Grief is a complicated and often untouched issue, even in the therapy room. Ambiguous grief, is a specific, more complicated form of grief, when the grievers don’t recognize that a loss happened or aren’t sure if they are “allowed” to grieve. This presentation will touch on ways to help clients explore grief that may not be named as such.  Supported by current theories on grief, the presenter will offer methods of validating, contemplating, and handling ambiguous grief with adults and families that will help strengthen a clients ability to hold “nameless” loss.

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Workshop Objectives:

1. Participants will be able to conceptualize ambiguous grief.

2. Participants will be able to recognize appropriate interventions for ambiguous grief

3. Participants will be able to use culturally appropriate language when working with ambiguous grief

About the Presenter:

Shirley holds a Masters of Arts degree in Marriage and Family Therapy (MFT) from Northcentral University, with a specialty in Medical Family Therapy. She also holds a certification in Thanatology (CT®) from the Association for Death Education and Counseling. Lastly, she is a Master Practitioner of Neuro-Linguistic Therapy (NLP). 

Shirley believes that even if things are not okay, we can be, which is also her definition of incurable optimism. She believes that we can all be best version of ourselves, under our circumstance. Shirley is an AMFT under supervision and direction of Jennifer Vann, LMFT and Kara McDaniel, LMFT.  She is a MFT PhD candidate specializing in supervision.  

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Continuing Education:
This workshop is approved  for 2 Core hours by GAMFT.  Related hours for Allied Professions. #150-2023

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