EMBRACING GRIEF
WELCOMING LIFE

Grief Support – For When Life Brings You Lemons

We Offer Grief Support Circles, Workshops and Rituals – Online and In Person in London and Devon

Our Approach to Grief Support

Embracing Grief offer one-off grief support groups online and in person. Our online events (Embracing Grief Support Circle), and in person workshops (Embracing Grief Community Journey) include an awareness of the body, use creative ways of working, and shared grief rituals. The way we shape events, and the practice we use is called Grief Tending. Because in grief support groups, we tend to our feelings. We welcome emotions without trying to change anything, or offering advice. As a consequence, we encourage people to find their own way to express themselves.

Why Do We Grieve?

Grief is a natural response to change, loss and bereavement. Bereavement is only one of many reasons to grieve. Adding to this, after the loss of someone or something significant in our lives we may also experience other losses as a consequence – such as loss of identity, security, health, companionship and support. As a result, we may sometimes experience multiple, sudden or traumatic losses, which may leave us with complex layers of grief. In addition to the personal, grief may be a response to collective issues, such as ecological grief, social injustice, or stress in response to the rising costs of living.

You Are Not Alone

Importantly, there is a huge range of possible responses which may all be part of a grief experience including: anxiety, depression, sadness, anger, relief, guilt, shame, dismay, overwhelm and numbness. Because of this, trying to find our way through grief can be confusing. As a consequence, we may feel isolated. And so, being with others who are experiencing grief can help us feel less alone. Therefore, a grief support group can help us to find connection with others as we experience our unique grief circumstances. In Embracing Grief support groups, we encourage building support networks, and welcoming life alongside grief.

Grief Support Groups

Finding a grief support group can provide a helpful way to get in touch with how we really feel, with the solidarity of others. We may need support as a result of facing challenging situations that happened in the past, a current situation or anticipating a future event. Often we may feel stuck, or overwhelmed by grief. Sometimes we need support years after something happened. In Embracing Grief support groups, we invite participants to allow and value their own unique experience. By doing so, we offer exercises that may bring about mutual acceptance, support and a caring community as part of a guided journey.

Grief Support Using A Grief Tending Approach

Embracing Grief offer events for grief support that use the practice of Grief Tending in community. This approach to grief support draws on a variety of teachers, traditions, theories and practices. Primarily, we are indebted to our teachers Sophy Banks and Jeremy Thres. Maeve Gavin developed this way of working; which in turn was informed by Sobonfu Somé, and also the Celtic tradition of keening. Other important practitioners in the field include Francis Weller, Martin Prechtel, Malidoma Somé and Joanna Macy. We honour the indigenous peoples whose practices inspire us. In addition, we value the theories of grief, trauma recovery and neuro-science which help us to use a trauma sensitive approach.

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“We’re not going to figure it all out: grief doesn’t need to be solved; it needs to be tended. Whether it comes from our ancestors, or from what we didn’t get from those closest to us, or from the parts of ourselves we shut off, or from the destruction of the natural world, our job is to mourn that loss so that we can become people who respond to the world rather than just survive day to day.”
Francis Weller from ‘The Geography of Sorrow’