theme: how my recent grad school experience impacted my grief and my continuing bond with Kade

cohort

As soon as I thought of this topic, I was wistful for my classmates. Though our classes were at night and we had our own lives and families, we came together for something special a few nights a week (and some long Saturdays).

We crisscrossed paths over the program’s progression from wide-eyed newbies taking core classes, to getting into intense material, to our grueling clinical year, to the weary elation of graduation.

As I said in a previous post, a master’s counseling program is extremely self-reflective. Something we often heard was that we can’t take a client further than we’ve gone ourselves. We got to know each other and our stories.

I’ve written this before: School did not make especially difficult times in my grief, such as Kade’s birthday or the anniversary of his death, harder, but provided a (surprise) bonus source of support.

I’ve had classmates ask if they could give me a hug after class after topics especially close to home. I got a text from a thoughtful classmate asking, “Isn’t this the weekend you’re going rafting for the anniversary?” And there have been countless other examples of my classmates showing up in my grief.

Made it through Counseling Techniques I

Graduation – December 2018