April News at the Grief Centre
With Easter, Anzac Day and the school holidays all happening at this time of the year, we send our well-wishes to all the children, parents, grandparents and carers for good times of nourishment and connection. At the Grief Centre of Western Australia, the Team is busy with lots of activity and we're excited to share our latest news with you.
In this edition, we highlight the forthcoming Community Grief Gatherings, share the wonderful news about two recently approved grants, and we feature a new on-line, non-bereavement Support Group.
In addition to enjoying the newsletter, we also invite you to check-out and share our new-look website by clicking here. Your feedback is welcome, so please use the 'Contact Us' form if you'd like to share your thoughts with us.
We look forward to connecting with our community in the months ahead as we share our care and compassion for your grief and loss.
With gratitude and warmth, from the GCWA Team 🌸
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Community Grief Gatherings
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The Grief Centre extends a warm invitation to you, and your family and friends, to honour the grief you carry in your life by attending a Community Grief Gathering. These events are a new initiative of the Centre that are designed to hold a safe and nurturing space where we can acknowledge and attend to our grief together, rather than privately and on our own.
Grief Gatherings recognise that in traditional cultures around the world, grief and loss were always experienced as a communal activity. Coming together as a community, with the specific intent to honour grief, works to enable losses, and associated changes, to be held and integrated with greater ease and reverence. As Grief Specialist Francis Weller notes,
"Grief has never been a private affair.
It has always throughout our species' entire story been a communal process. We've always been held, we have always been seen. We have always been cared for during times of loss".
The Centre is delighted to have received a small grant from the City of Stirling to offer the following two Grief Gatherings in the next two months.
Sunday, 15 May - 2 - 4pm at Carine Open Space
Sunday, 12 June - 2 - 4pm at the Grief Centre in Tuart Hill
Community Grief Gatherings are free, simple, non-sectarian and inclusive. For more information and to RSVP, please click here, or be in touch with our Project Coordinator Erin Griffith, via email here.
If you are unable to attend, and wish to honour and support the Grief Centre to host future Grief Gatherings, please make your donation here : https://www.griefcentrewa.org.au/donate/
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Better Together - National Volunteer Week 2022
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As many in our community are aware, the Grief Centre was established in 2014 and has grown to be the specialist grief support service that we love today solely through the vision, generosity and commitment of volunteers. This year the Centre will recognise and celebrate our amazing volunteers by hosting a special 'Celebration Time' event with funding from a National Volunteer Week (NVW) grant.
NVW is Australia’s largest annual celebration of volunteering and is held on the 3rd week of May every year. The theme for 2022 is Better Together, and this absolutely represents the heart of our work at the Grief Centre, and our aim to build connection and community through the sharing and honouring of grief.
Our 'Celebration Time' event will be an audience participation screening of a loved musical at the Backlot Cinema with a sumptuous grazing table. Our volunteers have been invited BUT there will be room for some lucky members of our community to attend too. If you'd like to help us celebrate our wonderful volunteers - and are available to attend the event on May 21, 3 - 5.30pm - please register your interest here.
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'Walking with Grief' - Hiking Grant
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The Grief Centre is excited to announce funding support from the Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries to establish a therapeutic hiking program for people living with grief.
The "Walking with Grief" project is a unique approach to bereavement support that will work to integrate physical activity, forest trails, navigation, mindfulness practice, and supportive therapy with an intention to honour and celebrate the person who died, in a fundamentally active way.
The funding will bring together Outdoor Education professionals and Grief Centre Volunteers to co-design and run a series of half-day hikes and two-hour walks for our community. The long-term aim of the project is to have hiking an on-going offering of the Grief Centre and part of our suite of specialist grief support services.
We look forward to sharing more information about the 'Walking with Grief' project in our next email along with dates for the hikes and walks. In the meantime, if you are keen to be involved in the design and training aspects of the project please be in touch with us here.
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Our Grief Support Services
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FEATURED SUPPORT GROUP - Our General Grief Support Group is for people who are experiencing grief from a loss other than the death of a beloved friend or family member. This can include the loss of a pet, a home, a job, finances or perhaps even the loss of hope for the future. Grief is whatever makes your heart ache - and we warmly welcome you to acknowledge and attend to this heartache in this group.
The group will run on Wednesday evenings at 6:30pm, starting next week on Wednesday 27th April.
If you wish to join the group please send a brief email to Brenda here. Log-in details will be sent after your RSVP.
There is no fee and no expectation around on-going attendance. Some people may join each week for a while, some might attend now and again, it's up to you and what you need - but please be punctual so the session can flow with ease.
If you wish to attend, and honour the support of the Grief Centre with a donation, you can click here.
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