• On Your Mind Counselling offers personalized counselling grief support, guiding individuals along a path of hope and healing.
• Our counselling services extend across Ontario, providing accessible care for those grieving the loss of their loved ones.
• For those prepared to take the next steps, we warmly invite you to book a complimentary 30-minute consultation with a professional today.

Loss and grief is a deeply personal and profound emotional journey. It manifests in so many ways, often including deep sorrow, intense longing, and overwhelming heaviness. Our hearts are left aching, our spirits shattered, and our sense of reality thrown into chaos.

Navigating the challenges of the ‘new norm’ can often seem like a near-impossible journey. Yet, with compassion and support, it is possible.

On Your Mind Counselling is committed to providing more than just counselling services—we are dedicated to creating a safe space where your story finds a listening ear, your pain after you lost a loved one discovers healing, and a renewed sense of hope takes root. As a team led by empathetic mental health care experts, we are honoured to walk alongside you, offering specialized pain of grief counselling.

Together, we hope to provide the tools and unwavering support necessary as you work through the emotional grieving journey with greater strength, self-compassion, and hope.

Losing a loved one is an indescribable pain that changes the fabric of our existence, leaving us feeling broken. Often, we are left wondering how we’ll ever be able to pick up the pieces left after the loss.

Grief counselling can play a central role in your healing, helping you by:

• Providing a safe space to express emotions, where feelings of grief are met with empathy and compassion
• Offering coping strategies to manage grief-related stress, sadness, anxiety, or any other difficult emotion that may be interfering with your well-being
• Meeting you where you are on your journey through grief and tailoring the therapeutic approach to fit you
• Facilitating recovery from both a traumatic grief or unexpected loss and anticipatory or expected loss
• Helping to identify, address, and make sense of any potential complications associated with prolonged grief, including depression or potential symptoms of trauma
• Supporting the development of emotional resilience, helping you adapt to the changes that come with loss and find strength amid grief
• Helping you regain your daily functionality and restore a sense of control in your daily living while continuing to honour the memory of your loved one
• Exploring and planning for the future through emotional healing and personal growth (and re-growth) that accompanies this process

One of the worst aspects of loss is that there is no way to prepare for it.

No one forewarns you for the tumultuous sea of emotions that follow, both emotional and physical. It’s a struggle to breathe, to be present, and to find a sense of normalcy. It's as if everything in your life has become insignificant compared to the intense pain of the loss you’re currently facing.

The world loses its colour, joy becomes a distant memory, and every aspect of life is overshadowed by the haunting void left by your loved one's absence.

It’s important to mention that through the pain of loss and sorrow, grief is a natural response to loss.

Coping with the loss of a loved one can evoke a range of intense reactions, thoughts and feelings – from intense sadness to anger, overwhelming feelings of guilt to profound emptiness.

Bereavement is not limited to an emotional response alone. Grieving the loss of a loved one can also evoke a physical response, including changes in weight or appetite, difficulties sleeping, muscle aches, and impaired immune responses, which can impact our health in considerable ways.

The expression of our emotions or behaviours often represents the stage of grief and loss we are in. In no particular order, when we experience grief, the stages of grief include:

• Denial: serving as a defence mechanism to protect us against overwhelming emotions, denial involves the refusal to accept the reality (or severity) of the loss
• Anger: once the devastating reality of the loss sets in, anger often becomes the primary defence, which may be directed inwardly toward ourselves, toward others, or even to our loved one
• Bargaining: there may come a time when we attempt to negotiate or bargain with a higher power or ourselves as a way to go back in time, reverse the tragedy, or lessen the devastation we are experiencing
• Depression: feelings of intense sadness, loneliness, and despair are common in the experience of grief, causing individuals to withdraw from others and battle with feelings of hopelessness
• Acceptance: it takes time, but the reality of our loss can become easier to grapple with, allowing us to adjust to a new normal without our loved one in the physical world

Moving through the stages of each type of grief experience often happens in a non-linear way. It’s also possible to skip stages, move back and forth between stages, and even reach acceptance but still allow symptoms of grief, anger, or depression to set in down the road.

Understanding depression and grief is a deeply personal journey for each of us.

At On Your Mind Counselling, our approach to each type of grief counselling is founded on a deep understanding of the profound impact loss can have on individuals.

With our expertise in grief counselling and our commitment to fostering a sense of belonging and compassion, we strive to empower you to find healing, meaning, and hope in the midst of your loss.

Our approach to professional grief counselling is centred on personalized life care and tailored interventions that meet you where you are today. Whether you're grappling with the loss of your brother, mother, father, child, or pet, our goal is to help you honour your experiences, provide the foundations for cultivating resilience, and guide you on a path to move forward with renewed strength and purpose.

Together with our care team, we can find ways when you seek help.

• Accept the reality of loss
• Process the pain of grief
• Adjust to a world without your loved one
• Discover a lasting connection with your loved one while moving forward on a new life

Since every journey is unique, we offer a range of evidence-based strategies proven to help people face grief with more clarity. Here are a few of our commonly used interventions.

Oftentimes, our counsellors utilize Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), which helps individuals who are coping with grief, as it focuses on identifying and challenging negative thought patterns or behaviours that accompany feelings of grief.

From a trauma-informed lens, CBT counselling can help individuals recognize and modify certain negative thoughts, such as guilt or self-blame, in an effort to develop healthier coping strategies. This approach is integral for building resilience and allowing for the gradual adjustment to life without our loved ones.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is another valuable approach that focuses on accepting difficult emotions associated with grief. Rather than forcing ourselves to eliminate or suppress these emotions, ACT encourages us to mindfully engage with them within a safe and nonjudgmental therapeutic environment. It guides us to live authentically and make choices that align with our values.

Oftentimes, our counsellors utilize ACT to promote psychological flexibility, placing us in the driver's seat of our pain and allowing us to adapt to the changes of our loss while also discovering purpose and fulfillment in life.

As we know, emotions are at the forefront of our grieving process. They exist whether we try to express, transform, or suppress them. Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT) focuses on helping us become more aware of our emotions, learn how to express them safely, and transform certain maladaptive or problematic emotional responses into healthier ones.

Our trauma-informed counsellors utilize EFT as the framework for exploring and making sense of the emotional impact of our grief. Working together, we can develop emotional regulation skills necessary for coping and healing.

During a grief counselling session, narrative therapy focuses on the stories we tell about our experiences. It helps us process grief and work through the pain by externalizing it. In other words, narrative therapy enables us to view our grief as a separate entity rather than a part of our identity.

Our counsellors utilize narrative therapy to help us reconstruct or reinterpret our grief stories, emphasizing our own strengths, resilience, and agency. This approach can offer us a way to discover meaning, create a more empowered narrative of our stories, and offer a path toward healing.

No matter the approach used within the therapeutic context, our trauma-informed counsellors offer compassionate listening, expert guidance, and evidence-based strategies to support you every step of the way as you journey through grief toward healing and wholeness.

Our approach revolves around:

• Supportive individual therapy sessions that provide a nurturing environment for sharing experiences and learning coping strategies to navigate grief
• Expert support utilizing current evidence-based counselling methods to instil hope, resilience, and new perspectives
• Comprehensive education about the grieving process, offering insights into what to expect and providing effective coping mechanisms for various stages of grief
• Development of personalized coping skills and techniques to manage overwhelming emotions and alleviate stress associated with the grieving process
• Collaborative assistance in setting achievable goals and creating a plan to navigate life transitions and find renewed purpose after experiencing loss
• Access to referrals for additional resources and support services, including Grief Recovery Support Groups and community organizations
• Ongoing long-term support and follow-up care to ensure sustained progress and facilitate adjustment to life changes following the loss of a loved one

Connect with our experienced and compassionate team for personalized assistance. Whether you have questions or need guidance, we're here to help. Find support today.

At On Your Mind Counselling, we take pride in our team of highly qualified and licensed counsellors, each dedicated to providing empathetic and personalized support. Our grief counsellors specialize in navigating the complex emotions of loss with sensitivity, compassion, and insight.

Through therapy, our goal is to guide you through the different stages and provide bereavement support, helping you rediscover hope and meaning in life while learning to cherish and memorialize your loved one.

We want to ensure we set you up for success early in this process. For this reason, we offer a complementary 30-minute consultation where you and your counsellor can get to know one another and familiarize yourself with our virtual platform.

In this session, we encourage you to discuss any concerns, expectations, and goals regarding the therapeutic process and assess your compatibility with your counsellor.

Once you’ve found the counsellor that is right for you, we are ready to set up a personalized counselling plan specially curated for you and your needs.

This may involve selecting individual sessions or sessions with friends and family members, targeting therapeutic techniques such as cognitive-behavioural therapy, emotions-focused practices, or narrative therapy that align with your needs and provide the most benefit. 

As we progress through the counselling journey, we regularly assess your progress and make adjustments to ensure you receive the most effective support.

Every online counselling session will be held in a safe and supportive space, encouraging healing to occur organically and at a pace that feels right for you.

Our goal throughout the journey of grief counselling is to offer practical coping strategies to manage challenging symptoms of grief that may come up on a day-to-day basis. As we encourage the exploration of emotions to promote healing, we aim to empower you to embrace life with more confidence and a renewed sense of purpose.

Are you ready to begin your healing journey? Book a therapy session tailored to your specific needs.