Sometimes a death can cause too much grief to deal with on your own, or even with the support of family and friends.

When this is the case, Barnet Bereavement Project (BBP), based in Leicester Road, New Barnet, can help. BBP has about 35 trained volunteer counsellors helping about 100 bereaved people a year.

Jan Jenkins and Marlene Jones are BBP co-ordinators. Their role is to assess would-be clients to see if counselling would help.

"It's better if it's not too close to the death," says Mrs Jenkins. "Typically the family and those closest to them close up and are supportive. There is a lot of shock and pain. Counselling requires thinking and that's not always possible really soon after the bereavement.

"We like people to be three or four months on and be able to talk about what's happened and think about themselves. Most people manage without counselling. But there is some intensely personal and painful work to be done.

"Families and friends are often frightened of the pain they want to cheer you up and say 'it's been a month now'. The counsellor will never say that. Some of the people who struggle most have had early losses as a child. A bereavement in adulthood can tap into other bereavements in the past. Other clients like to offload their misery and have it shared and witnessed."

This month, BBP was chosen to receive £3,000 from this newspaper through a Gannett Foundation grant, the charitable arm of our owner Gannett.

The money will allow BBP to take on ten new volunteers most of whom are on college courses and need practical experience train them and support them over the whole year. And as Mrs Jenkins explains, support for the counsellors themselves is a vital part of the charity's work.

"Sometimes one's own buttons get pressed during counselling. The levels of pain in the work are very high so it's important that we understand about our own losses and integrate them in our own lives. We should be comfortable with our own losses before we approach other people's.

"Often it is losses of one's own that draw people into the work they want to give something back. But they need to be at least two years from a major loss. A lot of needy people feel they can take on the work before they can. I lost my mother many years ago and that was really difficult but it was years later that I came into bereavement care and when I did I recognised her death in a way I hadn't before. One's own losses are both a resource and a hazard," she says.

BBP counsellors make weekly visits over a limited period of six months, which Mrs Jenkins says can bring dynamism to the counselling process.

"Because of the desire of people to have counselling and the desire of our funders to see results, we push it through and make it work. We get good feedback. Occasionally we find a client for whom a lifetime of counselling will not be enough. But sometimes people have something to say and will only say it on the last day so the time frame brings an energy to the counselling."

BBP is also looking for new trustees for the charity, particularly a treasurer. Trustees meet ten times a year. For more information call Sandra Clark on 020 8441 3572.

May 29, 2003 13:00