Virtual Military Survivor Seminar

While we are all facing these unexpected adjustments to our daily lives, one constant remains — the love and support of your TAPS family. That is why we’re bringing our seminar right to you. We have a variety of dynamic sessions available online throughout the weekend at no cost, with all of the resources, care and love we can offer, coming to you in the comfort of your home. 

Our session presenters are leading experts in the field of grief and loss, and you will have the opportunity to gain tools and resources for your grief journey. We will have an exciting program of virtual workshops, care groups, and family programming.

Session Descriptions and Schedules

Friday, September 18, 2020

• 7:00 p.m. – 8:30 p.m. Eastern

  Separate Share Group Sessions for:
  › Spouses, Ex-Spouses, Fiances, Significant Others with Children
  › Parents
  › Siblings & Adult Children
  › Spouses, Ex-Spouses, Fiances, Significant Others without Children
  › All Relations
  
  Share groups offer an opportunity to share your own story, experiences, and feelings while listening to others who have a similar story and relationship with their service member. They're structured by relationship, circumstance, or sometimes both. TAPS offers a wide range of groups with something for every survivor.

  Please review: Share Group Guidelines for Participants

• 9:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m. Eastern

  We Downshift: Meditative Movement for a Restful Evening  – Emily Muñoz
  Friday evening Downshift is a way to unwind and relax in the safe space created by your TAPS family. Accessible for all bodies and levels, this is non-fitness based movement and mindfulness to help calm and soothe body and mind. Options will be offered to ensure that everyone feels comfortable and supported - chairs encouraged, mats warmly welcomed, breaks available as you need them. Breathe deeply and relax fully with us - all you need is a a space to sit or stand, with something comfortable on which to sit or kneel, and an openness to learning how we can self-soothe and reconnect.

Saturday, September 19, 2020

• 2:00 p.m. - 2:45 p.m. Eastern

  Opening Session  – Bonnie Carroll | Dr. Bret Moore
  Please join TAPS President and Founder Bonnie Carroll in welcoming our special guest and keynote speaker, Dr. Bret Moore.

• 3:00 p.m. – 3:45 p.m. Eastern

  Grieving and Connecting to Your Body after Trauma  – Grace Seamon-Lahiff
  When we are living through grief and trauma it becomes easier to ignore our body and the things it is trying to say. Join us for a discussion on the ways grief and trauma impact our physical and emotional health and work through skills that can help alleviate the weight of grief and trauma in our lives.

• 4:00 p.m. – 4:45 p.m. Eastern

  Beyond the Breakers: Rituals for the Life Transitions that Follow Loss  – Dr. Thom Dennis
  As a result of the physical distancing guidelines brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, many of the traditional rituals that sustain the bereaved immediately following a death, like funerals and visitations, have been abridged, delayed, or denied. However, those rituals are best understood as just the first in a series of rituals intended to sustain people trying to navigate the waves of grief. Whether your loss was six weeks, six months, or six years ago, this program offer help for those who have discovered the gales of grief have carried them far out to sea, with no wind in their sails, no land in sight, and no clear sense of which direction they should go in the future. Borrowing from Arnold van Gennep's Rites of Passage, Thom Dennis will offer insight into how rituals can help those who are feeling lost, stuck, or abandoned on their grief journey and provide a template for creating your own rites of passage for sailing through the life transitions that follow loss.

• 5:00 p.m. – 5:45 p.m. Eastern

  Rhythms of Grief  – Dr. Carla Stumpf-Patton
  After the death of a loved one, it can seem as if time stands still and the pain of loss will never end. In response to grief, survivors often feel unprepared by being left with the unfamiliar, and often fearful task of coping with loss. Grief can bring with it, a rhythm or pattern of emotions which twist and turn, wax and wane, and ebb and flow, where the bereaved attempt to find ways to make it through each day in spite of the physical absence of their loved one. This session will discuss the rhythms associated with grieving, examples as how to regulate emotions and cope with significant dates or milestones, and how such concepts can help to integrate loss in our lives as we navigate the healing process.

• 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. Eastern

  What's Next? Your Way Forward - Bonnie Carroll | Audri Beugelsdijk | Dr. Bret Moore | Dr. Thom Dennis | Carla Stumpf-Patton | Grace Seamon-Lahiff
  Following the seminar sessions we invite you to participate in an open forum discussion with Bonnie Carroll and our seminar presenters. If you have questions that were not answered or if you would like to spend more time with your TAPS family please join us for this session.

All sessions other than sharing groups/sessions will be recorded, so if you cannot attend a session, it will be available at taps.org for you to experience at a later time.