How to cope with grief: The New Normal peer support group meetings help participants help each other through loss – now in Cantonese, too
- When she lost her dad in the UK, Jess Hulton discovered The New Normal, which provides free peer-group support to cope with grief, and brought it to Hong Kong
- Its volunteers now hold meetings in Cantonese, but worry they will use the wrong words. Creating a safe space for people to speak matters more, one has learned
In 2020, Jess Hulton was living and working in California when she heard that her father was terminally ill. She returned home to the UK as the Covid-19 pandemic was sweeping across the world.
The hospitals were stretched, and she and her mother cared for her father as his health deteriorated.
After her father died in June 2020, Hulton searched online for counselling support to help her cope with the grief of losing a loved one. She had found the experience of caring for him deeply isolating and upsetting.
However, she faced a challenge in finding affordable support. The public health system was overwhelmed, and private counselling was very expensive.
“I found TNN on Instagram through a shared post by Ben May, the founder. I started attending their peer support groups and quickly realised that all I needed was for someone to say, ‘I was you, and even though you might not believe me, it will get better.’ That’s what peer support is for me – hope,” says Hulton.
TNN – The New Normal Charity – founded in the UK in 2018, provides free peer-group support to those who have experienced loss. The charity has expanded across the UK and beyond, and when Jess Hulton moved to Hong Kong for work, she brought it with her.
