Sudbury's Samaritan Centre to offer clients help with grief

The executive director of the Samaritan Centre in Sudbury will soon be trained to help clients manage their grief.

The Samaritan Centre in downtown Sudbury provides services to vulnerable people, including many who are experiencing homelessness.

The centre received $4,500 from the Sudbury Community Foundation. Lisa Long, the executive director of the Samaritan Centre, said she will take a program called the grief recovery method.

"It's evidence based that helps people in their grief," Long said.

"We think about grief as something that we need to have closure. But really, it's not about closure. Closure suggests a closed door, that's it, it's over, it's done. Really, it's a matter of completion. We need to go through grief as an idea of something we complete rather than closure, period. Completion, semi-colon."

Long said she's noticed a change in her clients in recent years, especially since the pandemic started.

"A profound transformation in what and how people are grieving," she said.

"Grief is a normal, natural response to loss of any kind. It could be death, but loss of any kind, so loss of loved ones, loss of community, loss of housing, loss of sense of self, loss of identity."

She said currently, she works to support her clients as best she can.

"But any tool we can add to our toolbelt, it helps us better care for our clients," she said.

"By helping our clients manage their grief, we're going to empower them to stay in the present moment."

Long said she hopes to get more staff members trained in the future. In the meantime, she said once she's trained, she's willing to offer help to her own staff members and staff at other agencies who work with her clients.

"The suicides, the overdoses," she said.

"In our community, we've faced as staff and as vulnerable folks, we've faced a lot of trauma."

According to the Canadian Mental Health Association, grief and loss is "one of life's most stressful events."

"Grief is complicated," the association stated on its website.

"There is no one way to experience grief. Feelings, thoughts, reactions, and challenges related to grief are very personal."

The association said while many can get support from loved ones, sometimes extra help is needed.

"A person's experience of mental illness, lack of personal and social supports, and difficult personal relationships can also affect the impact of grief," the association said.

"A type of counselling called grief counselling supports people through difficulties around grief."