Grief Counseling
Are You Coping With A Difficult Loss Or Change In Your Life?
After losing someone you love, grief often comes in waves, hitting you when you least expect it—when you’re just carrying on with life. Secondary losses like significant financial changes or shifts in other relationships (e.g., becoming a single parent) can create an added layer of fear and uncertainty.
Photos, birthdays, anniversaries, and keepsakes are constant reminders, yet you can’t bear to let anything go. And although friends and family rushed to help in the beginning, maybe you’re unsure of where to turn to for support now, but you’re hoping grief counseling can help.
Like The Grieving Process, Loss Can Be Different for Everyone
Losing a loved one can be devastating and life-changing, however, grief and loss can include a broad spectrum of painful experiences that aren’t always validated in the same way:
• Moving to a new place, children leaving home, losing a pet
• Not getting a job or promotion, retiring from a long career
• Aging, major health issues, loss of mobility or athletic ability
• Divorce, miscarriage, childhood trauma, loss of innocence
All of these examples can be emotionally consuming, which is why counseling is so important during the grieving process, no matter the type of loss. At Bozeman Counseling Center, we’ll support you unconditionally, walking with you through your grief until you find your footing in this world once again.
Are you ready to schedule or have any questions? Send us a message
Grief And Loss Are Things That All Human Beings Experience
There is a lot of misleading information out there about how to process grief and loss. Well-meaning friends and family members will say you need to go through specific, predefined steps and stages with grief. They worry if you grieve too long, you’ll become stuck and depressed, so they’ll say things like, “You just need to move on.”
However, grief has no linear set of stages or steps—and all losses are different, requiring a different healing process. Unfortunately, in our culture, we often put a “deadline” on a person’s mourning, so people are typically not given enough time and space to fully move through the grieving process.
For Those Grieving, Reaching Out For Help Can Be Complicated
As a society, we can feel uncomfortable talking about death, emotional suffering, or grief and loss, so we tend to avoid those conversations. As a result, people often isolate themselves or refuse to share their struggles out of fear they’re burdening others or they’ll be judged. Plus, there’s this cultural expectation to be strong and carry on no matter the obstacle, so a lot of people either try to rush through the grieving process or bypass it altogether.
However, it’s crucial to allow yourself a chance to sit with your feelings and process your grief on your own terms, which is where therapy really helps. Whether you’re coping with bereavement, divorce, the death of a pet, or any other change that’s impacted your life, grief and loss counseling offers you time and space to heal.
Grief Counseling Can Help You Navigate Your Pain And Find Peace
Grief and loss are far-reaching and one of the most common yet agonizing experiences we encounter as human beings. However, when we allow ourselves emotional space to sit with our feelings and process what is happening, we can move through these painful things more quickly and with more resilience.
That’s why grief therapy can be so empowering. It gives you time and a safe space to work through thoughts and feelings with a supportive, non-judgmental ally who will witness your pain, guide you toward healing, and provide tools and resources for coping from day to day.
What Can You Expect Going Into Grief Counseling?
Grief therapy is very unique in that it does not follow a set formula or trajectory. Rather, the healing process is specific to each client and depends greatly on the type of loss as well as other life factors.
Sometimes, when there are missing pieces to a story or extenuating circumstances that make it hard for a person to have some sort of closure, it can result in complicated grief. For instance, maybe you suffered childhood abuse by your parents and saw them pass away as an adult, or perhaps you were adopted and learned about the passing of one of your biological parents.
So, we want to first understand what we are dealing with so we can have an accurate launch point for grief counseling. Then, we can begin building some coping skills, processing your experience, and finding ways to navigate daily life with less pain while still honoring the memory of your loss.
What Happens During Grief Therapy Sessions?
When working with grief, we always start by finding out more about where our clients are in their own process. We educate people on the stages of grief, stressing that these stages are not linear nor the same for every person. And at the client’s own pace, we let them share their experience of loss and help them unpack events.
Our grief therapists will provide resources to help with the overwhelming and mixed-up thoughts and feelings that can occur—or if a client is emotionally numb and feels nothing. We’re also trained to understand what is happening to the brain, nervous system, and body during times of grief and can help normalize what our clients are experiencing not just emotionally, but also physically and mentally.
Many times, a grieving person will develop strange bodily symptoms: a lack of concentration, less energy for daily tasks, or a heaviness in the chest. We not only help validate these symptoms, but we also offer gentle ways of coping and adjusting that can make each day a little easier.
Loss Is A Natural Part Of Life
Yet, it is one of the hardest things for us to experience because it impacts so many domains of our lives. And though it may be tempting to “tough it out,” grieving is not something that you need to go through alone.
Our compassionate, supportive grief counselors at Bozeman Counseling Center understand how confusing and overwhelming it can all feel, and we’re here to guide you through the grieving process toward true healing. Our goal is to help you find a renewed sense of hope, joy, and meaning in life while still honoring your loss.
Considering Grief and Loss Counseling But Still Have Concerns?
I worry that going to therapy will make my grief worse.
Avoiding overwhelming feelings sounds like it makes sense. However, when grief is not allowed time and space to be processed, it can become complicated grief and make life even more difficult. Grief counseling, in contrast, gives you a safe, supportive space to navigate feelings of anger, resentment, guilt, sadness, or confusion—even feelings of denial about the loss—so things improve instead of get worse.
Other people I know didn’t need grief counseling after their loss or breakup, so why should I?
Everyone is different and has different needs to heal from a breakup or other loss, so it’s not fair to compare your experience to others. Plus, people often tend to think it’s strong to be able to "let things go" without processing or feeling the weight of the event. However, the strongest, most courageous people are those who give themselves the emotional space to experience their feelings and sink into the hurt.
I worry my grief may turn into depression, so it may be best to avoid talking about it.
Avoiding your grief process and all the feelings associated with loss is more of a precipitating factor for it turning into depression than addressing it with a therapist. Discussing, processing, and allowing time and space for your grief can actually help you avoid longer-term depressive episodes. Moreover, our grief counselors are trauma-informed, meaning we are specifically trained to make sure things don’t get worse as you get better.
You Don’t Have To Make This Journey Alone
If you’re struggling to overcome grief and loss and just need someone to listen and help you make sense of everything, our therapists at Bozeman Counseling Center are here for you. Please Contact Us or call (406) 624-6007 to schedule your free, 15-minute consultation—or, when you’re ready, schedule your initial online or in-person grief therapy session.
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