Can counseling really help a broken heart?

“Well, no I don’t specialize in grief specifically but with my many years of experience I’m confident I can help you,” said the counselor on the other end of the phone.  It had been 18 months since we lost our daughter Aly, and my husband and I were caught in the black abyss of sadness and hopelessness.  I was finally ready to wave the white flag and seek help.  

Many well-meaning family and friends urged us to get counselling immediately after the accident, but I adamantly refused.  I bristled at the very idea that someone would tell me how to grieve the loss of my beloved daughter.  Or worse, that I would be trapped in a group of crying mothers stuck in their own horrible grief for years on end.  No, I would rather do it myself for I didn’t want to be part of THAT group in the first place.

But over the coming months as reality sank in that our nightmare was permanent, we found ourselves on autopilot, barely staying afloat on the outside and dead on the inside.  And by the time we realized we needed help processing our grief, we had fallen so deep into the black abyss that the simple task of finding a counselor, any counselor, felt utterly overwhelming.  So I reached into the depth of my soul to muster what energy I could to google local counselors, and called the first number I saw.  

And thus began an 18-month relationship with a counselor who knew absolutely nothing about grief.  A lovely woman, to be sure, and in looking back I’m sure she learned a great deal from us as her clients.  But much to our dismay, we gained nothing from our appointments.  At least we hadn’t gone backwards, I told myself, and the mere idea of trying to find a better counselor was simply too overwhelming.  So we stayed where we were week after week for 18 months.  

And then three years after losing our daughter, my 46 year-old husband suffered a major stroke.  He went from being a highly intelligent, well respected, vibrant man who had managed multi-million dollar projects to a patient in a hospital bed that couldn’t walk, talk, read, or write.  Yes, my dear sweet husband’s stroke had totally destroyed all forms of communication and paralyzed his entire right side.  I found myself facing a fresh, new black abyss, and I hadn’t even found my way out of the first one.  

And then help arrived in the form of Dr. Ford, a neuropsychologist who made daily hospital rounds to stroke patients.  His specialty was helping to support patients as they transition through, and adapt to, their new disabilities.  And now that my husband was trapped in a hospital bed and could no longer bury his grief in 60-hour work weeks, Dr. Ford found himself doubly tasked with helping us address the profound hopelessness left in the wake of losing our daughter while we struggled to adapt to our new life left in the wake of my husband’s stroke.

Dr. Ford was in his early fifties, about the same age as our prior counselor.  He was tall and fit though not aggressively so, and his polished short hair yielded to a stubborn childhood cowlick he never outgrew.  His face was kind, his voice calm yet intelligent.  My husband and I liked him immediately.  And to our collective surprise, his specialty of helping stroke patients face a new life with severe disabilities wasn’t all that different from helping grievers face a new life without their loved one.  And thus began a professional relationship in which we finally found help in processing our deep sorrow.  

It has now been two years since my husband’s life-changing stroke, and five years since our daughter’s passing.  And we continue to see Dr. Ford fairly routinely, though the frequency changes depending upon our needs.  As far as I see it, the life-changing stroke was actually a lifeline in disguise, for it brought a compassionate, intuitive, and highly skilled practitioner into my husband’s hospital room.  And although he came for a different reason, his counseling proved to be the outstretched hand offering us the help we so desperately needed.

I am not angry we spent 18 months with a counselor who was unable to meet our needs.  Actually, I admire her for taking us on in the first place.  She didn’t harm us, and she did try her best to help us, and I am forever thankful.  But I wish I had acknowledged sooner just how critically important it is to find the right care in our darkest hours.

When one suffers a heart attack, they call in a cardiologist.  When one has a broken leg, they call in an orthopedist.  So when one faces profound loss, one needs a highly skilled and qualified practitioner to help navigate the way through, and eventually out of, the deep abyss that is left in the wake of overwhelming grief.  Can a heart attack patient survive without a cardiologist?  Yes, but the chances of surviving are much greater when under the care of a proper practitioner.  And this is never more true than with the most critical of all wounds….that of a broken heart.