Grief and Trauma:
Working with sudden, unexpected loss
JUNE: Thur 26 & Fri 27 and JULY: Thur 3 & Fri 4 2025
This existentially-informed workshop may be taken as stand-alone CPD or as part of an accreditation pathway*
Certain types of loss – violent, sudden, preventable, untimely, multiple – are more likely to be experienced as traumatic, leaving an individual feeling overwhelmed emotionally, cognitively and physically. Yet the experience of trauma in these cases is not always a given. It is equally true that all losses have the capacity to overwhelm, shock and shatter. Indeed, it has been suggested that each grief experience contains trauma and each traumatic experience contains grief.
Drawing on existential frames of reference, this workshop will engage you with a unique blend of grief and trauma theory, experiential learning and opportunities to explore effective and embodied ways of working with clients living with grief and trauma.
Across the 2 days you will be invited to consider:
- How our individual experience of life events can become traumatic
- Attachment styles and their influence on grief and trauma
- Avoiding the perpetuation of trauma while working with grief experiences
- Post-traumatic growth as both a concept and experience
- The importance of relationship and ‘being with’ in grief and trauma therapy
You will leave this 2-day workshop with:
- A deeper understanding of the relationship between grief, trauma and existential crisis
- Safe and effective existential approaches for working with sudden and/or unexpected change, loss and death
- An enhanced capacity to support and manage an authentic therapeutic relationship with clients experiencing grief and trauma
- Practical ways to assist clients with the integration of traumatic loss experiences
Facilitator: Dr Greg Roberts PhD, BSW (Hons), MAASW
Greg Roberts introduces this workshop as part of an existentially-informed series that is designed for practitioners wanting to develop their skills in the field of grief, loss and bereavement. The series is designed for both practitioners who are new to this field of practice and those that are experienced and wanting to add to their professional development in specific areas of grief, loss and bereavement. Other workshops in the Grief, Loss & Bereavement series include:
- Stepping into the Heart of Grief and Loss – Working Beyond Models (introductory workshop)
- Working with Complex, Prolonged Grief – Addressing Crisis of Meaning and Existential Angst
- Grief Across The Life Span – Children, Adolescents, Adults and Older Age – mid 2025
- Anticipatory and Non-Finite Grief – Supporting Clients through Terminal/Chronic Illness, Injury and Disability
- Grief and the Body
*Accreditation Pathways
Completing the five 2-day Grief and Loss workshop series – which encompasses face-to-face workshop hours, readings and successful completion of two assessments – fulfills the grief and loss training component required for certification with:
Grief Australia – formerly Australian Centre for Grief & Bereavement (Australian certification)*
See full information on Grief Australia certification here
Association for Death Education and Counselling (International certification)*
See full information on ADEC certification here
*notes: Meeting the training criteria for ADEC entitles you to sit their certification exam. Certification is fee-based for both ACGB and ADEC
Greg Roberts PhD, BSW (Hons), MAASW
Greg is a Doctor of Philosophy (Grief and Bereavement) and an accredited Counsellor and Social Worker with specialisation in the field of grief, bereavement and trauma. He founded a suicide bereavement support group in 2004 and co-founded the Suicide Prevention Awareness Network (SPAN) in Victoria. Greg is the Manager of Client Care Volunteers for Peninsula Home Hospice and the Founder and Director of the Grief & Trauma Support service in Frankston, Victoria.
Dates: JUNE: Thur 26 & Fri 27 JULY: Thur 3 & Fri 4 2025
Time: 9.30am – 12.45pm
Location: online via zoom
Cost: $480 (flat rate)
CPD Hours: 12
If you think you may like to participate, submit your expression of interest. We will email you once registrations open in March 2025 and in advance of general promotion of the event
