Grief Support Workshops and Groups
A supportive, empathetic space to grieve and mourn, to work towards healing and reconciliation with your grief.
Introducing:
Art Therapy Grief Support Groups
Combining the power of both art therapy and support groups—this journey through essential themes of mourning will become a vital part of your reconciliation with grief.
“Art making has the ability to move people along their journey of grief and loss into a more balanced place of healing and hope. In the face of tragedy, the creative process can help re-calibrate a mourner’s life.”
~ The Chandler Gallery at Maud Morgan Arts
6 Session AT Grief Support Groups
What themes will be covered?
While each group will be different and the needs of the particular individuals that make up each group will influence the exact themes and art prompts, generally you can expect that in the time together we will gently and respectfully go through some of these important themes:
Define our terms and explore metaphors for “grief,” “mourning” and “reconciliation with grief.”
Reflect on, normalize and process the emotions of your grief journey,
Ponder and process some of aspects that make your relationship with the person (or people) you lost unique.
Acknowledge particular difficulties, regrets and unfinished business; receive comfort and encouragement in the face of these realities,
Consider our support networks and resources and we might strengthen them,
Memorialize the one you’ve lost,
Plan strategies for the ongoing journey.
For each of these sections there is some instruction and discussion, then gentle invitations to process with art.
If a particular idea or art prompt seems difficult or unhelpful, I work with you to find something that is more appealing. You should never feel ‘pushed’ to processing in ways or areas that feel uncomfortable or distasteful for you. You will be encouraged to trust your inner sense of knowing throughout the whole process.
With a Grief Support Group or Workshop, you receive:
Guidance through “the wilderness of grief”
Spending time with the thoughts and emotions of your grief journey can be so difficult—like a great and dark uncharted wilderness before you. To go it alone would be daunting.
In this journey into the wilderness, I, as the Art Therapist, will be your guide and facilitator. Our mutually agreed upon group guidelines will allow group members to support you, and you to support them. How comforting to be going through it together.
Relief from your feelings of grief
Many find relief in discovering that all of their emotions, including some of their more difficult ones (or those not easy to tell others about) are a normal part of the journey.
And, while in this group, knowing that you will be doing your grief work in each session or in the one-day workshop, perhaps in the times before or between sessions you will start to be able to take the opportunity to rest from the grief work.
Healing, reconciliation with your grief
It will not happen fast and it won’t be easy. Also, depending on where you are in your journey, it likely won’t be completed at the end of our group’s last meeting.
However, I expect you will experience that healing will happen. You will be further along the journey than you were at the beginning due to the specific work we will do together. And, you will be better equipped and supported for the rest of this grief journey, once our group has finished meeting.
Next Grief Support Events
Virtual Group, 6 Weeks, $240 + GST
**Early Bird discount of 10% off if registered by _____. Use Code “Grief10” at checkout.**
Weekday Evening Group
Dates: TBA
Time: 6:30-8:30 p.m. (MT)
Location: Online with Zoom
Participant Limits: These groups will be limited to 8 participants, and need at least 4 participants to go ahead. If less it may be postponed or cancelled. If there is a need to postpone, you will be contacted to confirm availability and have the option to withdraw with full refund.
This group is for you if:
✔ You feel alone in your grief journey. You’d like to know there are others on a similar path, perhaps feeling similar things.
✔ You would like the weight of grief to be lighter, to start to feeling more hopeful and to have ways of coping when the waves of grief hit.
✔ You have done some grief work, received some support, are able to follow along and work in the themes of a group AND support others in their journey with your attention and empathy. (Note: this often, but not requires that the death happened 3-6 months prior. Earlier, individual sessions might be more appropriate.)
✔ You are able to commit to coming to this group for EVERY session. This is a closed group—same participants from beginning to end. Group dynamics and trust need your presence and support.
✔ You want to honour and respect the needs of others in the group, and have them honour and respect yours. We will create our own group parameters in the first session, but these group guidelines can serve as a starting place.
✔ You would like to know you are moving forward in your journey towards healing, and have the time and emotional energy to put work into it. .
If you can “check the boxes” above, then I believe you will, in this group:
✔ Be relieved to know that whatever you are feeling is normal.
✔ Feel support in a group who will listen to and understand your journey.
✔ In a measured way, work through specific grief work tasks that will lead to healing.
✔ Feel the healing happen, bit by bit, and perhaps in unexpected times and ways.
✔ Be equipped to handle the grief feelings that will come in the future.
Suzanne Styles is a certified Professional Art Therapist registered with the Canadian Art Therapy Association (#51900298 ) and the Association of Counselling Therapies of Alberta (ACTA #2749).
She also has an M.A. in Leadership and a B.A. in Psychology.
I will be your art therapist facilitator in this grief support group.
It was more than fourteen years ago I first attended an all-day workshop on “Complicated Grief” lead by Dr. Alan Wolfelt of the Center for Loss and Life Transition in Colorado. That began my journey of researching and facilitating grief support groups. For more than ten years I facilitated these groups for young people in China, learning to companion the grief journey of different individuals in their difficult losses.
During my Art Therapy training I had the privilege of supporting a small group of mature adult Canadians through similar themes and ideas, but now with an Art Therapy base. Group members found great benefit and healing. (You can see quotes from them below.)
I am grateful to be able to you offer you this Art Therapy Grief Support Group, to support your journey of healing.
If you would be interested in more individual support, I welcome you to consider one-on-one sessions, where we can work at your pace, with the themes and needs arising in and from your life.
“The art was the most helpful—cathartic, lessens the pain. Put it out on the table and leave it there. Creating helps to identify your feelings and to express them.”
“Helped to take away some of the pain and to feel happiness in the memories”
“The letter was eye opening. I thought I had nothing to write but once I started it all came out…”
“Helped to identify some unresolved issues”
—from art therapy grief support group participants, comments made in the final evaluation. Permission granted to share anonymously
Before These Sessions:
The pain or weight of your grief may be heavy, sometimes unbearable.
You may feel alone in the struggle, as though no one understands or cares.
You may wonder if this journey will ever end or if the depression will lift.
You may wonder if life will ever feel “normal” again.
Certain memories “nag” at you—keep coming back, or stay there, just below the surface.
After These Sessions:
The pain and weight of your grief is not quite as sharp or heavy as before.
Even though you know each person’s grief is unique, you have felt the groups’ empathetic support.
You have the sense that healing and reconciliation with your grief is happening.
You know what to do for support in the future.
You have tools and skills for the next part of your journey.
Here’s what you get:
1. A closed group
In a “closed group” the same participants are there from beginning to end. You get the chance to get to know the other members in a deepening way. Trust grows as we offer empathy and understanding as each one shares.
2. A safe environment to grieve and mourn
This safety can only be created by the group, each one participating, offering what they can, honouring each other and our agreements. We begin by establishing guidelines we all agree to. These include:
confidentiality
commitment to attending every session
allowing each to have different emotions and responses in their journey
equal time to share, and
permission to share as much or as little as you wish in the group
As the facilitating art therapist, I guard the space, the time and the process.
3. Support based on reliable research
I base most of the foundational ideas and session themes for these groups on the work of Dr. Alan Wolfelt, founder and director of the The Center for Loss & Life Transition in Colorado. I will briefly explain some of these ideas, how he explains them, in our sessions: companioning, the wilderness of grief, the difference between grieving and mourning, reconciliation with our grief.
Virtual 6 Week Group
Registration Open for Next Two Groups—$240 + GST
**Early Bird discount of 10% off if registered by Dec. 20, 2022. Use Code “Grief10” at checkout.**
Tuesday Evening Group
Dates: Tuesday evenings, Jan. 17-Feb. 21, 2023
Time: 6:30-8:30 p.m. (MT)
Location: Online with Zoom
Participant Limits: These groups will be limited to 8 participants, and need at least 4 participants to go ahead. If less it may be postponed or cancelled. If there is a need to postpone, you will be contacted to confirm availability and have the option to withdraw with full refund.
Need to chat first? Contact me with your questions or book a free consultation call.
6 Weekly Sessions
or One Day Workshop
Spend time in a supportive and empathetic space, letting creativity emerge, leading to new insights and healing
Themes covered and the order in which they are presented will be tailored to the needs of group members as understood from initial intake forms and our sessions together.
With in-person groups, all materials are supplied. For online groups you using the art materials you have on hand.
**a limited number of sliding scale spots may be available
Need to chat first? Book a free consultation call here.
FAQs
1. What will we do in each session?
In session 1 I will introduce you to the format we will follow in each session, decide on our group guidelines or ground rules, begin to get to know each other an start making some art around our grief journey. Each time we will start with a check in, then there will be an introduction to that session’s theme. There will be 1 or 2 art making directives each time, with time afterwards to debrief—processing and sharing the experience and learning from the art making. We will then have a closing, checking in again. Sometimes I will share a final poem or some quotes related to the theme or what emerged during the session. This is a time to reflect on our learning and consider what we might take into the next week.
2. What if I can’t come to a session?
To safeguard the group process and honour the investment each brings, before you sign up I ask each one to commit to coming to all the sessions, prioritizing this group over other engagements that might come up. If that is not possible, then it might be better for you to join the next offering. If for some reason you must stop attending or miss a session, our group guidelines request that you let the group know.
3. What supplies do I need?
For In-Person groups—all materials are supplied.
For Virtual Groups—I will send you a supplies list one to two weeks before the group begins. Or, alternatively, if you are in Calgary, provide an art supplies kit for a modest fee. This is not an art class. We are not, generally, doing art to show others or hang on the wall so supplies are simple and inexpensive.
4. What if I sign up, then change my mind? Can I get a refund?
To ensure those who sign up can count on there being a group they can count on attending, The grief support group refund policy is as follows.
There is an additional $30 cancellation fee on all cancellations.
A full refund (minus $30) is available if you cancel more than two weeks before the first session.
A 50% refund (minus $30) is available if cancellation occurs more than one but less than two weeks before the first session.
With less than one weeks notice, no refund is available, however in special circumstances group fees, minus the $30 cancelation fee, may be applied for attendance in a future group.
There is no refund for missed or cancelled sessions.