St. Croix Hospice: National Bereavement Month!

Hi, everyone, it's Alyssa with St. Cray Hospice. I am welcoming you to our livestream today. So we just wanted to kind of take today to really kind of focus on something that's kind of deeply important. August is National Bereavement Month, so I really want us to kind of focus on some of those things for the month of August. Right. This month is dedicated to acknowledging and supporting those who are grieving. And today we want to explore how we can offer support and find solace during these challenging times.

So first, let's kind of talk about what National Bereavement Month is. It's observed every August, every year, and its purpose is to raise awareness and kind of acknowledge that grieving process. So it also helps offer support to those who have lost their loved ones. Also promote resources that can help individuals and families cope with their loss. So this year, National Bereavement Day actually falls on August 30, and we'll have one of our other team members actually join us on the 30 August. It's a Friday, and they're going to kind of dive more into kind of that topic during her live stream.

But first, I just kind of want to dive more into. Hello. I just wanted to kind of dive into kind of understanding grief. Right? Like, what is grief? Grief is a deeply personal and unique experience. Right? There's no right or wrong way to grieve, which I kind of talked in my last live video about. But everyone's journey is very unique. It's very different. Some common emotions that people might experience include sadness, anger, guilt, and even relief. Right. So it's really important to understand that all of these things, all these feelings, all these emotions that we're going through are valid and they're appropriate when we're grieving.

So now we kind of want to kind of fall under, you know, how do we support someone who's grieving? You know, that's what August is about, right? National Bereavement Month. How can we support those individuals? Supporting someone who is grieving can be very challenging, but I'm going to kind of give you a few ways that you can offer that support to other individuals. First, we really want to listen without judgment. Right. Sometimes the best things that you can do is just to sit back, listen, be compassionate, and just sit back and absorb all of those feelings and emotions that someone's sharing with you.

Let them express those feelings, let them kind of share with you how they're feeling emotionally, physically, mentally, and try to offer unsolicited advice when you're listening to them it's really important to kind of focus on that piece of it. A second thing that you could do is just offer practical help. Simple acts like preparing meals, running errands, helping, you know, household chores, you know, maybe mowing the lawn for the neighbor. All of those things can be incredibly helpful. So it's really important to kind of just offer some sort of practical help that is going to go a long way.

And thirdly, let's just be patient, right? Grieving doesn't have a set timeline. It's important to be patient and offer that ongoing support. So kind of sitting back and just support those individuals who are truly grieving. And that's why we really just want to promote all of that. Another thing is just to make sure that we are providing self care or offering forms of self care for those who are grieving. And that is where we want to focus on how crucial self care is. And so a few of those tips can kind of include for yourself or for others, you know, allowing yourself to feel, allowing others to feel.

Providing a safe space where we can give ourselves permission to kind of experience those emotions fully. It's okay to cry, it's okay to break down, be angry and upset moments. We might feel numb, right? So allowing ourselves to feel those things and those emotions can really help. Another thing that we can do is seeking professional help, therapy or counseling. It's another safe space to process those feelings. It helps us develop coping strategies. One thing with St. Croix Hospice that I am like obsessed with and I can't talk more about is that we have a lot of our bereavement coordinators who will sit and listen and talk with you if you're grieving.

They're ones who will share their personal experiences, their coping strategies, different skills and techniques. So definitely seeking some of that professional help. It's important to kind of just sit back and absorb and share. But having that safe space, making sure that we're connecting with others, right. Reaching out to our friends, our families, maybe joining support groups, they can be virtually, like at our company, at St. Cray Hospice, we offer them both virtually and in person. We offer monthly, we do series, different things.

We come up with different activities to do during some of those support groups. So it's definitely another way when we're connecting with those others that we can experience that lighten of that burden. We're kind of releasing that energy there and then just finding all of the different resources that are available. There's so many different resources that are out there, you know, for individuals who are grieving they're not always ones to want to just jump in and do a Google search of what resources are out there while I'm grieving, right?

We like to have them readily at hand. So organizations just like us here at St. Croix Hospice, we offer counseling, support groups, a bunch of other helpful resources. So don't hesitate to reach out to some of those organizations that might be near and dear to your heart. Maybe there's some other organizations that are out there that you're unfamiliar with. So it's really important to just kind of not hesitate, but just jump into some of those resources when you're needing that support, because they're all willing to sit back, listen, and help you navigate those feelings and emotions.

Or even if there's someone else that you know who's grieving, it's a great time to kind of talk about it, allow them that safe space and provide them with those different resources and support options that are out there. So I just really wanted to kind of dive into, you know, some of those things as we're kind of heading into August, which is national bereavement month. So I really just wanted to thank you all for joining us today. And just remember, grieving is a personal journey and there's no right way to do it.

There's no wrong way. Make sure that we're offering support and understanding it can definitely make a big difference in someone's life. If you have any questions or need any additional resources, please feel free to kind of drop in in those comments and reach out to us directly. You know, we're happy. You can always contact us at think Gray Hospice. Our bereavement team is always willing to go above and beyond to help anybody who's grieving. So we're here to support you. So, yeah, that's what I wanted to share today.

I hope you all have a fantastic rest of your week. Now that we're going into the weekend, I hope you all take care and we'll see you next time. Bye.