IN-HOUSE The Missing Stage of Grief: Clinical Strategies to Overcome Anxiety in the Wake of Loss

Credits

Speaker

Claire Bidwell Smith, LCPC Related seminars and products

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Claire Bidwell Smith, LCPC, worked as a therapist specializing in grief for over a decade and is the critically acclaimed author of three books of nonfiction: The Rules of Inheritance (Penguin 2012), After This: When Life is Over Where Do We Go? (Penguin, 2015) and Anxiety: The Missing Stage of Grief (Da Capo, 2018). 

The Rules of Inheritance is a coming-of-age memoir of a young woman forging ahead on a journey of loss that humbled, strengthened, and ultimately healed her. It has been published in 18 countries and is currently being adapted for film. Claire’s work has been celebrated by mental health advocates like Maria Shriver and New York Times Bestselling Author Cheryl Strayed.

Claire has written for various publications including The New York Times, The Huffington Post, Salon.com, Slate, Chicago Public Radio, The Guardian, Psychology Today and Yoga Journal.

Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Claire Bidwell Smith maintains a private practice and has an employment relationship with Conscious Grieving Inc. She receives royalties as a published author. Claire Bidwell Smith receives a speaking honorarium and recording royalties from PESI, Inc. She has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.
Non-financial: Claire Bidwell Smith is a board member of The End Well Foundation.

 

Objectives

1. Explore the connection between grief and anxiety and the implications for grief treatment.
2. Establish how clinicians can better recognize grieving clients who mask their anxiety.
3. Specify how mindfulness and meditation techniques can restore a sense of calm and interrupt pervasive anxious thoughts.
4. Characterize how techniques that help clients make amends with lost loved ones can help them overcome guilt driven anxiety.
5. Specify how personal narratives and grief recovery letters can be utilized in the treatment of grief and anxiety.
6. Communicate how clinicians can prepare themselves to work with anxiety in a variety of grieving client populations.

Outline

• The link between grief and anxiety
• Anxiety, loss and life’s unpredictability
• Polyvagal Theory – how our bodies react to fear and sadness
• Panic attacks, hypochondria and social anxiety following loss
• Why anxiety surrounding death is unexpected
• Complicated grief

• Where the traditional 5-stage model fails
• How to measure intensity and duration
• Identify grief and anxiety triggers
• Recognize clients who mask anxiety symptoms

• Awareness techniques – identify where fear starts in the body
• Mindful breathing to restore a sense of calm and peace
• Simple mantras to rewire anxiety and grief
• Exercises that free clients from pervasive thoughts
• Reduce anxiety with present moment immersion

• Strategies to normalize anxiety and panic attacks
• CBT techniques for reducing anxious rumination
• Exercises to break fearful thought-spirals
• Make amends to overcome guilt driven anxiety
• Replace fear with anchor thoughts

• Personal narratives to overcome anxiety and grief
• Grief recovery letters
• Exercises to overcome the fear of losing more
• Maintain connection – death is not the end of love

• Sudden deaths, violent deaths, and chronic illnesses
• Loss of partner or child
• Children’s grief strategies
• Research limitations and treatment risks

Target Audience

• Counselors
• Social Workers
• Psychologists
• Marriage & Family Therapists
• Case Managers
• Nurses
• Chaplains/Clergy
• Addiction Counselors
• Physicians
• Nursing Home Administrators
• Other Mental Health Professionals

Location

Please note this program will be in the city/state specified but an exact venue location has not been determined yet.

Napa, California, United States