When someone you love dies, there is no “normal” to get back to.
One minute you may be fine, and the next minute you’ve abandoned your cart at the grocery store because the grief has hit you unexpectedly. The more time passes, the more the pressure builds to “move on” — both from yourself and those around you — but the feelings of loss don’t simply go away.
While grief can look different for every person, you may be experiencing things like:
Depression
Rage or extreme anger
Difficulty focusing or concentrating
Feelings of numbness, guilt, or shame
Replaying of traumatic memories
Strained relationships
Use of alcohol, drugs, or food to cope
Grief is a crucial part of saying goodbye.
What you are experiencing today is not a sign of weakness, incompetence, or selfishness. It is valid and appropriate (and yes, even normal). When grief is left unattended, it can continue to manifest in your physical, emotional, and mental health.
In grief therapy, we’ll offer you a safe place where you can experience and express your feelings, rather than suppress them. We’ll help you work toward accepting the reality of the loss, as well as learn effective coping strategies so you can find ways to live this new version of life.
Express
Your experiences & emotions—whatever they may be. Everything is valid, accepted, and honored here.
Normalize
Your experience. Learning more about the grief process can help you feel less alone and more hopeful.
Extend
Compassion to yourself. This is a new reality you’re living in—it’s unfair to expect too much of yourself too soon.
Learn
Practical coping strategies and receive support for difficult moments. Find meaningful ways to honor your loss.
A NOTE ABOUT
Death by Suicide
We recognize that the grief journey as a survivor of suicide loss is unique. It can be isolating when it feels like your experience doesn’t fit into “typical” grief or when it includes emotions like shame, guilt, regret, or anger that others cannot relate to.
If you are a suicide loss survivor or survivor of suicide, please know that at Gig Harbor Counseling Services, you will be met with understanding, experience, and support that takes these individual challenges into account.
Our Approach to Grief Therapy
We offer a mix of support, strategies, and tools in grief therapy. This means we’ll help you find ways to plan for and manage the feelings around a memorial or upcoming anniversary as much as we’ll support you in the (often unpredictable) day-to-day ups and downs of grief. Therapy is a place dedicated to you: where you don’t have to fear being judged, shut down, or “fixed.”