Duration: 10 Weeks
Schedule: 3 hours per week
Audience: Counsellors, psychotherapists, social workers, coaches, support workers, pastoral carers, health professionals.

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Week 1 — Introduction to Non-Death Loss & Emerging Grief Frameworks

Learning Outcomes

• Understand grief as broader than bereavement

• Recognize types of non-death loss (identity, relationships, health, dreams, safety, roles, culture, etc.)

• Differentiate non-death grief, ambiguous loss, and anticipatory grief

Lecture Topics

• What counts as loss beyond death

• Emerging grief theories and contemporary models

• Why non-death loss is often overlooked

• Language, misconceptions, and stigma around “illegitimate grief”

Practice

• Group reflection: “Losses I’ve never named.”

• Grief vocabulary expansion exercise

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Week 2 — The Psychology of Anticipatory Grief

Learning Outcomes

• Understand anticipatory grief as emotional preparation for change

• Identify psychological, relational, and physiological features

• Recognize anticipatory grief in both clients and families

Lecture Topics

• Anticipatory vs. conventional grief

• Emotional phases: fear, disbelief, dread, sorrow, hypervigilance

• Caregiver burden & role reversal

• Emotional forecasting and imagined futures

Practice

• Guided reflection: mapping anticipatory grief triggers

• Paired discussion: “Living with the fear of loss”

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Week 3 — Ambiguous Loss: When Closure Is Impossible

Learning Outcomes

• Understand ambiguous loss (non-clinical exploration)

• Identify two types: physical absence/emotional presence & vice versa

• Learn stabilisation and coping strategies

Lecture Topics

• What makes ambiguous loss unique

• The paralysis of “frozen grief”

• Emotional ambivalence, uncertainty, and identity confusion

• Working with chronic uncertainty

Practice

• Ambiguous loss genogram activity

• “Naming the unknowns” exercise

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Week 4 — Grief from Identity Loss, Life Transitions & Unlived Futures

Learning Outcomes

• Understand identity-based grief (loss of roles, abilities, dreams)

• Support clients grieving changes in life direction

• Explore grief connected to “the life I thought I would have”

Lecture Topics

• Identity grief after illness, trauma, separation, or major change

• Loss of career paths, physical abilities, or personal identity

• Regret, self-blame & loss of imagined futures

• Reconstructing self-narratives

Practice

• “Possible selves” exercise

• Personal identity mapping

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Week 5 — Relationship Loss Without Death

Learning Outcomes

• Explore grief after divorce, estrangement, separation & break-ups

• Understand relational endings as significant grief events

• Navigate complicated emotions: betrayal, anger, confusion, abandonment

Lecture Topics

• Relationship grief cycles

• Grief after sudden relational rupture vs slow relational fading

• Co-dependency wounds, attachment trauma & grief

• Closure myths

Practice

• Roleplay: validating relational grief

• Relationship loss timeline activity

Formative Assessment

• Short essay 1,000 Words: “Why ambiguous loss is harder to grieve.”

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Week 6 — Chronic Illness, Cognitive Decline & Loss of Health

Learning Outcomes

• Understand grief caused by chronic illness (self or loved one)

• Identify anticipatory grief in degenerative or long-term conditions

• Support clients through identity shifts and lifestyle changes

Lecture Topics

• Loss of autonomy, ability & bodily trust

• Role reversal in caregiving

• Anticipatory grief in dementia and cognitive decline

• Hope, acceptance & adaptation

Practice

• Health-identity mapping

• Supporting clients in “dual awareness” (hope vs. reality)

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Week 7 — Societal, Cultural & Collective Grief

Learning Outcomes

• Explore grief caused by displacement, migration, environmental loss & societal change

• Understand how culture shapes mourning expression

• Work sensitively with diverse grief traditions

Lecture Topics

• Cultural loss & diaspora grief

• Loss of belonging, home, community, language

• Climate grief & ecological anxiety

• Collective grief in communities after large-scale events

Practice

• Cultural lens reflection

• Group mapping of cultural grieving narratives

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Week 8 — Therapeutic Approaches to Non-Death & Anticipatory Grief

Learning Outcomes

• Use integrative therapeutic methods for grief processing

• Differentiate which interventions fit which grief type

• Support meaning-making, expression & emotional regulation

Lecture Topics

• Narrative therapy for grief

• Cognitive & compassion-focused approaches

• Somatic awareness in grief

• Ritual & symbolic loss processing

• Boundaries and pacing emotional work

Practice

• Grief narrative rewriting

• Somatic grounding & emotional stabilisation

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Week 9 — Working with Complicated Emotional Responses

Learning Outcomes

• Understand complex emotions connected to non-death loss

• Support clients experiencing guilt, anger, relief, resentment, or ambivalence

• Work through stuck grief states safely

Lecture Topics

• Mixed-emotion grief

• Why clients feel guilt or relief

• Secondary losses & disenfranchised grief

• Compassion fatigue in long-term caregiving relationships

Practice

• Emotion-mapping for grief ambivalence

• Therapist role-play: normalising complex emotional states

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Week 10 — Ethics, Boundaries & Practitioner Wellbeing

Learning Outcomes

• Develop ethical competence when working with grief

• Recognize limits of practice & safeguarding responsibilities

• Protect against burnout and empathic strain

Lecture Topics

• Maintaining scope & boundaries in grief work

• Confidentiality considerations

• Impact of vicarious grief on the therapist

• Self-care, resilience & supervision

• Course integration & future pathways

Practice

• Building a personal wellbeing & supervision plan

• Final reflective circle

Final Assessment

• 3,500 Word Summative Assignment​