Blog 12

It seems like this topic on death has been in my life a lot lately.  Most of you all know this but over the summer before I started the school counseling program, my mother passed away.  It was one of the hardest things to go through in my life.  It was unexpected and makes me question life.  Corey and Corey (2010) describe that people who have died can teach us a lesson on how to live life.  I can easily say that I have learned a lesson.  My mother died when she was 53.  She wasn’t that old and who knows that something like that can happen to me.  I have learned that I need to cherish everyday and what it has to offer.  I now take more time for my friends and my sister because they mean so much to me and I don’t want to lose them.  I know that death is inevitable but when someone dies early before their time, it is hard to completely ignore the life changes that come with death.  I have learned a lot from my mother’s death and I have grown tremendously.

            Another reason why I say that death is in my life lately is because I just finished my group facilitation project on grief for high school students.  I created eight sessions on what grief is and how to work through it.  One of the main things I talk about in my eight sessions is the stages of grief that it also outlined in the Corey and Corey (2010) textbook.  Personally, I think I am finally in the acceptance stage.  I say this because I am not depressed or angry anymore about my mother’s death.  At times I am sad about it but I know that my mother would want me to move on with my life.  Also in my sessions on grief, I provided the group with multiple coping mechanisms when it comes to death.  The items that I told my group on coping with death was similar to what was in the textbook with physical, psychological, social, and spiritual tasks (Corey & Corey, 2010).  I created the group on grief for my project because I know what it was like going through it as well as I know that a lot of schools don’t have a grief group.  This knowledge on grief will help me to use my group facilitation on future high school students.  It is also beneficial that I conduct the group because I can relate to what the students are going through.  It is important to reach students on this topic because they don’t necessary have the knowledge or ability to cope with death well.

Corey, G., & Corey, M.S. (2010). I never knew I had a choice: Explorations in personal growth. (9^th ed.). Belmont, California: Thompson Brooks/Cole.