Grief counseling: Alice

We're on one of our mobile tours, and I went to an elementary school today to see a little girl for grief counseling.

That's not odd itself; I do quite a bit of counseling with children. But this was the first time I've ever counseled someone who was grieving something that hadn't happened yet and might not happen.

We'll call her Alice.

Her teacher brought her in, and you could see the grief all over her face. My heart immediately went out to her. She just looked wan and hollow, the way kids do when they've lost everything. So I was both relieved and confused when Alice started talking.

"My brother went to Iraq," she said. She was looking out the window. She didn't say anything else.

"Do you miss your brother very much?" I asked her.

Her gaze never flickered. "He's still alive now but in about a month he'll be dead. He's going to kill himself. I'm never going to see my brother again."

Wow. Talk about a blow. I've been in counseling for a long time and I've never had to deal with anything like that before. I wasn't sure what to say. Part of me wanted to call Audra in for a consult. I was that stumped.

But then she looked at me, and something in her cold, blue eyes stopped me dead. I just stared at her. Then I said, "It's terrible to know that something is coming and not know how to stop it."

She nodded. "But it's worse than that because no one can stop it."

I swear to Goddess, I got goosebumps. It was the weirdest goddamned thing, and I have seen a lot of weird shit. I reached out and took her hand. And then she started crying and the grieving began.