Death of a Parent

Caileigh – My own grief and supporting others

Caileigh tells about her own grief and now it has given her a really powerful lens on how to support children going through grief as well. Along with her professional education and training, there is now a different perspective on grief and how that fits in with supporting others.

Grief & Ice Cream

When my wife of 18 years died in 2016, I became a single father missing the love of my life, and also had to learn how to raise two girls (13-17 at the time) on my own. I remember a conversation I had with my mother-in-law and oldest daughter that began as reminiscing over a person who became a lost love to all of us. We all talked about different aspects of my wife but shortly, it transformed into a “who meant more to her” fest.

Adam – Crying and singing

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Adam talks about how crying and singing helps him cope even at the cemetary

Matt – Adoption and grief

Matt talks about how adoption and grief have similarities. Matt continues to grieve the death of his birth mother.

Lisa – Music and a safe space

Lisa explains how music has been a safe space for her to feel all of the emotions that have come up since she lost her Dad

Learning from Grief

Grief is weird. Odd start, I know, but that was the sentence I used a lot whenever someone asked me how I was. It was never a constant feeling; it changed day to day. And still does. It’s the full gambit of emotions from sadness to anger to guilt and, though dark, even humour found its way in.

Karyn and Aidan – Support.

Karyn and Aidan discuss how much the support they received helped

Hope – Waves of grief

Hope talks about the loss of her father and how grief comes in waves and how a therapist helped her understand that she had pushed her emotions down

Mary S – Dogs

Mary talks about how special dogs are and how much they helped her grief

Jessica M – My Story

Jessica talks about losing her grandfather at 14 when her mother was terminal, her mother and aunt died when she was 15. She felt alone until she found a peer support group

Caileigh – Recommendations as a therapist and a griever

Caileigh discussed two recommendations for parents on how to support their child’s grief. as a therapist and a griever. The first is to recognize that being with is far more important than fixing. There’s two pieces to connection. The first being that one of the most important healing aspects to grief is feeling connected to others.

Kim – You can get through this

Kim talks about the difference between her Dad and her Mum’s death