Conclusion

When a colleague has died, everyone in your service family will be affected. Grief involves thoughts, feelings, behaviours and affects you physically. Your grief will be impacted by your relationship with the colleague who died, how they died, how you learned of the death and the aftermath, as well as the acknowledgement and support you receive from others.

As you look for ways to live with this loss, try to pay attention to how you are feeling and responding. Your feelings can be important guides to help clarify what you need to focus on. It’s OK not to be OK. Sometimes the ways we respond to grief may not be helping us, and we may need to try other ways.

Connecting with family, friends, your service family and other peers, being involved in activities that honour their memory, joining a peer support group or seeing a counsellor who specializes in working with grief and trauma are all ways that may help.

Remember that everyone has their own way of grieving. Grief is hard, and there are no shortcuts. Try to be as kind and patient as you can with yourself and others.