Grief Therapy: Clinical Tools to Assess and Treat Normative and Prolonged Grief Disorder
When your clients are devastated by loss, they’re counting on you to guide them through their pain. But grief is unpredictable, often misunderstood, and leaves wounds that linger for years afterward.
Mental health and healthcare professionals are faced with the often misunderstood and misdiagnosed symptoms of uncomplicated and complicated grief. Formal education rarely, if ever, provides extensive enough training to accurately identify and treat those who are grieving. Often grieving clients present with other diagnoses because symptoms can mimic uncomplicated or complicated grief. The grieving process is often pathologized, or misdiagnosed, resulting in potential exacerbation of the presenting issues because inappropriate interventions are utilized. As a result, those who are grieving are often inadvertently disenfranchised by providers, which can make the professional support they sought to reconstruct their previously shattered identities and worldviews ineffective. It is essential to be versed in identifying grief related constructs that may underlie, or even cause, mental health difficulties.
This course aims to provide current information on the grieving process, clarify misconceptions of outdated theories, and differentiate between uncomplicated and complicated grief, and also examines the changes in conceptualization, differential diagnosing, treatment planning, and interventions used with grieving individuals. You will leave with an improved clinical skill set you will be able to immediately use to identify and treat clients., and you will enhance your skills and will feel more prepared than ever before to walk alongside the grieving in a world overwhelmed by loss.
DAY 1
Assessment of Grieving Clients:
Uncover Grief Intensity, Depression, Substance Use and Suicidal Ideation
- Grief intensity scale
- Hogan grief reaction checklist
- Assessment to uncover trauma, depression, substance use and anxiety
- QPR and S-SSRS to assess for suicidal ideation or substance use
- Isolation, sleep and nutrition concerns for grieving clients
Assessment and Treatment of Persistent Complex Bereavement Disorder
- How to diagnose using the DSM-5
- Assessment resources
- Complicated Grief Treatment Model
- Meaning Reconstruction
Grief Therapy and Counseling in Action:
Clinical Tools and Treatment Approaches to Facilitate Healthy Grieving
- Grief counseling vs. grief treatment – what’s the difference?
- CBT techniques for guilt, blame and other maladaptive cognitions following loss
- Mindfulness interventions for anticipatory grief and anxiety symptoms
- Narrative approaches to process grief by putting words to the pain
- Exercises to help clients better face uncertainty
- Creative tools to support emotional regulation and expression
- Tools to manage regret and facilitate forgiveness and reconciliation
- Alternative ways to honor deceased loved ones and find closure
- How to make virtual sessions as effective as in-person ones
Non-Death and Abstract Losses:
How to Effectively Work with Clients Who’ve Experienced “Living Losses”
- Abstract losses – how to work with loss of connection, routine, normalcy and identity
- Divorce
- Substance use
- Natural disasters
- Life-limiting and mental illness
- Developmental disabilities
- Military or incarceration
- Symbolic Losses
DAY 2
The Traumatic Grief Treatment Toolkit:
Build Clients’ Resiliency and Move Them Toward Post-Traumatic Growth
- Assess for PTSD symptoms
- Emotional regulation techniques for clients who’ve had a traumatic loss
- DBT techniques to decrease avoidance and manage suicidal ideation
- CBT coping skills for traumatic memories and rumination
- Clinical strategies to reduce fear responses
- How to work with the unique challenges of suicide survivors
- Exercises to help clients overcome guilt and shame
- Employing a strengths-based approach to build resiliency
The Clinician’s Guide to Grief and Loss Groups:
How to Successfully Structure and Facilitate Grief Support or Treatment Groups
- Differences between
- Psychoeducational groups or therapeutic process groups
- Peer or clinician led groups
- Loss-specific or general grief groups
- Open and closed groups
- Participant screening
- Keys to effective facilitation
- Program evaluation
Grief Work with Clients of Diverse Race, Backgrounds, Cultures and Beliefs
- How culture impacts length of mourning and continuing relationships with the deceased
- Spiritual impacts on grief
- How inequalities in race, gender, sexual orientation and age impact support of grief and loss
- Personal assessment activity
- Cultural competence vs. culturally and difference intentioned/aware practice
- Cultural & difference-focused engagement ideas and strategies
Ethical Considerations in Grief Counseling and Treatment
- Boundaries of professional competence
- Research and treatment risks
- Working with the terminally ill, minors, families and end-of-life decisions
- Vicarious trauma, compassion, fatigue and self-care
Objectives:
- Assess for trauma, depression, substance use and anxiety in grieving clients.
- Utilise two assessment measures for gathering grief responses.
- Distinguish how the experiences created by different types of loss impact assessment and treatment planning.
- Evaluate contemporary models of bereavement as they relate to case conceptualisation for grief therapy.
- Assess the boundaries of professional competence in grief work and know when to refer out.
- Investigate factors that can influence the grief process including the type of loss and support system.
- Use the DSM-5 to diagnose/identify Prolonged Grief Disorder.
- Employ emotional regulation techniques to help calm clients who’ve experienced a traumatic loss.
- Implement a bereavement plan of care for identified Prolonged Grief Disorder.
- Use CBT techniques to help bereaved clients manage guilt, blame and other maladaptive cognitions following loss.
- Apply narrative approaches to help clients construct meaning following loss.
- Utilise mindfulness interventions to reduce anxiety symptoms in clients with grief.
- Evaluate the clinical implications of cultural beliefs surrounding mourning and continuing relationships with the deceased.
- Utilise best practices to structure and facilitate grief support or treatment groups.
- Develop strategies for self-care when working with grieving clients.
- Analyse continuing attachment bonds and their relevance to clinical practice with bereaved clients across the lifespan.
CPD Information For Mental Health Professionals
Enjoy complete flexibility with 100% self-paced learning you can access anytime, anywhere, and on any device. Pay once for lifetime access.
Course Duration: 12 learning hours
Certificate and CPD hours: On completion you’ll receive a Certificate of Completion to support your CPD records.
Assessment: Complete a short quiz at the end (80% pass mark), which you can resit as many times as needed.
Lifetime Access: Your access to the course does not expire, so you can revisit key concepts anytime you want a refresher for practice.
CPD Eligibility: This program may be suitable for CPD for professionals such as:
- Psychologists
- Counsellors and Psychotherapists
- Social Workers
- Community Workers
- Mental Health Nurses
- General Practitioners (GPs)
- Occupational Therapists
CPD requirements vary between professional bodies, so please check with your association or credentialing body to confirm you can claim CPD hours/OPD points for this program and what evidence they require.
Course Content
Meet Your Instructor
Grief and trauma that traditional therapy approaches struggle to address require clinicians who understand the unique landscape of loss. Christina Zampitella has devoted more than three decades to becoming one of the world's leading thanatologists - psychologists who specialise in death, loss, and bereavement - transforming how practitioners understand and treat complex grief.
As founder and director of the Center for Grief and Trauma Therapy in Delaware and host of the "Phoenix Rising with Dr. Z" podcast, Dr. Zampitella bridges clinical expertise with lived experience of loss. Her designation as Fellow of Thanatology by the Association for Death Education and Counseling, combined with her Outstanding Doctor of Clinical Psychology Award from California School of Professional Psychology, reflects her commitment to advancing grief therapy as a specialised field.
Dr. Zampitella's expertise spans thanatology, traumatology, EMDR, nature-based therapy, narrative psychotherapy, and meaning reconstruction approaches. Her work with diverse populations - across all cultural, gender, and religious backgrounds - gives her unique insights into how loss affects different communities. She integrates mind, body, and spirit approaches, showing clinicians how to honor clients' cultural backgrounds, spiritual beliefs, and individual grief expressions.
What sets her training apart is authentic understanding. Zampitella doesn't just teach grief theory - she shows practitioners how to sit with profound loss, recognise when grief becomes complicated, and differentiate grief symptoms from other mental health conditions. Her international speaking and training engagements, combined with her faculty role at the Portland Institute for Loss and Transition, demonstrate her dedication to mentoring emerging clinicians and advancing the field.
For your practice, expect to gain specific skills in assessing complicated versus uncomplicated grief, practical interventions for trauma-related loss, and tools for supporting clients through various types of bereavement. Her approach particularly benefits clinicians who want to specialise in grief work or feel unprepared to address loss in their current practice.
Qualifications
- PsyD, Clinical Psychology, Alliant International University (California School of Professional Psychology), 2005
- M.A., Clinical Psychology, Alliant International University
- M.A., Counseling Psychology, Immaculata University, PA
- B.A., Psychology, University of Delaware
- Fellow of Thanatology (FT), Association for Death Education and Counseling, 2010
- Licensed Clinical Psychologist: Delaware (#B1-0001010), California (#PSY20878)
- Grief Therapy as Meaning Reconstruction Certification
- Certified Grief Informed Professional (CGP)
- Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) certified
- Certified in yoga nidra
- EMDR trained
Teaching & Roles
- Founder & Director, Center for Grief and Trauma Therapy, Wilmington, DE
- Host, "Phoenix Rising with Dr. Z" podcast
- Associate Professor, National University, CA
- Adjunct Professor, Goldey-Beacom College, DE
- Faculty member, Portland Institute for Loss and Transition
Speaking & Training
- International speaker and trainer in grief and trauma therapy
- ADEC (Association for Death Education and Counseling) conference presenter
- Professional training nationwide
Ready to develop specialised expertise in grief and trauma? Discover how Dr. Zampitella's thanatology-based methods can enhance your ability to support clients through their most difficult losses.
Feedback & Reviews
This course includes:
- Lessons 8
- Topics 0
- Duration 12 hours
- Quizzes 1
- Language English