Families Helping Families Support Group Guidelines
Breathe and Relax: There is nothing you have to do or say in support group. No performance to give, nothing to prove. You may want to talk, but you don’t have to if you are not ready.
Acknowledge Your Decision to Attend: Coming to support group is, by itself, an act of courage and faith. Everyone gets an “A+” just for arriving. Showing up is half the battle.
Safe Environment: The support group aspires to be a “Judgment Free Zone.” Leaving all comparisons, condemnation and criticism at the door makes it safe for us to ask for help and share our experiences with one another.
Confidentiality: This means keeping what happens in the group private. This way we can benefit from each other’s experience. Nothing we share here should ever come back to hurt us.
A Place to Grieve: Practice giving yourself permission to grieve here. It’s okay to be sad and angry. Here we practice constructive expression of the emotions we feel - gently letting our grief out in a way that nobody gets hurt, including you.
Be Honest: Be honest with yourself and others.
Speak for Yourself: Talk about your experience, what works for you and how you are. We practice avoiding generalizations and speaking for others.
Ask for Help: If you or someone else is in need of assistance (i.e. on the verge of imploding, exploding or leaving) let your facilitator know right away.
Monitor Yourself: We practice being mindful of how we interact within the group experience so that each person feels safe and supported. Lectures, speeches, unsolicited advice, interrupting, inappropriate humor, changing the subject, dominating can detour from the group’s experience.
Peer Education & Support: The group is based on supporting & learning from one another. As such, there are no “experts” and we avoid “shoulds.”
Your Facilitators: Each support group is staffed by trained facilitators whose job is to help the group maintain focus and insure safety. Please tell your facilitator what you need from the group.
Allow for Silence: Listen to the silences within yourself and in the room. Sometimes the greatest breakthroughs happen with just a little space to be silent, listen and then open. If the silence feels uncomfortable allow yourself to take a deep breathe.
Self-Compassion and Self Care: Take care of and be gentle with yourself at all times during support group (breathe, stretch, bathroom breaks, etc.) Let the group know ahead of time if you have a special need or have to leave early. It is your job to take care of yourself and get what you need from the group.
One of Many Tools: Support Group is not intended to be the “be all, end all” or an “instant cure” for supporting your experience through grief and loss. Come to group as a compliment to your daily self-care routine which may consist of grief counseling, reading, exercise and/or other forms of support. Rebuilding a new life honoring the life of your loved one requires many tools.
Patience and Gentleness: Each group is but one page in a long book. Be patient with yourself as you navigate the path of grief, with all of it’s hills and valleys. Healing takes as long as it takes. Progress can be slow and uneven. Often we are doing better than we think. Please be gentle and patient with yourself.
