While most of the focus on the subject of grief/bereavement has been associated with death-related losses, many of us encounter losses which are non-death akin, and, in effect, these losses will continue to be felt in various ways for the rest of an individual’s life.

At the Regent Theatre on Sept. 27, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., Dr. Darcy Harris Ph.D., FT, internationally recognized speaker, therapist and writer will be speaking on grief and losses as The Edith Fox Life & Loss Centre presents, ‘Living Losses: Grief and Loss in Everyday Life’.

Kathleen Foster-Morgan, Founder and CEO of The Edith Fox Life & Loss Centre and organizer for the workshop explained who the event is intended for.

Initially designed for professionals to provide them the extra hours of public education they need for certification purposes, the workshop is open to the public to allow a first hand interactive experience.

“I think the real important aspect of it is  we’ll get people come from the community who have said ‘I have never talked to a counselor or therapist and this workshop really helped me a lot’,” Foster-Morgan told The Gazette.  “We are trying to open it up to those people to who may be struggling on a personal level about past losses, multiple losses or  even the losses of young women having a miscarriage or are in the position where they can’t have a child and they know it’s not for the best and do an abortion, and so those young women would benefit greatly. And you never have to disclose why your there.”

Dr. Harris, with a Fellow in Thanatology from the Association of Death Education & Counseling (ADEC), will be specifically talking about different losses and not just by death.

Various life changes such as job loss or maybe having a parent in an longterm care home will still bring an individual to experience grief and loss.

“There are those hidden losses that often happen at a conference like this, as I’ve done them before,” Foster-Morgan expressed. “There could be an elderly man who comes in and he’s lost his wife but he doesn’t talk about her, he talks about his dog who just died. It’s the complexity of having two great loves in his life which is hard, and it unravels all the unfinished and unresolved grief losses from before.”

The grief process that happens after losing someone- not just a person as we love our pets too- can be a long emotional road but many people who don’t have the human to animal connection don’t really understand how someone could feel the same love for animal as the same for a human being.

Foster-Morgan thinks it’s extremely possible.

During the workshop/program, validating the importance of having a counselor, journaling and visiting the public library to see what books on Thanatology they have will be greatly encouraged.

The hope is to get people started on the normal grieving process as somehow we normally shut down when it seems to get messy with tears and a lot of emotion Foster-Morgan added.

“But if we never really express said emotion we’ll never really get through to the healthier human being we can be for having gone through such an amount of compassion,” she said.

To purchase tickets online please visit http://www.theregenttheatre.org/tickets/ or at The Regent theatre Box Office.

For more information on the workshop or The Edith Fox Life & Loss Centre please contact [email protected]

and for more information on awareness on grief and loss please visit https://www.adec.org/ 

Tickets are $175 or $75 for currently enrolled Loyalist College students, plus applicable facility fees, service charge and tax. Lunch break will be self-directed.