In October 2022, we marked the end of the King’s College Hospital Charity Bereavement Service, run in partnership with St Christopher’s Hospice and supported by funding from NHS Charities Together.
Recognised for excellence in the 2021 Third Sector Awards, this vital service provided tailored therapeutic counselling to children and adults who had lost a loved one at King's during the pandemic, and to any King's staff experiencing bereavement during this difficult time.
For more than two years, the bereavement service offered support, solace and a real lifeline to people who, due to lockdown restrictions, were essentially grieving alone.
Participants spoke of difficulties sleeping and eating, some struggled with their alcohol intake or reliance on medication, and many were unable to concentrate on daily tasks. Following counselling, the majority experienced improvements in all areas.
- 475 referrals assessed
- 355 people received therapeutic counselling
- 3,400 one-to-one counselling sessions conducted
- 18 qualified counsellors on hand to offer information and understanding
Dawn (not her real name), said to her counsellor: "I felt I could tell you anything – it was important to me because there were some things I hadn’t felt able to tell my friends…it’s good to be able to put a voice to those dark fears because there was only one other person at the time that I told I had had suicidal thoughts.
[In the sessions] I thought we would focus on the grief, the bereavement and my experience of it…but I liked that you took me back to my childhood, my family dynamic, what I’d gone through and my achievements because that did help. It was a positive focus on my existence, reminding me of who I was – my identity – and not just on the loss.
You saved my life because you made me think about so many other parts of it. Even though it was very hard, I gradually began to feel – and I never thought I would at the start of our sessions – that there was a bigger me.”