Grief Counselling 

Grief is an intensely painful and difficult burden to bear. It is strange that an experience that almost everyone will have can be so isolating. Perhaps this is because each loss is unique. Perhaps the way society tends to turn away from the darker parts of human experience and prefers to always focus on the shiny bits has something to do with it. But the result is that when the big losses hit, most of us have no idea how to navigate them.

Grief is not something that just happens to us. It is not a passive experience. We have to wrestle with the big feelings, the unanswered questions, the empty hole where possibility used to be and figure out what to do. The choices we make and strategies we use affect our suffering, ability to engage with life, and ability to face the future.

The Goal of Grief Counselling

In the case of losing a loved one, the goal of grief counselling is to help you get to a point where you can remember your time together with more feelings of love and appreciation than suffering and pain. It is also to support you until you can look to the future and see possibilities, instead of only absence.

Sometimes the loss of someone we had a complicated relationship with, or who caused us harm, can bring up unexpected feelings that are hard to navigate. In these cases, the goal of grief counselling is to help you work through these feelings and get to the point where your attention is no longer drawn to the past or the loss, and memories of the person don’t trigger intense feelings. 

Why Grief Counselling?

Life is busy and does not stop making demands just because we are grieving. It is often necessary to push aside the grief to deal with day-to-day responsibilities. Grief counselling gives you a time and space that is just for you, where you can be supported as you face the pain and work through the tasks involved in coming to terms with loss.

Since grief depletes our internal resources and makes us less resilient, grief counselling includes support for both new and pre-existing day-to-day life challenges.

Grief counselling is practical too, and teaches you strategies for coping and processing grief to reach the goals described above. There is no shortcut through grief, but the wrong coping strategies can extend suffering and rob us from being able to cherish and celebrate our lost loved ones.

Trauma and Grief

While loss itself is traumatic, the way it happened is often a traumatic experience in itself. Trauma leaves us “stuck” in the past and can prevent us from being able to properly grieve. While there is no shortcut through grief, there are ways to facilitate the processing of trauma. Addressing the trauma connected to loss reduces suffering, increases our internal resources (which leaves us with more energy with which to cope with the grief) and allows us to make progress.

When to Get Help

Most losses are processed one way or another over time. That time is difficult, and anyone who has suffered a loss can benefit from support. Sometimes though, we can get stuck in the grieving process and need help to get over the hurdle. If you experience any of the following, please consider reaching out today:

  • Nothing about your grief has really been changing. The pain is not getting less, the burden is not getting lighter, you are still thinking about the same things related to the loss, and your attention is still mostly focused on the loss.
  • It is hard to feel anything positive when you think of what you lost.
  • You had a fraught or complicated relationship with the person who died.
  • The person had some responsibility, intentional or not, in their own death.
  • You are angry at the person who died.
  • You have no support network, or your support network has shrunk and/or you are feeling isolated and not understood.
  • People expect you to be “over it” by now.
  • Normal life demands are overwhelming, and you are not coping.
  • You are grieving a loss for which there is little social support or acknowledgment (for example, loss of a pet, an abuser has died, or when you have/had multiple partners)


I am experienced in supporting people of a variety of faiths and belief systems. While my counselling practice is secular, that does not mean my clients cannot address their spiritual struggles in our sessions. 

It can, however, be challenging for the non-religious and non-spiritually inclined to find grief support that does not refer to or rely on such practices. I am dedicated to providing fully secular counselling to atheists and agnostics, and will never bring religion/spirituality into the session in any way.