Supporting the Suicide-Bereaved

This course explores who the suicide-bereaved are and what they tend to go through: the early and ongoing reactions that define the often complicated grief of suicide bereavement. We look into the chief mourning tasks that all must pass through en route to feeling “normal” again, what the characteristic types of grief are, and why our individual grieving patterns are different. Support groups and counselling are the mental health practitioner's stock-in-trade, so we look at how those can work to support the bereaved: both those who are adapting to the death and those who have developed depression, PTSD, and/or complicated grief. Some people have special needs in grieving that must be acknowledged and we include an extensive section on that. Supporting the Suicide-Bereaved is a companion to the course “Supporting Clients at Risk of Suicide,” which deals with spotting warning signs of those at risk for suicide and supporting them. Because Supporting Clients at Risk of Suicide extensively covers basic concepts about suicide, we strongly recommend that you do that course before embarking on this one. Upon successful completion of this course, you will be able to: List at least eight roles affected by a person's suicide; Explain what is involved in each of the four mourning tasks; Name four factors which cause us to grieve differently from one another; Discuss the three main characteristic types of grief; Identify five early grief reactions in a suicide-bereaved person; Recognise nine ongoing mourning reactions in a suicide-bereaved person; Name the most important components of successful support groups for the suicide-bereaved; Cite at least seven of the ten commandments of grief counselling; Discuss at least four therapeutic modalities or strategies for counselling the suicide-bereaved with PTSD; Explain the two aspects of Complicated Grief Therapy; Name at least five different groups with special needs in grieving, and be able to list two important points for supporting each group.