Grief Counseling
Grief counseling is a form of psychotherapy that aims to help people cope with grief and mourning following the death of loved ones, or with major life changes that trigger feelings of grief (e.g., divorce, or job loss). Grief counselors believe that everyone experiences and expresses grief in their own way, often shaped by culture.
Five Stages to Rebuilding a Shattered Life
Impact: shock, denial, anxiety, fear, and panic.
Chaos: confusion, disbelief, actions out of control, irrational thoughts and feelings, feeling despair, feeling helpless, desperate searching, lose track of time, difficulty sleeping and eating, obsessive focus on the loved one and their possessions, agony from imagining their physical harm, shattered beliefs.
Adapting: bringing order back into daily life while you continue to grieve: take care of basic needs (personal grooming, shopping, cooking, cleaning, paying bills), learn to live without the loved one, accept help, focus on helping children cope, connect with other grieving families for mutual support, take control of grieving so that grief does not control you, slowly accept the new reality.
Equilibrium: attaining stability and routines: reestablish a life that works all right, enjoy pleasant activities with family members and good times with friends, do productive work, choose a positive new direction in life while honoring the past, learn how to handle people who ask questions about what you've been through.
Transformation: rethinking your purpose in life and the basis for your identity; looking for meaning in tragic, senseless loss; allowing yourself to have both painful and positive feelings about your loss and become able to choose which feelings you focus on; allowing yourself to discover that your struggle has led you to develop a stronger, better version of yourself than you expected could exist; learning how to talk with others about your heroic healing journey without exposing them to your pain; becoming supportive of others trying to deal with their losses.
By Joanne T. Jozefowski in 1999's The Phoenix Phenomenon: Rising from the Ashes of Grief.
Anger Management
Angry is a natural emotion and we all experience it from time to time. Anger can come as a displeasure or resentment and usually this is a health response. In addition, anger can be a normal response to feeling sad, lonely or frightened. However, if anger turns into rage, it can impair judgement and things, making people more likely to do and say senseless or irrational things. If anger is interfering with your quality of life, seeing a mental health professional might be the most effective approach.
Although one of our experienced and expert therapists must provide a diagnosis, here are signs that a person needs help with anger management:
Being in trouble with the law
Frequently feeling that they have to hold in their anger
Having numerous arguments with people around you, especially family or colleagues
Getting involved in fights
Hitting a spouse or child
Threatening violence to people or property
Breaking things during an outburst
Losing one's temper when driving and becoming reckless