Grief Counseling
You are experiencing emotional combinations and intensities you didn’t know existed. One moment it is shame or guilt, the next sadness, the next anger, and so on. One day you think you have come out the other side, the next… you’re barely able to move.
What began as one loss has become many. Now, you are unsure who you are or what life is. You know this - you feel alone. Your experience is unique, and many struggle to understand or find the right words.
But life says, “You have to keep going.” You have responsibilities and expectations.
You have a story in the chaos. Let’s see if we can find it together.
Understanding Grief
“I don’t need someone to tell me everything happens for a reason. I just want someone to understand that life doesn’t make sense right now.”
You are looking for predictability but can’t find it. One minute, you seem fine, the next you are drowning in the emotions that came with a new wave of grief. You are finding that grief is layered - and that your grief journey is likely to be unique to you.
The complexities and layers of grief feel overwhelming and unpredictable. Grief is not just about the singular loss. It encapsulates all the layers of you and your life that are now different. It’s the way your heart sinks when walk into the house you used to share with your favorite person or pet. Or it’s the people you used to see daily before you lost the job. It’s the redefining of yourself now that you are forced to spend your time and energy differently. The list goes on.
Then there is the isolation of grief. Societal expectations around timelines, positive attitudes or to keep going can make you feel like something is wrong with you. (Spoiler: nothing is wrong with you.) When friends clearly want to find the right words, but can’t, you can simultaneously feel disappointed and like you need to reassure them at the same time - it’s disconnecting. Or always being the “prayer request” makes you feel pitied rather than connected.
Grief is simply chaotic and disconnecting. But grief counseling can be a place to untangle the chaos and find your story. It can be the place where you can reconnect with yourself, begin your healing journey, and find a new way to move forward that is unique to who you are now.
Therapy Approach
What Grief & Loss Therapy Looks Like with Christin
We'll begin by understanding what you lost. This is not about the specific loss, but about how it changes your world. It changes routines, relationships, identity, future dreams, assumptions about the world, and sometimes even faith. In grief counseling, we can make space to explore your grief without it consuming you.
Some sessions you may want to focus on exploring the loss or how it has changed you. Other sessions you may be finding language for what it looks like to move forward, or for the new dynamics and characteristics of yourself and your life.
At the end of the day, my hope is that you begin to integrate the event into your larger story, while the chaos begins to settle around you.
FAQs
Questions About Grief & Loss Counseling
Grief and healing from loss are not linear processes. Your grief experience will be uniquely yours. We hear about the phases of grief and feel the hope of having a tangible process to follow. But in reality, the phases do not always come in the same order. You may experience all grief phases, or only some. You may experience some of them more than once.
Because grief is so layered and complex, we usually experience it more like waves. Exploring the waves in grief counseling can help put language to your unique experience.
This is such a natural question to ask. It is easy to be concerned that you are not “moving on” like you should. Or maybe you are surprised by the intensity and patterns you feel. We all want to know that we won’t be stuck in this type of grief any longer than necessary.
This is such a natural question to ask. It is easy to be concerned that you are not “moving on” like you should. Or maybe you are surprised by the intensity and patterns you feel. We all want to know that we won’t be stuck in this type of grief any longer than necessary.
That being said, I do pay attention to certain things. While we won’t be trying to fix your grief, I will be looking out for other concerns that can emerge alongside it. We can recognize those patterns early and respond thoughtfully, while honoring the natural process of grieving.
The intensity and unpredictability you are feeling, at times can feel almost unbearable. Wanting it to stop is natural. There is hope in your experience, though it may not look as you would expect. Typically, grief does not completely disappear. Rather, our life grows around it so that it becomes a smaller demand on our time, thoughts, and emotions. Eventually, the chaos subsides and we can integrate the event into the story of our life… without it defining that story.
