Pride: A Time for Celebration and Advocacy

As many communities across Canada prepare to celebrate Pride month the feeling of hope and resilience is palpable. Pride is a time to lift up our voices and to experience the joy of being together and acknowledging the journey toward wholeness and authenticity. It can also be a time for advocacy and indeed protest as we continue to proclaim and protect the rights of 2SLGBTQ+ people worldwide.

Inclusion in Hospice Palliative Care

Hospice Palliative Care also seeks to include all people in the effort to support individuals and families at end of life, and through bereavement. Historically many organizations have not included 2SLGBTQ persons in the circle of care, either through a misunderstanding of our needs or simply by not recognizing how to offer a welcoming and inclusive environment.

Understanding Grief in 2SLGBTQ+ Lives

Grief is the natural response to love and loss that we will all experience, each in our own manner throughout the lifetime. For a gay or transgendered person, the journey to self acceptance is often a tumultuous one. Although we now might take for granted the protection offered through the human rights act in Canada for 2SLGBTQ+ people, as recently as the 1990’s gay civil servants could be terminated if their sexual orientation was discovered. In 2017 a historic apology from the federal government was offered to those individuals whose lives and careers were destroyed as a result of laws and policies that were discriminatory and unjust.

The Emotional Toll of Marginalization

Norman Cousins who wrote extensively about the challenges of living with a life-limiting diagnosis once said, “Death is not the greatest loss in life; the greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.”

Many 2SLGBTQ+ persons have experienced the pain of being different from a young age. Bullying, violence and isolation may have led us to believe that we were somehow flawed. As Alan Downs explores in his book, “The Velvet Rage” the tendency to hide our true selves is very strong. We may have learned to mask our true feelings and self, developing a public persona that we thought was acceptable to the outside world.

Barriers to Grief Expression

Early life experiences of isolation, trauma and fear that are common in the lives of many 2SLGBTQ+ individuals may lead to later challenges in the expression of grief when a loved one dies.

Grief is a unique experience for everyone and there is no right or wrong way to express our loss. Our North American culture may treat grief like an illness to be cured, or a problem that needs to be solved, packed up, and put away.

For queer persons there may often be a lack of support or an estrangement from family who are not accepting or understanding of their son, daughter or sibling. There might also be an inability to acknowledge the painful aspects of the loss due to the “masking” tendency developed as a survival strategy throughout life.

Creating Inclusive Grief Support

Healing through grief includes acceptance of ourselves as we are, and our unique expressions of emotions and struggle. While this may be more difficult for 2SLGBTQ+ persons, I believe that it is possible to find a way through. Educating and empowering organizations to support us in our experience of loss is a path forward. Too often well-meaning hospice and other community-based agencies have not fostered a culture of inclusiveness and belonging.

Service organizations can take meaningful steps to relieve unintentional barriers to care by:

• Honouring pronouns and fostering belonging through inclusive language.
• Adapting intake forms to reflect chosen names and preferred address.
• Displaying Pride flags and 2SLGBTQ+ symbols in visible spaces.
• Embedding inclusion in mission statements and values along with a non-discrimination policy.
• Offering queer-friendly services such as individual support and 2SLGBTQ+ grief circles.
• Training staff in community-specific needs and cultural competency.

A Path Forward

By prioritizing inclusivity, everyone – regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity – will know that they are welcomed and accepted and have found a place to honour their unique expression of grief. And, to receive support that may be an essential part of the healing journey.

Self acceptance, safety, and the positive regard of others in our life are essential ingredients for resilience and healing.

Originally posted 2025-06-27 13:22:59.

The post Grief and bereavement in the 2SLGBTQ+ community: exploring challenges and resilience first appeared on Geoff Straw - Counselling.

Today we gather as a community of mourners, each of us drawn here by a common thread as we seek to remember and honor the life of a person who is special to us.  We are each grieving a loss, we remember how life used to be and we are trying to re build our lives as best as we can.  Some days it’s a challenge, seeking to grieve and to care for ourselves wanting to find healing in the pain of loss.

My own mother died one year ago today and I am grateful for her life and for what she taught me – the importance of community, to always be kind, and to believe in myself.  But I also struggle with her absence – and at times feel lost as I try to adjust to “the new normal” without her.  As you know, when someone you love dies, you can’t go backwards and change the things that you might have wished went differently.  Life as we know it, will never be quite the same again. We ask many questions – why did this happen?  Could we have done more? Been more forgiving, compassionate, aware? And so we move through our grief without necessarily having any answers  – sometimes clumsy, tentative, unsure and sometimes in spite of ourselves.

Someone once described grief as a “journey through the wilderness” meaning that we don’t have a map as we’ve never travelled this way before.  We may feel scared, angry and alone.  Yes, we will have experienced other losses and griefs, but this one is unique because our relationship with our loved one was unique and special.  Our life is changed and we can’t go back – we must move forward, one day at a time.  And so one thing that helps me on this grief journey –  is to try and remain in the present as much as I can – if I think too far ahead I feel anxious.  Each day we take another step forward, maybe some days reluctantly even when we don’t want to, but life for us and those around us, does go on.

Each of us here today will have a different experience – “your grief is as unique as your thumbprint.”  There is no one right way to grieve, to love, to live.  But even though we are different – we are also united by our grief.  I know that others can understand to a degree – what I am feeling because they are too, in their  own way.  Coming together today. –  to share stories, view the pictures of our loved ones, to cry, to laugh, to heal – is important because it helps us.  And so we honour our grieving, our loving and our healing.  This is a sacred path and one that will transform us in ways that are unexpected, perhaps uncomfortable at times and also amazing.  So as we release the beautiful butterflies, symbols of new life and of freedom, may we each receive the gift of hope and transformation.

Originally posted 2023-06-19 12:22:00.

The post Grieving the death of a parent first appeared on Geoff Straw - Counselling.

Common misperceptions:

• You should move away from grief, not toward it
• The goal is to get over your grief
• Nobody can help you with your grief
• It takes about a year to get over a significant loss
• It’s better not to think or talk about the pain
• Grief has an end point

Truisms about Grief:

• Grief has no timetable
• The goal is to grieve well, not right
• Grief is not a linear process
• Others can help you, support is crucial
• Grief changes over time

As Lao Tzu said many centuries ago, “New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings.”

Originally posted 2023-03-13 12:20:34.

The post Growing through Grief first appeared on Geoff Straw - Counselling.

Much of the time, though he seemed to be processing a lot on the inside, invisible to us his family and friends who could only offer our presence  and wait as the illness progressed.  As a palliative care counsellor, I was aware of the healing potential at end-of-life; not only for the patient but also for family and friends who witnessed the final transition from life to death.  And so, the time I spent by my father’s bedside – feeding him, reading to him, massaging his legs and feet, or just holding his hand – all seemed to be an invitation to a greater intimacy and connection between us.  I knew that time together was short, and wanted to spend as much with him as possible.

And now it seemed as though time had run out.  Would I get there in time to join the family in this our final journey with him, I wondered?  As I drove from the airport to where he was that night, I noticed the biggest and brightest full moon that I had ever seen.  It hung very low in the night sky and seemed to be lighting the way back, the way home.  I arrived to find some of the family at his side, my father appeared to be mostly unconscious but comfortable.  The morphine that was being given may hasten his death, we were told.  I decided to spend the night with him in his room while the others went home to get some sleep.  What could I say or do, I wondered to help him?  I decided to pray, and read a few passages from his mother’s old bible which I found near his bed.  Did he even know that I was there, reading to him, could he hear me?  I had no way of knowing and felt helpless as I watched and waited for some change.

It had been a long illness for him and for us.  The most difficult part I think, were the gradual losses that came with the decline in ability.  The loss of clear speech, the ability to write, the privilege of driving his car, and most of all his self confidence and strength.  Surrendering to these losses and to the ultimate loss of his physical presence was both emotional and frightening.  But none of us wished for his life to continue in this form and we knew that he didn’t want to go on either.

By morning there had been no visible change and so I went home to rest as other family members kept vigil in the room.  By the time I returned it was almost time for supper and someone suggested that we bring in some take out food and eat it down the hall in the family dining room.  And so that’s what we did, leaving his room to eat, all but my sister who felt that she wanted to stay near him.  As I left his room, glancing back at he and my sister, I knew clearly that his death was imminent.  Nonetheless, I left anyway, sensing that things were unfolding as they should.  Years earlier I had learned that it was sometimes the moment when the crowd gathered round the bed left to eat or grab a coffee that the patient could let go of all things earth bound and make the final transition.  It was no surprise then, when moments later, the nurse called us to return at once to his room.  At that moment as we began to walk back down the long corridor to his room  I heard the words and music of the battle hymn of the republic.  The music therapist was leading the residents in a hymn sing, “His truth is marching on…” rang out loud and clear as we returned to his room.

I believe that my father’s death impacted us all profoundly and touched us each in a unique way – not only on that cold winter day in March, but on all the days and months to come.  Someone once said that grief is as much about finding as it is about losing.  Certainly we could all agree on the many ways that we felt the sting of loss.  We missed his physical presence immensely.   That Christmas eve, the first without Dad, I thought I was doing OK until I began to carve the traditional roast beef, a job that always been his.  Suddenly I was overcome by a wave of sadness that he wasn’t with us as he should have been.  And there would be many more times in the journey of grief when that same wave would come crashing down upon me in ways that were both uncomfortable and cathartic at the same time.

The “finding” part of grief was present too – if I looked for it.  At times that was difficult, but when I asked Dad for guidance and for his presence, I was often surprised by the results.  After his death, the night nurse shared with us her last conversation with him,

just before he slipped into unconsciousness.  Again, the request for his words of wisdom, as she made her nightly rounds.  His reply this time was just one word – the last that he likely spoke to anyone: happiness.  It seemed that perhaps he wanted to leave us with one final truth, one last charge – to find happiness.  Or, was he telling her that he had in fact found happiness at the end, and was finally in a place of peace.  A few weeks later, my sister-in-law gave me a small charm on a necklace as a gift in the shape of a Chinese character.  I had no idea of its significance until I was chatting with a neighbor of my parents while wearing it.  “What is that you have around your neck?” she asked.  I replied that it had been a gift.  She took a closer look and declared, “Oh! It means happiness!”  I was astonished.  There was his word again – happiness, and now I was wearing it around my neck! Ever since, I have been left with a quest of sorts, to learn the meaning of happiness in my life.

Originally posted 2022-11-27 12:18:24.

The post Living through Loss first appeared on Geoff Straw - Counselling.