Real Life Counselling · Online Therapy in BC & Ontario

Grief can affect your sleep, focus, mood, and relationships. You might feel sadness, numbness, anger, guilt, anxiety, or exhaustion that comes in waves. Counselling can help you process what you have lost and feel more supported as you move through this season.

Therapy is not about rushing your grief. It is about helping you carry it with less overwhelm, more stability, and more space to breathe.

All new clients begin with a brief intake so we can match you with the right therapist.

Grief counselling in a calm and supportive online setting
Insurance coverage: Covered by most extended health plans. Receipts provided for reimbursement.
BC & Ontario: Services are provided virtually to clients in British Columbia and Ontario.
No referral required: A doctor’s referral is not typically needed to begin counselling.

When grief counselling may help

There is no single shape grief takes, and no loss too small or too complicated to bring. People reach out to us for many kinds of loss, including:

Loss of a loved oneRecent or long ago, expected or sudden, including anticipatory grief while someone is still here.
Pregnancy & fertility lossMiscarriage, pregnancy loss, and fertility-related grief, losses the world often doesn’t see or name.
Relationship lossSeparation, divorce, or estrangement, grieving a person who is still alive.
Life-change lossesA job, health, a home, a version of the future you were counting on. These count too.
Feeling stuck or numbWaves of overwhelm, or the opposite: nothing at all, months after everyone expected you to be okay.
Struggling to functionWhen grief is making work, home, or relationships hard to sustain.

How grief counselling can help

Counselling helps you make room for grief in a way that does not swallow your whole life. Together we work on stabilizing the present, supporting healthy coping, and processing the loss at your pace, with a therapist who will never hand you a timeline or a checklist for how you should be feeling.

Over time, many people notice fewer spikes of overwhelm, improved sleep, and a stronger ability to move through hard moments with more steadiness and support. Grief doesn’t end so much as change shape; therapy helps you build a life that can hold it.

What you can work on in therapy

  • Processing grief waves and complicated emotions
  • Managing guilt, anger, anxiety, and intrusive thoughts
  • Sleep support and coping tools for hard days
  • Communication, boundaries, and relationship changes after a loss
  • Rebuilding routines and meaning over time, without leaving the person or thing you lost behind

How getting started works

  1. Complete the short intake (2 to 5 minutes), sharing as much or as little as you want
  2. We review your needs and province
  3. You’re matched with a therapist experienced in grief, not whoever is next available
  4. You book your first session, with evening and weekend times available

Grief is one of the most common reasons people begin individual counselling, and there is no wrong time: some people come weeks after a loss, others years.

Grief counselling FAQs

Is what I’m feeling normal?
Almost certainly. Grief can look like sadness, but also anger, numbness, guilt, relief, anxiety, exhaustion, and moments of unexpected okay-ness that bring their own guilt. It comes in waves rather than stages, and two people grieving the same loss can grieve completely differently. If your grief worries you, that is a good reason to talk to someone, not a sign something is wrong with you.
How long does grief last?
There is no timeline, and healthy grief doesn’t have a deadline. For most people the waves gradually soften and spread out. If many months have passed and grief still dominates daily life, makes functioning difficult, or feels frozen in place, counselling can be especially helpful; persistent, impairing grief responds well to support.
Do I have to go through the “five stages” of grief?
No. The five stages were never meant as a required sequence, and modern grief research doesn’t treat them as one. Real grief moves in waves and loops, not steps. Therapy meets your grief as it actually is, not as a model says it should be.
What’s the difference between grief and depression?
They can look alike and can co-occur. Grief tends to come in waves connected to the loss, with capacity for moments of connection and even joy between them; depression tends to be a more constant heaviness with persistent hopelessness or self-criticism. A therapist can help you understand what you’re experiencing; see also our depression counselling.
Will I have to talk about the loss in every session?
No. You set the pace. Some sessions are about the loss directly; others are about sleep, work, family, or getting through Tuesday. All of it is grief work.
Is grief counselling covered by insurance?
Most extended health plans in Canada cover services from Registered Psychotherapists (Ontario) and Registered Clinical Counsellors (BC). We provide receipts for reimbursement; check your plan to confirm coverage.
Is online counselling effective for grief?
Yes. Research on video-delivered therapy has found it comparable to in-person care for many concerns, and many grieving clients find it easier to have these conversations from their own home, tissues and tea within reach.
Where is grief counselling available?
Anywhere in British Columbia and Ontario by secure video, including Toronto, Mississauga, Ottawa, Vancouver, Surrey, Victoria, and Kelowna.

Related counselling services

Individual CounsellingDepression CounsellingTrauma CounsellingLife Transitions

Whenever you’re ready.

Grief doesn’t need fixing, and neither do you. But you don’t have to carry it alone. Complete the intake and we will contact you within one business day to match you with the right therapist.

If you are in crisis, call 911, go to your nearest emergency room, or call or text 988 (Suicide Crisis Helpline, Canada), available 24/7.