Grief and Loss Counselling in Niagara Falls, ON.

Losing a loved one can be one of life's most personally challening events. It can lead you to re-evaluate you won position in life. I will work with you to understand how to continue caring for yourself as you move through the process of grieving. When you are ready to, we can discuss any changes you might want to make in your lifestyle in response to your loss.

After loosing someone close to you it is often hard to find emotional balance. Therapy can provide you with a safe space to process your loss and the difficult emotions that often follow. Feeling sad, lonely, angry, and confused are all normal and healthy emotions to experience during this time. Working with a therapist can help you through these tough emotions as well as how to feel normal and happy again.

As loss may be best described as the absence of something valuable, grief is the reaction to this absence. It permeates every area of our lives. The way we experience grief is personal and changes as we adapt to the loss. Feelings of guilt, disbelief, anger, yearning, and sorrow are often present. Going through the stages of grief is difficult. Together, we will explore the healing journey ensuring you are self-companionate while honouring the one’s you have lost and to explore and understand your thoughts, feelings, and behaviours that are integrated into your bereavement process. Schedule a free consultation to see if we are a good fit.

Grief is the emotional suffering we feel when we lose something or someone important to us. This can include the loss of friend, partner, or family member, a change in life circumstances, death of a pet, getting fired, loss of health, safety, a dream... anything that we once had and now do not. The intensity and process can be unique for each person, but like all other emotions that impact the quality of our life, ignoring it or suppressing it does not work. Seeking support as we move through the various stages of grief is very helpful. Planning for our healing is crucial so that we do not become 'stuck' in the pain. A skilled therapist can assist us during this vulnerable time.

With Gestalt therapy the five tasks of mourning, are supported: (1) To accept the reality of the loss, (2) To experience the pain of grief, (3) To adjust to the environment in which the deceased is missing, (4) To withdraw (some) emotional energy and reinvest it in another relationship, and (5) To find a place for and maintain a continuing bond with what we lose, however not in any specific order. A gestalt therapist supports the bereaved with an emphasis on a "loving authentic presence and communication that allows expression of EACH other’s personhood" so that feelings are honored and explored at the clients own pace. The here and now is emphasized and that is what leads to support/change

In my practice you will find a safe place to talk about and work through pain, and the feelings of sadness, confusion, guilt, shame and anger that often accompany the experience of grief and loss. Moving through grief and loss is your personal journey that takes time and is experienced uniquely from your own perspective. I provide therapy, counselling and and support for people who have lost a loved one such as a family member, friend or colleague whether through death or the ending of a relationship, those who have lost an important pet or animal companion or people who have experienced a loss that includes a loss of a job or personal identity.

Grief, loss, and bereavement, whether it is the passing of a loved one, the end of a career, or the falling-apart of a relationship are all similar: we are losing or have lost an important part of our lives. Understanding the emotions, feelings, and behaviours we have when we experience grief and bereavement is part of helping us accept what has occurred, why we feel the way that we are feeling, and what is next for us. In working with clients on grief, loss, and bereavement it is important to understand that the way we process these experiences is unique to each person, and the pillar of respect is paramount.

As someone who has experienced loss and studied loss, I understand how unique and different everyone's experience with it is. Grief can be one of the most complex and complicated of human experiences and can occur with or without a tangible loss. Using a person centered and strengths based foundation, I will hold space with you and aid you in navigating these complex feelings at your own pace.

Loss and grief are devastating. Sudden loss is a shock. Long, drawn-out loss is exhausting. Loss changes our expectations of daily life. It brings disbelief, despair, anger. Divorce, a wayward child, a job layoff, poor health – all disrupt our expectations of how our life should be. Then there is the pain of death's finality. To stop hurting can feel like a betrayal of the one we lost. The grief is terrible, but it is all we have of the loved one. We finally need to realize that we cannot go on living in constant pain. We need other ways to fill the emptiness, new routines, new roles, and new interactions. We need to redirect our energy. Counselling helps you to find the road ahead.