Anna's Embrace

                                          AdaptNeedNurtureAccept

Anna's Embrace is a bereavement group created to assist women experiencing emotional pain during grief and loss. The group's inspiration comes from the loss of a woman - a mother, daughter, sister, Godmother, Goddaughter, cousin and friend to so many - her name is Anna. Her loss emotionally crippled members of her family and left them powerless. Watching her suffering during her final months led to years of painful reflective memories overshadowing the bright remembrances of her life. The women of her family have choose to emerge from the ruins her loss created. Not only through the death of Anna, but being along side her during her battle to survive, created experiences for her family that once left them breathless, feeling powerless and crippled in bed to a wellspring of strength.  This was no easy measure, this took years... Years to stand firm above their grief.  Years to make sense of her death and not to hate the deity above (God our creator) who took her so prematurely. Years to understand why her and not me.  Years to believe in humanity again. Years to care about other's grief and their aloneness.  The power of these painful experiences lies in the value of the fight she fought.  Anna taught us, the women in her family that are here while she is not, to embrace the lives we have, utilize and offer our strengths, love those we have, and cherish the days we have to live.  This involvement, as gut-wrenching as it was, affords us an assortment of enlightenments.  Even the worst experiences of our lives, can eventually provide absolution. 

The goal of Anna's Embrace is to bring forth the universality of pain and to support women affected by the loss of a loved one. When we meet as a group, we will experience grief, identify it, deal with it, and place it on a shelf within each of our lives. Compartmentalizing emotions, switching gears in a sense, allows a woman to grow and mature - frankly the only blessing of aging. Our losses are  always a part of our futures, it is how we live with the experiences of the loss as days continue. Since no pain is any greater or more profound than any other, what a woman feels can give her the ability to help bring about the recovery of individuals whose hurts are both similar to and vastly different from her own. All members within the group will have their own voice and own unique meaning.

Comfort/Emotional support animals are available during sessions. Our animals are not only sensitive to those who are in emotional pain, they also make great kleenex boxes when tears are running... Anna's family lived through one of the greatest losses, they have has chosen to channel their experiences of pain into compassionate service to aid other women to successful recovery.  This offering to help other women, is the best and strongest way to declare that their pain did not defeat them, but in fact helped them heal. 

Group therapy as a whole allows group participants an opportunity to heal naturally with those women who are ready to disassociate themselves from their identity as sufferers.  Readiness of an individual woman is key.  In fact, the simple decision to put aside the pain carried is what grants a woman the strength to redeem that pain through giving, and helping others.  Group is about helping yourself and others. Individual pain, as personal and alone as this feels, gives a woman a unique insight into the minds of others who have experienced similar heartache and loss.  For many, finding a group that has others with a similar type of loss can be critical to their healing process.