The Programme
16 hours, including 12 hours of teaching time and 4 hours of self-study.
This course is facilitated by a specialist bereavement care trainer with experience and knowledge of supporting bereaved people in a therapeutic setting. It is ideal for counsellors and therapists wanting to further their knowledge and equip themselves with the insight and skills needed to work safely with this client group.
At the end of this programme participants will gain a certificate for 16 hours of CPD along with a Sands logo to display with a statement confirming their completion of the course on their websites and counsellor directory profiles.
Aims of the programme
- To provide first hand insight into how clients and their families experience pregnancy loss and the death of their baby
- To develop a holistic understanding of the therapeutic needs of parents and families
- To promote the therapeutic skills and approaches required to work in an integrative and effective way with pregnancy and baby loss
Learning Outcomes
At the end of this course participants will have knowledge and understanding of:
- the experience of pregnancy, birth, loss and the death of a baby – covering all aspects of the journey
- the real-life experience – hearing from a parent speaker
- the unique nature of grief and loss in relation to pregnancy and baby loss
- useful grief models and integrative therapeutic approaches to work effectively with baby loss
- working holistically with a client’s identity, culture and diversity
- the whole family experience of baby loss, including parents, grandparents, siblings and other relatives
- how clients experience therapy after loss – personal challenges and barriers to access
- life as a parent following the death of a baby
- the needs of people who are going through pregnancy following loss
- the impact of your own loss when working with pregnancy loss and baby death
- how to recognise vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue
- working with different types of clients and applying theory to practice
Course fees
Per individual: £295
Groups: £1,850
Interested in organising a course for a group of local counsellors? We’ll come to you (or you can do the course online) for groups of up to 12 counsellors.
Online or in-person?
The course is offered online to ensure it is as accessible as possible. It is interactive, skills-based and gives plenty of opportunity to learn from each other. However, if you are a local counselling organisation or have a group of counsellors who would like to attend the course together, we are very happy to provide the middle two modules as a full day in-person workshop at a venue of your choice.
Programme Overview
MODULE ONE: 3 hours, online
Preparation
Different types of pregnancy loss and baby death
The wider impact on the parent experience
Grieving together, partners and siblings
Grandparent
This online webinar starts our programme by exploring circumstances that clients experience, both at the time of their loss and in the months after. We hear from different parents about how their experience impacted them and their wider family. We focus on their experiences in hospital and in healthcare, and later on as their lives go forward – in social situations, and in the workplace. The effect on partners, the relationships between parents and with their wider families – other children and their own parents – are also explored.
MODULE TWO: 3 hours, online or in-person
Experience of pregnancy, birth, death and grief
Reactions and emotions
Hearing a parent’s story
Research and grief models
Using therapeutic approaches in practice
Module two can either be attended as a webinar or as the morning of an in-person study day, depending on the course you book. Module two gives you the opportunity to learn more from each other. We delve further into the experiences of parents, this time focusing on their grief and its impact on their lives, including hearing from a speaker live at the event who will talk about their own experience. We will offer you insights from research into how parents experience therapy after the death of a baby and give the opportunity to think about how this might impact the way you would work with parents. We’ll explore grief models and how they relate to practice, and give you some practical interventions to take away.
MODULE THREE: 3 hours, online or in-person
Identity: parent, culture, community, background
Inequalities in baby loss
Diversity of experience
Whole family experiences of life after loss
Pregnancy following loss
Module three can either be attended as a webinar or as the morning of an in-person study day, depending on the course you book.
Identity is a key theme throughout this module, in someone’s identity as a parent, a mother, a father, the diversity and community that makes their identity their own. We’ll look at the inequalities that are present in both healthcare and in bereavement care and the impact this has on someone’s grief journey. We will also explore how the loss of a baby impacts on each member of a family and the relationships that change as a result. The majority of parents go on to be pregnant after a loss and this can be a hugely anxious time so we’ll look at what they may need.
MODULE FOUR: 3 hours, online
Recognising your own losses
The impact of working with baby loss
Vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue
Using theory in practice: case studies
Reflection
This final online webinar provides an opportunity to focus on recognising and acknowledging your own losses and the impact of those on you and your work. We explore the impact that working with pregnancy loss and baby death has on you as a therapist, and provide you with space to think about what could be helpful for both you and your clients when experiencing vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue. We will explore case studies designed to help you use all the learning from the course in real-life scenarios, and finally end with some time for you to reflect on your learning.
SELF-STUDY: 3 hours, to be completed between modules
Inequalities in bereavement care, baby death and maternity care
Grief theory and models of grief in relation to baby loss
Grief in different cultures
Unconscious bias
Compassion-focused therapy
7-eyed supervision model
Countertransference
If you have any questions or would like to find out more, please do contact us anytime.
This course is suitable for qualified counsellors or therapists who work with, or who are interested in working with, bereaved parents on an ongoing basis. It is also suitable for student counsellors who have started their placements.
If you are a healthcare professional who works with bereaved parents in other ways, please have a look at our free training events.
