back story of the relationship with the deceased, revising the personal story of the mourner’s own sense of identity, and sorting through the existential story of life in the shadow of loss.  We will then review very recent research that traces the impact of avoidant and approach-oriented coping on meaning making and symptomatic outcomes in the case of traumatic losses as through suicide and drug overdose as well as the utility of a validated measure of client needs in dealing with sudden dead bereavement.  Finally we will explore various meaning-oriented techniques that help mourners make sense of the loss in the context of the changed story of their lives but also make sense of themselves as survivors in light of it. 

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LEARNING OBJECTIVES

• Describe the link between different styles of coping and bereavement outcomes following traumatic loss;

• Distinguish between therapeutic “presence” and “absence” in the process of therapy;

• Summarize recent research on the expressed needs of survivors of sudden bereavement and their implications for risk of prolonged grief;

• Apply My Loss Epicentres in Life as a form of loss history review to facilitate integration;

• Implement Restorative Retelling procedures for mastering the event story of the loss;

• Execute Analogical Listening to help clients make better sense of their emotions; and

• Distinguish between emotion-focused, sense-making and benefit-finding approaches to journaling and highlight the role of each.

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GRIEF COUNSELLING TOPICS COVERED

• Meaning-Focused Grief Therapy:  A Roadmap for Intervention

• Coping with Crisis:  Avoidance vs. Approach

• Finding a Focus:  Identifying Client Needs in Traumatic Loss

• The Power of Presence:  Constructing a Relational Container

• Loss Epicentres in life:  An Experiential Practice

• Restorative Retelling:  From Principles to Practice

• Conversing with the Canvas:  Analogical Listening to the Heart of Grief

• Directed Journaling:  Writing for Wellbeing