February PCSBV Newsletter 2023

How Art Therapy is Helping with Grief

Art Therapy had been part of the client care program with the Palliative Care Society of the Bow Valley since 2021. If you are not familiar with art therapy, Kristin Slagorsky, a PCSBV Art Therapy program facilitator and practicum student, explains it as this, “Art Therapy is the exploration and use of an experiential creative process to help integrate mind, body, heart, and spirit. It is a form of self-expression that communicates through the language of colour, shape, symbol, metaphor, and instinct.” Kristin has noticed that often, people have trouble viewing themselves as creative. "One of the main principles of art therapy is that we are all born creative, and that tapping into our creativity promotes wellness and connection. From this perspective, creativity is one of the hallmarks of our species, a birthright that can be reclaimed.” Kristin, along with Bill Harder, our Palliative and Grief Support Navigator, have been facilitating a Grief Support Art Therapy Group since January. It is a small group of 10 people who meet weekly for four weeks to use art therapy to process feelings of grief and loss. One of our client care volunteers, Lee Rinne, is both a volunteer with a client and a participant in the sessions. Once she joined the class, she was not sure what to expect. After attending the first session, she said she already found comfort, and connection with the group. The group was given paper, coloured pens, and an opportunity to freely draw whatever came to mind when they reflected on their feelings of loss and grief. Each person had the chance to share their drawing with other participants in the group. Each class has a different creative theme, but this was the first one.

“My father died during Covid,” Lee says, “He lived in another province, and we were not able to be with him in his last days. At the time, we could not gather for a celebration of life. I feel incomplete. Without closure, I feel a big hole inside me. It was traumatic and I need to reconcile with his loneliness and dying alone and my feelings about it.” Lee says the group is a safe space for her where she is openly sharing and getting present to the grief in the room. “There’s common ground. I had the chance to share my experience, and I felt like there was a pressure valve that was being opened and so pressure was relieved. I felt like closure was possible, given the generous listening in the room.” Grief is very personal. Each of us needs to find our own way to reconcile feelings and even find a sense of closure. Having a means to be able to do that with a group of supportive individuals can help with processing and healing. Lee says, I am learning to colour outside the lines in terms of my grief. With the different art mediums, I am learning to share and move through it in a new way, which is allowing me to better express my grief.” The next Art Therapy program is Art-therapy based grief support group for teenagers grieving a death or loss. It is a 4-week program on March 2, 9, 16, 30. For more information on the programs, please contact the Palliative Care Society of the Bow Valley via phone at 403 - 707 - 7111 or email at info@pcsbv.ca.

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