Creative Toolkit for Traumatic Grief & Loss

Creative Toolkit for Traumatic Grief & Loss

Co-Facilitated by Kate Beever, MT-BC & Bodhi Simpson, PhD, LCPC, ATR

May 30, 2025 • 9:30am – 4:30pm

Auburn Public Library – Androscoggin Community Room
49 Spring St, Auburn, ME 04210

6 Contact Hours

Traumatic grief is a form of grief that occurs in response to a sudden, acute, or unexpected loss. Grieving for these unimaginable losses is complicated and can be confusing, we can become in a sense “trapped” in the pain. The impact of traumatic loss can be challenging to work with through talk therapy alone as it impacts us beyond literal language; it can be challenging to access the words to fully express our complex feelings and experiences.

It is important for therapists to learn tools and techniques to help clients to be able to express and integrate traumatic grief. Art and music are powerful pathways to support full expression and to support clients in connecting once again with hope and in discovering new meanings. We are able to come into a new relationship with our grief and pain through creative expression.

This workshop offers clinicians experiential hands-on training in creative interventions designed to support clients who have experienced traumatic grief and loss that would be applicable in work with both individuals and groups.

Objectives

• Participants will gain an introductory understanding of the therapeutic benefits of incorporating art and music therapy creative interventions into traumatic grief work

• Participants will learn through personal experience the benefits of creative expression as a tool for navigating traumatic grief
• Participants will gain an understanding of ethical considerations involved in using creative interventions with clients experiencing traumatic grief

• Participants will gain an understanding of the importance of actively constructing a new narrative to integrate the loss and to be able to make sense of the traumatic event as a key part of healing from traumatic grief

Facilitator Bios

Kate Beever, MA, MT-BC

Kate Beever, of Maine Music and Health, is a board-certified music therapist with a Master’s in Music Psychotherapy from NYU and additional certificates in Neurologic Music Therapy and Remo HealthRhythms facilitation. Kate has a private practice connected to MaineHealth, where she works with children in palliative care as well as adults recovering from stroke, brain injury, and cancer. Kate has developed music therapy programming all over Maine in clinics, schools, corrections facilities, day programs, nursing homes, and more. Maine Music and Health has won numerous awards, including from the SBA, INC Magazine, and Mainebiz. Kate was the founder of the Creative Health conferences at USM and Bates College. She is also a professor at Berklee College of Music where she teaches Clinical Orientation, Psychology, Percussion, and Guitar. For more info, visit: mainemusicandhealth.com

Bodhi Simpson, PhD, LCPC, ATR

Bodhi Simpson of Conscious Creativity & Art Therapy holds a doctorate in philosophy, is a licensed clinical professional counselor in Maine, and a registered art therapist. She has 20 years of experience working with clients of all ages and educating clinicians across the state of Maine about the field of art therapy, as well as teaching tools and techniques for incorporating creative expression into clinical practice. Bodhi is a local and international workshop presenter, and she has a small “virtual” private practice in Maine where she integrates work with creative expression, imagination, myth, somatic approaches, meditation and mindfulness-based strategies, parts work, depth psychology, transpersonal psychology, positive psychology, and ecopsychology in her work with adults. Bodhi a co-creator of Expressive Wellness Workshops, Trainings, & Retreats with Kate Beever, MT-BC and is also a professor at the University of Maine at Farmington in the Masters of Art in Counseling Psychology with an Emphasis in Creative Arts program where she thoroughly enjoys supporting Maine’s future therapists in learning how to ethically and skillfully incorporate creative expression into clinical practice. For more info, visit: bodhisimpson.com

Agenda / Event Day Outline: 

9:30am – 12:30pm – Lecture, experiential learning, discussion

12:30pm – 1:30pm – Lunch

1:30pm – 4:30pm – Lecture, experiential learning, discussion

Event Attendance: Open to Maine Public Therapists/Clinicians