Case Studies & Interventions in Complex Bereavement

Course description

Most of us feel confident to work with routine grief issues in therapy such as loss of a grandparent or a job. But what do you do when a client presents with complex bereavement, often mixed with trauma and one or more mental health diagnoses? This course assumes a basic familiarity with the principles of grief work, and takes a deep dive into unraveling and treating three cases:

• Miss Tracy, a woman who lost her mother after a long fight with cancer

• Rose, the eldest of a large family, who felt responsible for her brother’s suicide death

• Jose, a man who lost his sibling to gang violence

This course briefly reviews related diagnoses, trauma, stress, depression, and PTSD, and how they play into complex bereavement. Drawing on principles of ACT, Relational-Cultural Theory, existential therapy, and Buddhist psychology, you will learn clear strategies for assisting your clients with complex grief with three tools designed to increase in intensity as your client’s coping capacity increases:

• Life and loss timeline (with illustrated examples and instructions)

• A letter to your loss (with script/prompts)

• A dialogue with sadness (with prompts)

We will explore the complexities of culture, generational trauma, and spiritual beliefs through these composite cases, along with the specific interventions that helped them heal from their grief as well as their trauma – and will help you with similarly complex clients.

2 hours CE. Recorded video format (non-interactive)

ESTIMATED COURSE LENGTH: 2 hours 

CE CREDITS: 2.00 continuing education/contact hours for social workers, psychologists, counselors, and marriage and family therapists

TARGET AUDIENCE: Mental Health Practitioners

LEVEL OF INSTRUCTION: Intermediate

PREREQUISITE(S): None

INSTRUCTIONAL METHOD: Recorded video format (non-interactive)

ACCESSIBILITY ACCOMMODATIONS: Closed captioning of audio components. In order to request further accessibility accommodations, please email support@psychhub.com.

COMPLETION REQUIREMENTS: To obtain your CE certificate, learners must complete a pre-test (not scored), progress through all course segments, complete a participant evaluation, and obtain a score of 80% or higher on a post-test. Learners are expected to complete the quiz within 3 attempts. If unable to do so, the learner will need to re-review the course segments.

FINANCIAL/COMMERCIAL SUPPORT STATEMENT: This course has no commercial support.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST:  This course has no potential conflict of interest or outside commercial support. Psych Hub's conflict of interest statement is found in the footer of the training center.

GRIEVANCE AND REFUND POLICIES: Grievance and refund policies are found in the footer of the training center.

PARTICIPATION COSTS:  The cost to participate in this CE activity is included in the subscription registration fee.

COURSE CREATION DATE:  6/27/2023

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Identify complex bereavement and differentiate it from other diagnoses
• Explain how trauma and mental illness contribute to the development or exacerbation of complex bereavement
• Develop a customized, client-centered approach to treatment of complex bereavement that incorporates the uniqueness of each client’s history and experience
• Use each of the three tools to guide your clients through complex bereavement

1. Brief review of general elements of the grief and loss experience
   1. Emotional
   2. Physical
   3. Spiritual
   4. Existential
   5. Sociological
   6. Economic
   7. Collective
   8. Generational
2. Brief review of treatment objectives and assumptions
1. Safety/harm reduction
2. Improved health-oriented behaviors
3. Increased community/social involvement
4. Telling the story/completing the story
5. Creating a meaningful life
6. Deriving meaning from loss
3. Introduction to the Three Cases
1. Miss Tracy, a 37-year-old African-American woman and only child who lost her mother after a long fight with cancer
2. Rose, 52, a woman with pre-existing depression and the eldest of a large and stoic New England family, who felt responsible for her brother’s suicide death
3. Jose, a 28-year-old Latino man and sexual abuse survivor who lost his 16-year-old half-sibling to gang violence
4. “Simple” grief and other diagnoses
1. Simple grief
2. Depression
3. Trauma
4. PTSD
5. Brief review of factors contributing to complex bereavement
1. Suicide
2. Violent death
3. Untimely loss
4. "Out of order" death
5. Delayed grief
6. Unresolved early childhood trauma
7. Chronic sorrow
8. Addiction
9. Single loss (the straw that broke the camel's back)
10. Multiple losses
11. Disenfranchised loss
12. Ambiguous loss
13. Unhealthy attachment patterns
14. Medical illness
15. Poor coping skills
16. Major mental illness or chronic mood disturbance
17. Lack of support system/community
6. In-Depth Look at the Tools, and How to Use Them
1. Life and loss timeline (with illustrated examples and instructions)
1. Assessment and when to apply
2. Context
2. A letter to your loss (with script/prompts)
1. Opening the secrets/naming the wounds
2. Shifting the power
3. A dialogue with sadness (with prompts)
1. Repeat for each source of grief
2. Beginner/intermediate/advanced