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Gloucestershire Support After Suicide Service

Community support

07483 375516

gloucestershiresupportaftersuicide@rethink.org

Last updated: 31/08/23

Monday - Friday :
9am – 8pm
Saturday - Sunday :
Closed

About our service

We are service based within the county of Gloucestershire providing a range of support to those affected by bereavement by suicide.

We provide support for people aged 18+ who live in Gloucestershire and have been bereaved by suicide. This includes family, partners, friends, colleagues, health & social care professionals and those who may have witnessed the death.

Our core opening hours are Monday - Friday 9am-5pm. For those who require support during the evening as a result of day time commitments, we provide support up to 8pm, so that you can access us at a time that suits you best.

Our staff and volunteer team is made up of people from a range of different and diverse backgrounds with a range of different personal and professional experience. Some of our staff team and volunteers have personal experience of bereavement by suicide and this helps inform our approach and delivery of the service.

If you need a translator or interpreter in order to access our service then please get in touch with us to discuss your needs.

You can download our referral form and publicity materials here

We have a version of our service leaflet translated into Polish which you can download here and Gujarati which you can download here

About why we are here

We know that when someone close to us dies, the grief that is experienced can bring about a range of powerful and complex feelings.

We also know that each person's experience of bereavement is unique to them but when someone dies by suicide, the powerful feelings become more complex, increase considerably and bring about many other practical issues to deal with.

We know that people bereaved by suicide need support at the time that is right for them – we support people at any stage of bereavement, including immediately after your loss or in the longer term when you feel ready to access support.

How to refer and access support

To make a initial referral or to refer yourself call us on our daytime number - 07483 375516 or email: glossupportaftersuicide@rethink.org

We can help you complete the referral form (or you can complete this yourself), and we can start identifying ways in which we can provide you with the help you need.

We also take referrals outside of office hours, 365 days a year between 5pm and 10pm, by contacting our Gloucestershire Mental Wellbeing Helpline on freephone 0808 801 0606 or text 07537 410 022.

The helpline will take your details and then pass your referral onto our support team when we will follow up with you the next working day.

If we receive a referral or enquiry for support for someone under the age of 18, we are able to direct them to alternative sources of support.

You can download our referral form and publicity materials here

What support do we offer?

One to one practical and emotional support

This is provided through face to face sessions, online, telephone or WhatsApp. We provide support in a way that will help you most.

The one to one support is provided by a Suicide Bereavement Worker and is offered across 6 personalised weekly support sessions. This is followed by 6 fortnightly sessions, with the option to extend support if needed. After your one to one sessions end, we provide monthly check-in sessions and we provide support on key anniversary dates, if you would find this helpful.

A little bit more about the one to one support we provide:

Space to talk about your bereavement and explore ways in which you might be able to cope and find ways of dealing with your loss
Emotional support that is tailored specifically to your unique situation and bereavement.
Signposting & referral to other services
Practical support including help to navigate processes e.g. police, funeral arrangements, inquests, the media and support to talk to your employer,
Advocacy to help you have your voice heard and speak out

Bereavement counselling

We provide bereavement counselling for people using our volunteer counsellors for between 6-8 weekly sessions with the option to extend to an additional 8 fortnightly sessions as needed.

Bereavement peer support groups

A provide closed support groups with a maximum of 6 participants. The group is facilitated by a Suicide Bereavement Worker and a volunteer with lived experience of bereavement by suicide. Groups are offered once each week for 12 sessions, lasting up to one and a half hours.

The groups provide:

A safe and supportive space to discuss and explore, without judgment, the impact of your bereavement upon yourself, your family and those you connect with.
Share stories and experiences in a safe environment.
Gain peer support and build connections with others

Online bereavement peer support

People who are using our service or who have used our service in the past can access an exclusive online Gloucestershire bereavement by suicide forum. This is hosted by a mental health online peer support platform called Clic. This forum is available 24/7 and is moderated, enabling you to share experiences and stories with others and gain peer support.

Let us know if you want to be given access to the online forum.

Useful resources, training and factsheets

We have collated information on a range of downloadable useful booklets, factsheets, online training courses about suicide bereavement.

This includes

How to cope with suicidal thoughts
How to help someone else who is feeling suicide
How to cope with dealing with loss after bereavement by suicide
Help is at Hand Booklet

You can view them by clicking here.

We have also created some blogs on social media around different aspects of bereavement which you can read here:

We obtained a grant from the Department of Health Social Care Suicide Prevention Fund to create suicide bereavement literature into other languages

The grant helped us to translate the English version of the Suicide - Coping With Loss factsheet into the 10 most spoken non-English languages in the UK. This is to make sure that people from BAME communities and people whose nationality is not English have access to bereavement information in their own language. The new languages include Arabic, Spanish, French, Bengali, Gujarati, Punjabi, Urdu, Polish, Portuguese and Chinese.

The link above takes you to the English version that can be read online or downloaded into a PDF. If you scroll down to the overview section you will see clickable links to download the factsheet in the non English languages.

We want to know who has accessed these translated factsheets and its usefulness. So we would be extremely grateful if you could complete this anonymous survey which takes less than 5 minutes to complete.

Other services and organisations

We have produced a list of other services, helplines and organisations may be of use to you and you can find out about these by clicking on this link.