Local grief support groups provide community for people suffering loss

Within three months of a brain cancer diagnosis, Esther Bjorklund lost her husband, Hal.

Grief struck her in a way she hadn’t expected. She became afraid of everything. Afraid to leave the house, even to walk to the end of the driveway and get the mail.

“That’s irrational,” she said, now three years after the death. “But that’s grief.”

Bjorklund was in California at the time where she and Hal spent the winters, and it was there she discovered GriefShare, a grief recovery group.

She found the program immensely helpful. It showed her what she was going through was normal, and gave her ways to cope and a group of people to talk to who really understood.

Bjorklund’s friend in Lakeside, Pat Morgan, lost her husband to lymphoma several years prior. Bjorklund told Morgan about the program, and she did a daily online devotional through the program and began to think the West Shore needed GriefShare.

While there are now a couple other groups around the Flathead Valley, there weren’t any at the time.

At first Morgan wasn’t sure if it was something she could do.

“I thought, oh gosh, this is a little bit out of my realm,” she said. But then she learned that GriefShare coordinators prefer if the facilitators have experienced a loss, and were at least two years out from it.

“I kind of felt this tap on my shoulder,” she said.

She contacted area churches, sent out flyers and enlisted Bjorklund as the other facilitator.

They had seven women attend the first session, some with very deep, hard losses who were experiencing intense grief. Since the first session in spring of 2013, they’ve held three 12-week groups.

During the first session people are asked to introduce themselves and share why they are there.

“By the end of the first session, there are hugs and tears,” Morgan said.

GriefShare is a 12-week program. Sessions start with a prayer and quick update on where everyone is at. Then they watch a 35 minute video that addresses the session’s topic. Speakers in the video range from experts, to the average person who’s experienced a loss. Then it’s followed with a discussion.

Morgan and Bjorklund try to keep sessions to two hours, but often they’ve found people want to keep talking.

“Those of us who have been through grief, we listen,” Morgan said.

And that is part of what is most helpful about the program, working with other people who truly understand what you’re going through.

“Until you’ve walked the path these people have, you don’t understand,” Bjorklund said. 

Gail, who asked to not have her last name published, went through the GriefShare program with Morgan and Bjorklund after she lost her husband to cancer after only three weeks, and then lost her son a few months later.

“It’s not something you ever get over,” she said. Being able to talk with people who understood helped.

“Sometimes family and friends are well meaning, but they don’t really want to hear that you are sad or lonely or missing your loved one,” she said. “It’s not that they’re being insensitive, but they just haven’t been through it.”

Bjorklund compared the grief of losing a loved one to a forced move, where you don’t want to be there, but now you’re stuck. She said a woman who had gone through the program described it as an amputation.

“It’s a huge chunk of your life that goes away,” Bjorklund said. 

Gail said when she and her husband. Mike. moved to valley, they built a home and planned for this new phase of their lives.

“It was like we had so many dreams,” she said. “A lot of them ended when Mike died. You never really think about that … when your partner in life dies, your dreams kind of die too. But that doesn’t mean the end of all dreams.”

Grieving is a personal journey and Gail has learned part of what that means for her is discovering what her dreams are now.

She plans to participate in GriefShare again.

“I just decided I’m at a different place,” she said. “I think it would be beneficial to take the class again and let the Lord show me new truths about what I’m going through.”

The topic of the first session, which starts Sept. 7, is “Is This normal?”

Finding out that what she was experiencing was normal was one of the biggest ways GriefShare helped Gail. “The first six months after Mike died, I felt really numb,” she said. “I was on autopilot. I found out that’s just so normal. There’s comfort in knowing what you’re going through is normal.”

There’s no limit to the number of times someone can participate in GriefShare. As facilitators, Morgan and Bjorklund have found that each time they go through the material, they take something new away.

“Every time we view it there are new things that come out because we’re at a different place in this journey,” Morgan said. “I truly think being a facilitator for this program has helped me immensely.”

Though the program is based around scripture, Bjorklund stresses that it’s open to anyone who has experienced a loss, regardless of faith. A new 12-week session  starts Sept. 7 at Eidsvold Lutheran Church between Somers and Lakeside.

To register call 709-2142 or 709-2186.