Grief and Loss Counselling Melbourne

Grief and Loss Counselling - Image ©Kirsten 2025

Grief and Loss are emotions that we experience often but I think can go unrecognised as we have been led to link grief and loss to death.

Grief and loss of course is felt when someone dies, but it is also felt when a dream we had or an expected plan fell through. A few expamples of when we feel grief and loss include - when a relationship ends (romantic, family, colleague, friends - any relationship that we enjoyed), when we have experienced family violence, divorce, when we lose or quit our jobs, when we move house, loss of financial stability, The list goes on and on. We can also grieve the life we had prior to big changes - an example of this may be that we grieve the freedom we had before we moved in with a partner, got married or had children. The other point is that when grief and loss is due to death this can include pets, celebrities, distant friends or family members, colleagues it isn't only valid when it is a person or a person that we are close to.

Grief and Loss can express itself in many ways, I think we all know Grief and Loss as sadness and crying but there are many other symptoms and it is important to note there is no correct way to grieve, we are all individuals and we all respond to grief and loss in our own unique way. Contrary to popular narratives we see in films and read in books there are no linear stages of grief that progress until the grief is finished, for some of us grief lasts a lifetime, and the goal is to be with the grief and live a fulfilling life around the grief.

Symptoms can include

Sadness

Irritability

Anger

Anxiety

Numbness

Difficulty concentrating

Depression

Shock

Denial

Guilt

Relief

Insomnia

Lack of appetite/ over eating

Stomach upsets

Headaches

Body aches

Exhaustion

Social withdraw/need to be surrounded by others

Weakened Immune

Change to hormones

AND SO MANY MORE

Grief and Loss can feel isolating, I speak with so many people who are going through grief and loss who feel that they can't talk to others about their pain as people either can't hold the conversation or want to fix them. This fixing, of course comes from a healthy and loving space, but it is not what we need when we are grieving, we need a safe space to talk and process our new world. A space where we can start to understand this new world we live in. Because that is the base of grief - our world has changed and we weren't prepared - we either didn't know the loss was coming, or we didn't understand the impact it would have on us. Our assumptive world has, in full or large parts, been taken from our future. It is no longer possible to live the life we presumed we would.

I had someone explain to me once that the book they had in their unconsious mind of what their life would be like, although it wasn't written yet, it was a work in progress as life is, it couldn't be finished as she just could not write the rest without the parts she had lost. She came to counselling when she realised that she had to close that book and start another "book of her life", it was blank, she came with the goal creating her new life, a life she could be excited about. That was her experience, others have come when they didn't want to close the book, they didn't want to write anymore either, they wanted to just keep rereading the book to that point - stay in the memories and not make new ones. Everyone experiences grief in their own way. Each person I have worked with starts counselling at the moment they want the additional support. For some that is as soon as the grief presents, for others it is once they have sat with the grief for a period of time, for others it is when they feel they "should have moved on by now, and want to explore what is wrong with them", for others it is to get support as they rebuild. There is no right or wrong time - there is only in your own time.

If you are feeling grief and loss OR supporting someone who is grieving, and would like to understand how Grief and Loss counselling can support you, please reach out. I offer 15 minute connection calls for you to ask questions to understand how counselling could support your journey. In Melbourne CBD we could do Walk and Talk, while throughout Australia I offer sessions via phone or zoom.