Webinar: When Grief Is Unseen - The Impact of Bereavement on Siblings
Join this 90-minute webinar exploring how bereavement affects children and siblings, and what helps restore safety, connection and belonging after loss. Julia Samuel MBE will share insights to support relational practice with children and families.
About this webinar
Supporting children and families through illness, loss and bereavement is one of the most sensitive areas of practice. While attention often focuses on parents and carers, siblings can be left carrying their grief quietly, feeling unseen and unsure of where they belong. This 90-minute online webinar explores how bereavement affects children and siblings, and how experiences of loss can disrupt a child’s sense of belonging within families, peer groups, and wider systems.
Taking place during Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week and aligned with the theme of Belonging, this session features a reflective, guided conversation with Julia Samuel MBE, leading UK psychotherapist, bestselling author and Founder Patron of Child Bereavement UK. Drawing on her extensive clinical experience, Julia Samuel will share insights into how children understand illness and death, how siblings experience loss, and what helps to restore connection, safety and a sense of belonging.
The webinar will include time for questions, offering participants the opportunity to share reflections, explore challenges and gain practical, compassionate approaches to supporting children and families navigating grief.
Aims of this webinar
To deepen understanding of how loss and bereavement affect children and siblings, and the implications for professionals working with children and young people.
To increase confidence in communicating with children and families about difficult experiences, including loss, grief and ongoing absence.
To explore how bereavement can disrupt a child’s sense of belonging within families, peer groups, and wider systems, and how belonging can be protected and restored during times of loss, in line with Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week.
To share evidence-informed insights from Julia Samuel and translate them into practical, relational approaches that can strengthen everyday practice.
Who should attend?
This webinar is primarily for professionals working directly with children and young people who have experienced bereavement, loss, or trauma, across health, education, social care, and community settings. The session is rooted in practice and lived experience, and will be most relevant to those in frontline and operational roles.
It will support practitioners to reflect on how loss affects children and families, and to consider the implications for everyday practice, communication and support.
While the webinar is not specifically designed for commissioners or policymakers, it may also be of interest to those in strategic or commissioning roles who want to deepen their understanding of lived experience, the realities of practice, and how these insights can inform service design and commissioning decisions.
Other relevant professional groups include: CAMHS practitioners, mental health practitioners, therapists, nurses, psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, school leaders, SEN and pastoral leads, educators, researchers, students, local authority staff and commissioners.
Speakers
Julia Samuel MBE
Leading UK psychotherapist and bestselling author
Nana Owusu
Head of Clinical Services at Anna Freud
-
16:00 - 16:05 - Welcome (Nana Owusu)
16:05 - 16:15 - Setting the context (Nana Owusu)
16:15 - 16:35 - Guided conversation with Julia Samuel (facilitated by Nana Owusu)
16:35 - 17:15 - Live discussion and Q&A (Julia Samuel, chaired by Nana Owusu)
17:15 - 17:30 - Close (Nana Owusu)
-
Julia Samuel MBE
Julia Samuel is a leading UK psychotherapist with decades of experience working in the NHS. She has held a number of senior roles across the charitable sector, including Founder Patron of Child Bereavement UK, an organisation she helped shape over 25 years, and former Vice President of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP).
Julia was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Middlesex University in 2017. She served as a member of the Imperial College Clinical Ethics Committee from 2019 to 2024, was a Trustee of The Prudence Trust from 2020 to 2024, and was appointed Commissioner of the UK Commission on Bereavement in 2021.
She is the author of three Sunday Times bestselling books: Grief Works, This Too Shall Pass and Every Family Has a Story. Her books have been published in more than 17 international territories. Julia regularly writes for national newspapers and has appeared widely across television and radio.
In October 2022, she launched the podcast Therapy Works, which reached the top 10 on the Apple charts and number one in the mental health category, with over 1.6 million downloads to date. In 2021, Julia created the five-star rated Grief Works app, a 28-day course supporting people through grief, which has been featured multiple times by Apple as a recommended and trending app. Since January 2023, she has written a monthly Agony Aunt column for Times Luxury.
Julia has been married for over four decades and has four adult children and ten grandchildren.
Nana Owusu, Head of Clinical Services, Anna Freud
Nana Owusu is Head of Clinical Services at Anna Freud, where she provides operational and clinical leadership within the Clinical Division and contributes to strategic leadership across programmes supporting children, young people and families.
She is a Registered Mental Health Nurse and Therapist with over two decades of experience across the NHS, the voluntary sector and international settings, including work linked to gaming within the e-sports space.
Nana’s work focuses on prevention and community-based approaches to mental health, with particular expertise in the early years, crisis prevention and parenting. She has led pioneering service models, including youth crisis cafés and parenting support programmes.
Her practice centres on strengthening parents’ capacity to understand children’s needs, develop effective strategies and create supportive environments that help children thrive and build resilience. She also brings specialist expertise in addressing the impact of deprivation on children’s mental health and improving access to high-quality, culturally responsive support for marginalised and underserved communities.
-
Zoom will be used to deliver online training. Prior to booking, please ensure you meet the system requirements so you can join this training session.
To test your equipment visit Zoom.us/test and follow the instructions.
-
Upon booking, you will be asked to confirm that you have read and accept our terms and conditions and our privacy notice. Please read these documents before booking:
Subscribe to our newsletter
Stay up-to-date with the latest trainings, conferences and events at Anna Freud.