Collective/Community Grief

Donna – “Grief in conversation”

Donna discusses language and talking about grief.

Jacqueline – How to help a grieving friend

Jacqueline discusses the power of just being there with someone in grief

Nicole – Advice for Other Professionals Managing Grief

Nicole discusses dealing with repeated loss while working in community outreach, not being afraid to be human.

Nicole – Stigma Surrounding Drug Use

Nicole discusses how the stigma around drug use has an impact on how people feel able to grieve when those in their community are lost.

Grief, Breastfeeding, and Care

In this essay, I share a bit about my story of grief and breastfeeding. I also share some thoughts about the cultural grief some people are carrying about the lack of support afforded to lactating families whose goal it is to feed their baby from their body. I use some gendered language throughout this essay…

Nicole – Pandemic Leads to Increase in Drug Poisoning

Nicole discusses the increase in drug poisonings during the pandemic due to a number of factors.

Jewish Perspectives on Grieving

What is Jewish Grieving? All humans can, and should, grieve over loss of life during a conflict. No matter the beginning or the end, all violence ends with grief. Someone’s grandparent, parent, sibling or child will die. That cycle of violence must cease.

Kristal – Professional Experience and Work

Kristal discusses being a peer support woker, working on a one on one level with community members to help them with their goals related to substance abuse. She supports those in the community dealing with loss and grief. She speaks to everyone’s experience with loss and grief being very individual.

Thoughts on International Overdose Awareness Day 2023

We lead multifaceted lives, and the deaths of those we love who have died by drug poisoning contain multitudes. The death of a loved one can bring intense grief, shock, anger, shame, or guilt. People who use drugs, and those who love them that they leave behind, face stigma in North America’s dominant, settler culture.

Michele – Normalizing conversations around death dying grief and loss

Michele discusses grief literacy, the importance of talking and that dying is a part of life

Sarah K – Supporting someone in grief

Sarah gives her thoughts on how many things there are you can domto support someone in grief and how to be proactive

Kristal – Drug Poisoning During Pandemic Stigma

Kristal discusses how the pandemic has created additional stigma surrounding those who use drugs. She dissuses how it seems like some losses are treated as more deserving of being mourned than others. Many people have had to grieve privately instead of publically within a community. She touches on the state of the public health system during the pandemic.