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Bereavement support group helps mourners deal with loss

When Judy Gunn lost two brothers and her father in a 20-year span, she “never probably grieved them.”

SAULT STE. MARIE, Ont. — When Judy Gunn lost two brothers and her father in a 20-year span, she “never probably grieved them.”

A friend suggested she attend a bereavement group offered by Victorian Order of Nurses Algoma after her mother, Ina, died in December.

“She was my whole world and held everybody together,” said Gunn of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., in a recent interview.

When her once-weekly group began meeting at the United Way agency earlier this year, there were three adults mourning their parents. Three others had lost their mates.

Gunn, who lost her first brother in 1973 when she was just 18, quickly felt at home.

“We were all there for the same reason and trying to help each other do the same thing,” she said.

“I was really down on myself for not being able to pull my life together and do what I had been doing. They helped me realize that there was nothing wrong with me, that it was normal what I was going through and just to go easy on myself.”

It’s advice she was able to share with other group members when they experienced tough days during the eight weeks the group met.

VON Algoma started offering bereavement sessions in 2005. Many participants are referred to the free program by counsellors and doctors.

“For a lot of people, for whatever reason, they get stuck looking for help to get through the painful first period (of mourning),” said Valerie Durnford, co-ordinator of VON’s volunteer hospice.

“You can try and repress the pain and move on, but it will usually come back.

“Usually it’s something you’ve got to deal with, face and move forward rather than try and ignore. Sometimes people don’t do that until consecutive losses build up.”

Most participants are widows or widowers followed by adult children, such as Gunn, who have lost a parent.

Topics discussed include misconceptions about grief and comments from family and friends that may be more hurtful than helpful after a death.

Facilitators help participants become “accustomed to your new life, as opposed to getting over (the death), because people don’t really get over anything,” said Durnford.

“They just figure out how to deal with it.”

Most people report a noticeable improvement in how they are handling a loved one’s death after the sessions end. Durnford credits the change to people talking to people.

“You can’t really take credit for it. The group does it themselves,” she said.