Grief and Loss Counseling
Grief is an emotion that individuals experience when losing something or someone of value. The loss of a loved one is without a doubt one of the greatest challenges to overcome. It is inevitable in life that individuals will someday experience such a loss. How one copes with this loss may become a barrier to one’s overall well-being. Similarly, but oftentimes not as intense, is when there is a loss of something of individual importance such as a job, a pet, a personal dream or even material things that represent a significant part of one’s life. Grief Counseling involves examining the depth of these different relationships and their personal meanings and then implementing ways to continue to thrive in life through developing healthy coping tools, hope and acceptance.
Some symptoms of grief are a pervasive sense of sadness and depression, withdrawal from friends, family, and normal activities. Those grieving can feel guilty about actions taken or not taken towards a lost loved one, anger at self or others, developing physical symptoms such as tightness in the chest or throat, becoming highly sensitive to noise, a lack of energy, difficulty maintaining sleep, and loss of appetite.
There are definite stages of grief that are properly worked through in a clinical setting. These stages progress in a specific order and are defined as; shock and denial, pain and guilt, anger and bargaining, depression and reflection, reconstruction and working through grief, and finally acceptance and hope.
360 Therapists are here to assist a grieving client navigate through this challenging time and assist in reestablishing life in a positive direction.