Joanne Reed

When life no longer makes sense

When someone dies, it can feel as though the world expects you to carry on while your own has fallen apart. You may look as though you're coping because you've gone back to work, you're looking after everyone else, or you're simply getting through each day. Yet inside, everything feels different.

Perhaps your mind won't stop racing. Perhaps you feel numb and wonder why you can't cry. Perhaps you're frightened by your own thoughts, exhausted by the effort of pretending you're okay, or quietly asking yourself questions that nobody else seems to understand.

These are often the thoughts that feel too difficult to say out loud.

I'm Joanne, an Accredited BACP Grief & Loss Counsellor specialising in bereavement, including suicide loss. I offer online and telephone counselling for adults across the UK, supporting people through the many ways grief can affect their lives.

You don't have to carry this alone

Grief reaches far beyond sadness. It can affect your confidence, your relationships, your sense of identity and your ability to feel safe in the world. It may leave you living with guilt, anxiety, loneliness, panic, depression or an overwhelming fear of losing someone else. For some people, particularly after a sudden, traumatic or suicide bereavement, grief can feel as though life has stopped moving whilst everyone else carries on.

Whether your loss happened recently or many years ago, you don't have to meet a particular definition of grief to deserve support. If your loss is still affecting your life, your relationships or your wellbeing, your experience matters.

What working together can look like

My approach is person-centred, grounded and trauma-informed. I draw on CBT and solution-focused therapy where they may be helpful, but I never lose sight of the fact that grief is deeply personal. There is no right way to grieve and no timetable you have to follow.

Together we'll make sense of your grief at your pace. Therapy isn't about forgetting the person who died or being encouraged to move on. It's about helping you understand what's happening, easing the weight of guilt and self-blame where they're present, finding ways to manage the hardest days and gradually building a life that can hold both your grief and your future.

Clients often tell me they feel relieved simply to stop pretending. Having a space where they don't have to filter what they say, hold everything together or hide the thoughts that feel too difficult to say out loud can, in itself, be the beginning of change.

If you're ready

If you'd like to know more about how I work, you'll find detailed information on my website, including answers to frequently asked questions, articles exploring many different aspects of grief, and practical resources that you can read in your own time. If you feel ready to take the next step, you can also book a free 15-minute introductory call directly through my website to see whether we're the right fit before committing to counselling.

I offer a free 15-minute introductory telephone call, giving you the opportunity to ask questions, talk through what has brought you to counselling and see whether working together feels like the right fit, with no pressure or obligation.