Good Grief Guidance
We may have grief from divorce, death, illness,
depression or other situations. To live is to be vulnerable.
We suff er and rejoice. In changing our relationship with
grief, we begin to live the love and beauty of who we
are. Good Grief Guidance understands to befriend our
sorrows and release outgrown stories of ourselves, we
can transform our pains and losses into healing. We
become empowered to move from a place of surviving
to thriving, within ourselves, how we relate to others,
and how we engage in a larger community. In a peer-
support setting, healing is facilitated by creating a safe
place of connection to affi rm the value of each individual,
recognizing each person as whole, unbroken, without
need for saving. In each grief group, whether in schools,
prisons, or the community, people tend to their grief by
tending to one another. Each person is seen, heard and
held through the witnessing of our respective wounds
in community. Through this collective act of love, they
may listen to and trust in the grief needing to be voiced,
embraced and healed within themselves.
Good Grief Guidance, Inc. is a local non-profi t founded
by Darlene Gertsch 10 years ago. It’s a movement for
emotional well-being in the Central Oregon Community, made possible through off erings of grief groups,
weekly drop-in gatherings, and workshops, available to teens and adults.
28 || BEND HEALTH GUIDE || WINTER 2017