Episode 5: Navigating Grief and Loss Through Bibliotherapy and Play Therapy

In this episode of Pages and Play, Freya and I discuss how bibliotherapy and play therapy can support children and adults navigating grief and loss, reviewing grief models including Kübler-Ross’s stages (noting its origins and nonlinearity), Lois Tonkin’s “growing around grief” metaphor (fried egg), and Shelly Gilbert’s upward-spiral model. We discuss how literature and poetry act as emotional translators through identification, catharsis, and insight, and introduce the “mirrors, windows, doors” framework for connecting to feelings and new understandings. The key to emotional regulation is framed as staying connected to oneself across emotional states rather than constant calm. We use the story of Goodbye Mog to illustrate how a parent used it to help her 7-year-old process their beloved pet cat’s passing through conversation, euthanasia preparation, and imaginative “ghost” play. 

This episode also shares children’s and adult book recommendations, creative and play prompts, bibliotherapy techniques (poetry, letters, narrative re-authoring), and resources such as Winston’s Wish.

00:00 Grief and Loss Intro

00:15 Grief Models Explained

01:01 Life Grows Around Grief

02:19 Why Books Help Us Grieve

04:34 Poetry and Group Healing

08:05 Regulation Not Calm

10:05 Narrative Mirrors Windows Doors

15:19 Lucy and Luke Cat Story

21:13 Kids Books for Grief

22:43 More Recommendations and Memoirs

26:34 Play and Bibliotherapy Prompts

30:19 Rituals Creativity and Closing

32:02 Final Reflections and Goodbye

Books Mentioned:

• The Invisible String by Patrice Karst
• The Memory Tree by Britta Teckentrup
• The Rabbit Listened by Cori Doerrfeld
• Goodbye, Mog by Judith Kerr
•  Rabbitiness by Jo Empson
• Mist Monster by Beautyman, Kirsti
• Oh, The Places You’ll Go by Dr. Seuss
• Mum’s Jumper by Jade Perkin 
• A Storm in a Jar by Samuel Langley-Swain and Katie Cottle 
• The Boy in the Black Suit by Jason Reynolds
• The Astonishing Colour of After by Emily Pan
• The Grieving Teen by Helen Fitzgerald
• My Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
• Lost and Found by Kathryn Schulz
• Grief Works by Julia Samuel
• Finding Joy By Gary Andrews

Play Prompt:

• Recall Luke’s story to highlight compassion, the value of sharing narratives, and the importance of accepting emotions.
• Encourage children to express feelings and be open to your child’s imaginative journeys like Luke’s one of Misty.
• Recommend resources such as Winston’s Wish website for creative activities and conversation starters.

Bibliotherapy Prompt:

• The key is not just which book you choose, but how you engage with it
• Use bibliotherapy techniques: reading/writing poetry, writing letters to lost loved ones, narrative therapy
• Read slowly, pause, ask questions, or sit quietly with the story together

 Themes:

• The healing power of play and storytelling.
• The transformative role of literature in therapy and self-discovery.
• Methodologies for recommending books to support mental health and emotional growth.
• Encouragement for parents to observe and nurture their child's development through play and reading.
• Biblotherapy’s four pillars: connections with the text/author, identification, catharsis, and insight/self-awareness/integration/reframe. 
• Overview of play therapy's history and how it aligns with children's brain development, making it an effective approach for addressing different challenges.
• Bijal and Freya’s personal and professional journeys into play therapy a

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to Pages and Play, the power of bibliotherapy and play therapy on young minds. On today's episode, we are going to talk about navigating grief and loss and the growth from reading and play to support us in these moments. It is helpful to explore some of the models of grief that we often see in the play and in our children as they're going through this period in their lives. We often refer to Elizabeth Gubel of Ross's five stages of grief. So denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. However, we must be aware that this model was developed to describe people with the terminal illness facing their own death. But it has become a way of thinking about grief in general. Also, Gubela Ross stressed that this model is not linear, that we might experience these aspects at different times, and we might not experience all the stages, and we might experience other feelings that are separate to this model. There are other models, so there's Lois Tolkien, Dr. Lois Tolkien, who observed that grief does not shrink or fade over time, but that life grows around the grief. So that the individual grows around it, experiencing new things in their life, such as relationships, moments of joy, while still carrying that loss. And they use this visual metaphor of a fried egg. And the yolk is the grief, and the egg white is life. And the circle of the white expands over time, and the yolk occupies a smaller proportion of the overall circle as life proceeds and enlargens. There is also Dr. Shelley Gilbert's Upward Spiral Grief model, in which he views grief as nonlinear also, but as an upward spiral that allows bereaved people to accept and face their feelings, safe and the knowledge that those feelings will come back and go and come back, but each time with less intensity. And with significant support and time, that spiral illustrates how the effects of loss can slowly diminish and help individuals recover mentally, emotionally, and in their actions. And when I was in the intense initial years of grieving my brother, I took refuge in reading, as I mentioned in our first episode. But I imagine that many people go to books and to poetry in these moments in our lives. What's happening here? How are books able to reach and support us in these moments?

SPEAKER_01 2:38

Thanks, Freya. I 100% agree. I think so many people turn to literature in these tough times. And there is so much literature and grief out there, some of which we will be mentioning today, which I hope will be valuable for listeners. But essentially, if we break it down, what's happening is that when we are struggling with grief, our internal language often disappears. That loss can feel so overwhelming that we struggle to articulate what we're feeling even to ourselves. And books step in as a sort of emotional translator, or they provide us with the language that we need to understand even ourselves better and our own emotions and what we might be feeling. Because it's not always as easy to identify emotions within ourselves. And going back to the three key processes of bibliotherapy: so identification, catharsis, and insight, when someone reads a story during grief, they often recognize themselves in a character's experience, and that recognition and shared experience can be profoundly validating. And these stories, of course, allow us to experience these emotions at a safe distance so that we can sit with the sadness, the anger, the confusion, even the relief of grief through the lens of a character, rather than necessarily having to confront it ourselves directly. And that distance creates safety for both children and adults. And even though it might sound a little bit counterintuitive, it leads readers to actually being able to explore these feelings which previously may have felt too overwhelming or even abstract. And also for grief, I particularly find that using poetry and poetry therapy really helpful. Poetry has an immediacy to it, and sometimes the metaphor is the more powerful vision that we need to really allow us to stay with the grief. And it's this showing rather than the telling which makes it easier to grieve. It offers imagery, rhythm, metaphor, and captures something we couldn't quite say ourselves, but it also makes us feel safe expressing it in those formats. And the most important, grief is never linear, as Freya mentioned before. And books, narratives, poetry, they often capture this non-linearity and the complexity of the grieving process, allowing readers to sit with all these emotions rather than necessarily solving them. They accompany us, they act as a companion, they offer compassion. And grief is very much a part of life. We all go through it at some point, these series of losses alongside the gains. And literature prepares us for this to an extent, but also sits with us when it comes. And bibliotherapy techniques, such as reading poetry or even writing poetry, in response to something that we have read, explores this grief. Even writing a letter using narrative therapy can help us find some closure and make sense of our grief. And I would say that in my book, Bibliotherapy, The Healing Power of Reading, I do cover a story about a group of mothers who suffered early losses and miscarriages and how they came together in a group bibliotherapy session, and were able to not only explore the emotions through the literature and the poetry that was offered that they read together, but also the shared connection of their experiences of loss. And this is hugely powerful in allowing them to move through the emotions, sit with them, acknowledge them, and still continue to hold on to them even once they've processed them and feel okay and steady in themselves. But what was really powerful about those sessions as well was the connection that they felt to their loved ones that they'd lost, and how they gained an insight through a couple of poems. The poems that were prescribed were John O'Donohue's For Grief and On the Death of the Beloved and Rumi's The Window. And some of the insights the mothers gained was that they felt that they were still connected to their loved ones in spirit, not obviously in the physical world. But that in itself was enough to give them the peace that they needed at the time. And both of these poems are really beautiful at triggering or provoking those insights. So I would really suggest or recommend them for anybody who is struggling with grief. Obviously, this is more for adults, but it was just a point in case that I wanted to illustrate. And we will have many book recommendations for children later on in the episode.

SPEAKER_00 7:46

Thank you, Mitchell. That's such a powerful example in your book there of the power of poetry and the power of poetry to be able to connect people in those moments and connect each other as a group and to be able to use that as a shared resource for healing. So thank you. So I'd like to just take a moment here to address the connection with our emotions and grief and the concept of regulation and calm. So the renowned play therapist and podcaster Lisa Dion talks about how regulation doesn't entail maintaining a state of calm at all times. Rather, it involves experiencing a range of emotions with self-compassion and self-connection. Being regulated does not mean that you will never feel angry, sadness, frustration, or pain. In fact, it's healthier to acknowledge and express a diversity of feelings and to demonstrate this to our children that these are normal emotions. Regulation is about staying connected to oneself over various emotional states and learning to navigate waves of activation and then return to a sense of safety, all that while staying connected. It requires the ability to adaptively respond to stress and subsequently return to that balanced of the more connected state. So during grief, for example, we may experience numerous intense emotions far removed from calm. And if we solely focus on achieving calm, we neglect these important processes of connection to oneself and honoring the journey of these feelings. Essentially, regulation and emotional literacy involves staying present with one's experiences without losing grounding. It is not about suppressing these feelings, it is about engaging with them thoughtfully. So consider connecting with yourself as a means of regulation rather than simply calming down. Okay. This approach is powerful in validating and accepting emotions inherent to grief. And as the reader, we can be there with them in this emotional journey, much in the same way that a play therapist is there for the child and seeing it through the play. What does it allow the reader to do? How does it provide that healing?

SPEAKER_01 10:27

I 100% agree. Narrative is so vital in allowing us to not only connect with characters who are going through similar experiences, emotions, events, but essentially with ourselves indirectly. So when you talk about connection, I feel that any strong piece of literature that's going to be helpful should enable that connection and narrative, literary, fiction, memoir, all of those types, even poetry is fantastic at building connection with the reader. And as you mentioned, this is an essential part of the regulation piece that we're talking about. When you read about a character navigating loss, we sit with them in their experience, we notice their thoughts, their fears, their moments of hope. And in doing that, we begin to recognize our own emotional landscapes. This connection to our emotions through the connection that we feel with the characters and their emotions allows us to establish an emotional presence and stay present, sitting with those emotions. And this is vital if we are then going to start processing them. Often for many of us, the minute, uncomfortable feelings take hold or we notice them, our gut reaction is to try and escape them through coping strategies such as addiction or bad habits or distraction or denial. So when we have a powerful narrative that enables this emotional presence, this is such a big part of the bibliotherapy process. So for children, especially stories, they create a container for big feelings. A child might not say, I feel scared about losing someone, but they might talk about the rabbit in the story who feels lonely or confused. And through that character, they're safely exploring their own emotions. And as we start to process these emotions, these narratives support what psychologists call emotional integration. So when a child reads or hears a story, they're linking feelings and images and meaning together. And that process helps the brain organize these difficult experiences rather than being overwhelmed by them. And in bibliotherapy, we sometimes refer to stories acting as mirrors, windows, and doors. A mirror essentially reflects our own feelings. A window lets us see other people's experiences, and a door invites us to step into a new way of understanding ourselves. And extending this to grief, this is especially powerful. A mirror allows us to see our own feelings reflected back to us. When we encounter a character who is missing someone, who's feeling confused, who's angry or deeply sad, we begin to recognize that this is exactly what we are experiencing in this roller coaster of emotions. A window then allows us to look into the experiences of others. Through stories, we witness how different people carry loss. Some through memories, some through rituals, some through imagination. And we learn ways to grieve and ways to continue living with loss. Lastly, a door gently opens towards new ways of understanding ourselves. We have processed emotion, integrated many of these. And even though they may appear again and are still very much a part of us, we can let them live with us and enable us to build our lives around them, growing around the loss, keeping memories alive and meaningful. And our love for a person we lost takes a new form. And the connection with them still remains and even strengthens.

SPEAKER_00 14:26

Definitely. When you were speaking there, Virgil, I was thinking about how many crossovers there are here for play therapy. So you're talking about storage creating a container for big feelings. And I was thinking about how in play therapy we do that through the relationship, the therapeutic relationship, and being able to help them with the co-regulation. And I loved the analogy of mirrors, windows, and doors, and how a mirror reflects your own feelings. And we would do that through reflections and tracking, and then with the window, seeing into other people's experience, that would be through the children playing out various different situations or things that they're trying to grapple with. And then the end bit with the door, inviting us into new ways of understanding ourselves is the end goal of self-actualization, the whole humanistic approach. So I love those ideas. I love the concept of thinking about those things in that way. So I thought at this moment I would actually share a real life story that mixes together bibliotherapy and play by parent. This story is a real life story from a friend who has generously allowed me to recount the story. So I've changed the identifying details, but the story remains as she told me. So I met up with my friend Lucy over a coffee, and while we were talking, she was talking to me about the family cat passing away. So Lucy is married with a young son called Luke, who is seven years old. Lucy's household also includes Misty, a cherished cat who was adopted from a rescue centre 15 years ago when Misty was just a kitten. So Luke has always adored Misty. And as Lucy realized that Misty's life was coming to an end, she was thinking about how she was going to prepare herself, her partner for the loss, but especially Luke, since this was going to also be his first encounter of grief. So Lucy and I actually became friends while studying English English literature at university, and she's an avid reader, and she has passed on that love of books to her son. And she frequently uses stories to guide Luke through his personal growth and his school experience, all in the bustle of primary school. To help Luke cope, Lucy chose to discurse the book Goodbye Mog. And the books are just these beautiful illustrated tales centered around a beloved family cat, Mog. And in Goodbye, Mog explores the themes of saying farewell while highlighting the ongoing bond that remains after loss. So Luke loves the Mog books and was really receptive to Goodbye Mog. And this helped him process the realities of Misty coming to the end of her life. And so Lucy was reading this story regularly every evening and answering Luke's questions as they were going through it, talking to Luke about Misty's impending death, and explains that sometimes when we have pets, we need to help them have a calm and peaceful passing. And this conversation introduced Luke to the concept of euthanasia and prepares him for Misty's final veterinary appointment. This means that when it comes the time to go to the vets, the whole family go together. So Luke goes with mum and dad and Misty all together. And so he's there in those final moments of Misty's life as she receives the last injection. And as they're walking out of the vets back to the car, Luke is actively discussing what's happening and what's happened with his parents. And then he starts to use concepts of play. So when Luke gets in the car, he begins to talk about Misty's ghost. And he starts imagining that Misty's spirit is there with them riding in the car journey home. And this really closely resembles the story of Goodbye Mog. So you can absolutely see the narrative being used here, where Mog stays with the family as they welcome a new kitten, and Mog helps guide the kitten and the family and gets her ready. In the following weeks, Luke continues to tell his mother at bedtime all these adventures that Misty is getting up to and what she's doing and where she's going. And he's really using these imaginations. They're going on amazing adventures here. Luke is able to bring Misty back to life in these stories, and that helps him process the grief in the time that he needs to be able to do it. And over time, Misty's ghost embarks on even more fantastical ventures further away from home, and they start to go into space, and it all gets really fantastical. But Luke starts telling these stories less and less until eventually he's ready to let go of Misty's ghost. Child-centered therapy is rooted in Carl Rogers' humanistic approach, an individual's capability for personal growth and safe actualization. And in this story, Luke demonstrates his ability to do this through the story of Mog and his imagination in his play and his relationship with his mother. He's able to express himself freely. He's able to have these conversations. And so he's able to process that grief and address it himself in the way that he is able to do that. His own coping strategies in his own processing time. And this is the power of non-directive therapy.

SPEAKER_01 20:25

It's a wonderful story in terms of showing how children do adopt the stories that they really resonate with and then use them to help them move through their own grief, especially when you mentioned about him staying with them, imagining the spirit of Misty with them in the car. I feel like that was the real door to him being able to explore his grief and cope with it.

SPEAKER_00 20:48

And you can really see the power of our imagination in those processes to do that healing. Yeah. It's utilizing the things that it's got there. It's got that narrative, it's got that relationship with mum, it's got all those open conversations. And through that, he's able to piece it together to use his imagination. So it's beautiful, absolutely beautiful story. So I'm so pleased she let me share it. Yeah. Thank you to her. There's so many great books out there for children navigating grief and loss. Some books really deal with it quite directly. So we've got Rabbitiness and Mr. Monster, Mum's Jumper, and books like A Storm in a Jar, that really looks at sadness and mixed emotions and anger. And so we really look at that regulation, the complex emotions that go on in these moments in our lives. And I keep on saying moments, but really grief and loss is not a moment. It goes on for the rest of our lives. It doesn't go away as we were talking about those models. Exactly. And we can have triggers all the way through our lives. Even books like All The Places You Would Go by Dr. Zeus. It's really talking about endings and saying goodbye. And those things are so important. That's something that we constantly look at in play therapy, the importance of endings, the importance of a structured, uh, planned ending that it is so important in that process, especially if we've got grief and loss within there. Another book, Counting by Sevens by Holly Goodburg Sloan. Um, and this is really looking at uh a 12-year-old's experience of using both of her parents. It's a beautiful book. So there are so many books out there that you can go to, which is great. And one book that I do think is really helpful for parents is Finding Joy by Gary Andrews as well. But I realize this is such a big topic. What books would you recommend?

SPEAKER_01 22:47

Thanks, Freya. I love all your suggestions, they are really helpful. I would really suggest to parents to pick them up if they're struggling or if their child is struggling with grief. But I'd also like to just say that these are books are really the conversation starters for these very difficult discussions that can sometimes feel impossible. And so for younger children, I'd often recommend stories that acknowledge grief without overwhelming them. So, of course, one beautiful book which I've mentioned before is The Invisible String by Patrice Kirst, which reassures children that love continues to connect us even when someone is physically absent. It's very comforting for separation anxiety as well. And I feel like we've touched on this theme of maintaining that connection even when a loved one passes. And I feel like that's such a vital coping strategy for both children and adults who are grieving. So it's something to really remember if there's one thing that you take away from this episode. Another powerful one is The Memory Tree by Britta Techentrop. It focuses on how memories of someone we love continue to live within us and within the community around us. And it's funny for her because I wrote a similar poem and my grandmother died, and I included in my book about how the memories stay with us, but they also change over time and we start to remember them differently, maybe even more fondly as time passes. So it was a real sort of meditation and reflection on the memories of people that we've lost. But yeah, that's a fantastic book. And then, of course, The Rabbit Listened by Corey Doorfield. That's really wonderful. It's less about loss itself, but more about how we support somebody in grief. And often it's just simply by listening and being present and being there for them, showing up.

SPEAKER_00 24:41

And we use this book a lot in therapy because absolutely, because, like you said, it really hones in on the importance of listening and being present with somebody. And when we saw that in the story of Lucy, she was able to be there and to listen to her son and be able to support him in that moment. So powerful.

SPEAKER_01 25:02

So powerful. No, thank you for sharing. And I think you could use this with many of the difficult emotions, and just that power of listening and being present, which is easier said than done, but a really important skill, nonetheless. And then, of course, for families, I often suggest books that adults can read alongside children. Because grief isn't something that children should have to navigate alone, and shared reading really creates this important yet gentle space for conversation, for support, for connection. For adults and young adults, I'd say memoirs and reflective books about grief can be incredibly helpful because they offer companionship during a time that can feel very isolating. And for this, I'd just like to throw in three memoirs, which is Joanne Didion's My My Year of Magical Thinking about the Loss of Didion's husband, and then Lost and Found by Catherine Schultz, where the author loses her dad but finds the love of her life. And in life, when we lose something, we also find something and the cyclical nature of everything. So it's a really wonderful book to reflect on. Her book called Grief Works. She is wonderful at bringing stories of people who are grieving, but she's also wonderful at building narrative and stories around grief. And I think she does a great job for readers in helping them navigate their own grief. So we'd really recommend those three as well. And Freya, I know we're coming to the end of the episode, so I think it's quite useful to share our play prompts and our bibliotherapy prompts as we approach the end.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

Thank you. Yeah, I just wanted to begin by recalling Luke's story, which highlights Lucy's compassionate and the value of shared narratives and the importance of normalizing and accepting those emotions, which we've talked about at length in previous episodes, but really encouraging those opportunities to express feelings and participate with your child's journey, which will enable them, as we saw with Luke, to use their imagination to gain their self-awareness in processing their loss. Additionally, I would really recommend Vincent's Wish website. They have a whole host of excellent resources to support children and young people in expressing their emotions and remembering their loved ones and engaging in activities designed to facilitate conversations and creative expression. This playful and creative expression may take you by surprise. So, for instance, during times of grief and difficulties, I often find myself returning to model housemaking. As a habit that continuously surprises me, yeah, it really offers me a focus and an outlet that contributes to my ongoing healing. So we were talking before about your nervous system. Explore, don't be afraid of where your creative expression is going to go. It may take your surprising roots in these moments.

SPEAKER_01 28:08

This is so useful, Freya. I'm definitely going to keep this in mind for when I'm experiencing grief. And it doesn't always have to be the death of a loved one, it could be the ending of something that was really hard for us to fathom, or it could be the loss of a job, or moving schools, or leaving our home and leaving our country. So there's a whole series of losses that we face in life. And I do feel that all of our suggestions here are applicable for any of those things. So I just also wanted to add, as you were talking about model housemaking, that I am a firm believer in creativity to heal. I think it's a vital part of the healing process and is often missed. So that process of model housemaking really resonates in me. So thank you so much for sharing. And I just wanted to add some similar bibliotherapy prompts. The key with bibliotherapy isn't just which book you choose, it's how you engage with it, whether you leverage it your reading, and whether you apply some of the bibliotherapy techniques that I've mentioned, such as reading and writing poetry, writing letters to loved ones whom you might have lost, and even narrative therapy, reauthoring your own story to make sense of it. Reading slowly, pausing, asking questions, or even simply sitting quietly with the story together is also profoundly helpful. So any of these techniques and the mindfulness around when we are reading to help us explore difficult emotions can be really powerful. So I would really recommend trying any one of these things that you resonate with here and that is making sense to you right now.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Yeah, anything else to add? Yeah, when when you were talking, then I was just thinking about the art cure again. So Daisy from Yeah, and that creative expression and looking at that as another pillar of well-being, exploring that, whether that be through music or art or theatre or creative writing, whatever that might look for you, yeah, use that as something that can support because I think that's really vital and really lovely to touch base on. And I think also just making time for those rituals, exploring those memories. And when you were talking it earlier, Bidjo, and you were talking about memories that might change over time, memories aren't static, and sometimes some memories go, and that can bring with it feelings of guilt or sadness. So just trying to see it with compassion and even looking at that in terms of creative expression. Can we hold those memories in a different way? Is there some way that we can explore those memories together with our children? So it's really not being afraid to have some of these difficult conversations and to really respect the whole array of emotions and the longevity of them, that they may come up again and again, they may trigger throughout our lives. And that's okay, that is part of a loss. And as you were saying, Mitchell, losses can come in many different forms. And so to hold on to that, actually in our lives, we are always going to experience losses, and so to find ways to look at that and to hold on to that, and also for it to become part of us, but part of us in a way that is is manageable and for us to still continue to grow around it.

SPEAKER_01 31:39

Yeah, I love that egg yoke analogy and how the egg white is getting bigger and bigger over time.

SPEAKER_00 31:44

It doesn't go away, but our lives expand and we can still treasure and hold that person or that place. Yeah, so play and reading can offer a safe haven to help us grow and make sense of the world, even when the world feels overwhelming.

SPEAKER_01 32:02

Thank you, Freya. That's such a powerful note to end on. I've really enjoyed recording this episode, and I really hope it's been helpful for users. I think grief is a very special emotion, and I think we should all hold space in our hearts to honour it, as and when we experience it, whether for ourselves or for our children. Thank you so much for all your insights, Freya. As always, I loved listening to them, and I'm really excited for our sixth and final episode.

SPEAKER_00 32:29

The sixth and final episode, yeah. And I'm gonna remember that mirror, window, and door analogy, because it's so powerful.

SPEAKER_01 32:38

Oh, thanks, Freya. Yes, I hope listeners can take that away with them this week and reflect on it. Thank you again, and thanks to everyone for listening. Until next time, stay well.