Resources

GGN Code of Ethics

Every GGN Certified Somatic Grief Support Practitioner agrees to uphold the following principles.

1. Do no harm. I put the safety and wellbeing of grieving people first. I offer only practices I have been trained in, and I stop any practice that appears to cause distress.

2. Honesty about my role. I describe my credential accurately. I do not call myself a counselor, clinician, or other licensed professional unless I hold that license. I never claim to diagnose, treat, or cure.

3. Informed and ongoing consent. I obtain informed consent before beginning services and before each practice. I respect every person's right to decline, pause, or stop at any time.

4. Touch-free practice. I do not use touch in GGN practice. If I hold a separate license that includes touch, I keep that work clearly separate and governed by that license.

5. Confidentiality. I protect clients' privacy and explain the limits of confidentiality. I store records securely. I never share stories, images, or tributes without explicit written consent.

6. Respect, equity, and cultural humility. I honor each person's culture, faith, identity, relationships, and ways of grieving. I do not discriminate. I do not impose my beliefs about death, the afterlife, or how to grieve.

7. Boundaries. I avoid dual relationships that could harm or exploit. I do not enter romantic or sexual relationships with clients. I do not accept bequests or significant gifts.

8. Fair business practice. I am transparent about fees. I do not pressure grieving people to purchase services. I offer referrals when my services are not the right fit.

9. Safety and referral. I respond to risk according to the GGN SAFE-LINK protocol. I refer to licensed professionals, medical care, and crisis services whenever needed, promptly and respectfully.

10. Competence and growth. I maintain my training, seek supervision, and keep my knowledge current, including about the evidence for and limits of somatic practices.

11. Fitness to practice. I monitor my own wellbeing. I reduce or pause practice when my own grief, health, or stress could impair my work.

12. Accountability. I follow the laws of my jurisdiction, including those on titles, practice, and mandated reporting. I cooperate with GGN's ethics review process and report concerns about other practitioners' conduct.

Raising a concern. Clients, colleagues, and members of the public may raise concerns about a practitioner with GGN through the contact options at thglobalgriefnetwork.com. GGN will review concerns through a documented process that may result in education, supervision requirements, suspension, or revocation.

Scope of Practice

Purpose

This statement defines the activities a GGN Certified Somatic Grief Support Practitioner may and may not perform under the GGN credential. It must be shared with clients and is binding for all credential holders.

Within scope

• Compassionate listening and companionship for grieving adults (18+).
• General grief education.
• The GGN core somatic practices taught in this program, offered invitationally and touch-free.
• Facilitation of grief support groups, remembrance circles, and rituals.
• Connection to resources, including crisis services, licensed clinicians, medical care, peer groups, and GGN community resources.
• Recognizing warning signs and responding through the SAFE-LINK protocol.
• With consent, coordinating with a client's healthcare or mental health providers.

Outside scope

• Diagnosis of any mental or physical condition, including use of diagnostic screening tools for that purpose.
• Mental health treatment, clinical counseling, or treatment of any mental health condition, including prolonged grief disorder, depression, anxiety, PTSD, or substance use disorders.
• Medical advice, including advice about medications or supplements.
• Physical touch, massage, or bodywork as part of GGN practice.
• Breathwork involving hyperventilation, breath retention, or intensity.
• Work with minors under the GGN credential (a separate youth-focused training would be required).
• Use of trademarked or proprietary methods of other organizations unless separately trained and authorized.
• Any claim to heal trauma, resolve grief, or produce physiological outcomes.

Licensed clinicians

Licensed professionals who hold the GGN credential may integrate GGN practices within the scope of their own license, following their licensing board's rules and professional ethics. In that context, their license, not this certificate, governs their practice. The GGN credential neither expands nor limits a professional license.

Jurisdiction

Laws regulating titles, counseling, and health practices vary by country, state, and province. Each practitioner is responsible for understanding and complying with the laws where they and their clients are located, including for online services across borders.

Referral Guide

When to refer: quick reference

Your personal referral list

Every practitioner must maintain and verify, at least every six months, a list including:

1. Emergency number(s) for each region served.
2. Crisis lines (988 in the US; national or local lines elsewhere).
3. At least three licensed clinicians or clinics with grief and trauma experience, including at least one low-cost option.
4. Primary care and urgent care options.
5. Substance use services.
6. Suicide loss survivor support groups.
7. Pregnancy and infant loss support.
8. Child and family grief services (for referral of minors).
9. Faith and spiritual care contacts appropriate to clients served.
10. Practical support services.
11. Your GGN supervisor's contact information.

How to refer well

• Explain why, with care and without diagnostic language.
• Offer specific options and help with the first step.
• Obtain written consent before sharing any information with another provider.
• Document the referral.
• Follow up.

Appendix B: GGN Core Practice Index

Appendix C: Practicum Log (Template)

Total hours: ______ Supervisor name and signature: ____________________ Date: ________

Sources and Further Reading

GGN content is original. The GGN names used in this handbook (for example the Grief Weather, the Settled Middle, the Safety Signals, Borrowed Steadiness, Breaks Belong, Love That Stays, Small Sips, Visit and Return, Gathering Supports, Unclear Loss, Unseen Grief, and Grief That Gets Stuck) are GGN's own plain-language teaching names. They are not summaries of, or substitutes for, any other author's model or method. The works below are listed so practitioners can study related ideas directly, in their original form, from the people who developed them.

Further reading: related ideas from other authors

• Stroebe, M., and Schut, H. (1999). The dual process model of coping with bereavement: Rationale and description. Death Studies, 23(3), 197 to 224. https://doi.org/10.1080/074811899201046 (Related to GGN's Breaks Belong.)
• Klass, D., Silverman, P. R., and Nickman, S. L. (Eds.). (1996). Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief. Taylor and Francis. (Related to GGN's Love That Stays.)
• Siegel, D. J. (1999). The Developing Mind: Toward a Neurobiology of Interpersonal Experience. Guilford Press. (Source of the term window of tolerance; related to GGN's Settled Middle.)
• Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation. W. W. Norton. (Related to GGN's Safety Signals and Borrowed Steadiness.)
• Grossman, P. (2023). Fundamental challenges and likely refutations of the five basic premises of the polyvagal theory. Biological Psychology, 180, 108589. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2023.108589 (A published scientific critique of the theory above.)
• Levine, P. A., with Frederick, A. (1997). Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma: The Innate Capacity to Transform Overwhelming Experiences. North Atlantic Books.
• Levine, P. A. (2010). In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness. North Atlantic Books. (Peter Levine's books describe titration, pendulation, and related ideas used in somatic trauma training; related to GGN's Small Sips, Visit and Return, Gathering Supports, and Looking Around.)
• Boss, P. (1999). Ambiguous Loss: Learning to Live with Unresolved Grief. Harvard University Press. (Related to GGN's Unclear Loss.)
• Doka, K. J. (Ed.). (1989). Disenfranchised Grief: Recognizing Hidden Sorrow. Lexington Books. (Related to GGN's Unseen Grief.)
• Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2014). SAMHSA's Concept of Trauma and Guidance for a Trauma-Informed Approach. HHS Publication No. (SMA) 14-4884. (Related to the GGN Steady Ground Promise and Habits.)
• Figley, C. R. (Ed.). (1995). Compassion Fatigue: Coping with Secondary Traumatic Stress Disorder in Those Who Treat the Traumatized. Brunner/Mazel. (Outside term: compassion fatigue.)
• McCann, I. L., and Pearlman, L. A. (1990). Vicarious traumatization: A framework for understanding the psychological effects of working with victims. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 3(1), 131 to 149. https://doi.org/10.1002/jts.2490030110 (Outside term: vicarious trauma.)
• Tervalon, M., and Murray-García, J. (1998). Cultural humility versus cultural competence: A critical distinction in defining physician training outcomes in multicultural education. Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 9(2), 117 to 125. https://doi.org/10.1353/hpu.2010.0233

Sources for facts cited in this handbook

• American Psychiatric Association. (2022). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-5-TR). American Psychiatric Association Publishing. (Prolonged grief disorder.)
• World Health Organization. International Classification of Diseases, 11th Revision (ICD-11). (6B42 Prolonged grief disorder; QD85 Burnout, classified as an occupational phenomenon.)
• World Health Organization, War Trauma Foundation, and World Vision International. (2011). Psychological First Aid: Guide for Field Workers. World Health Organization.
• 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline (988lifeline.org) and U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, Warning Signs of Suicide (nimh.nih.gov).
• Mostofsky, E., et al. (2012). Risk of acute myocardial infarction after the death of a significant person in one's life. Circulation, 125(3), 491 to 496. https://doi.org/10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.111.061770
• American Heart Association. Is Broken Heart Syndrome Real? (heart.org). (Stress cardiomyopathy.)
• Khalsa, S. S., et al. (2018). Interoception and mental health: A roadmap. Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging, 3(6), 501 to 513. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpsc.2017.12.004
• Lindahl, J. R., Fisher, N. E., Cooper, D. J., Rosen, R. K., and Britton, W. B. (2017). The varieties of contemplative experience: A mixed-methods study of meditation-related challenges in Western Buddhists. PLOS ONE, 12(5), e0176239. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0176239
• Zaccaro, A., et al. (2018). How breath-control can change your life: A systematic review on psycho-physiological correlates of slow breathing. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 12, 353. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00353
• Dazzi, T., Gribble, R., Wessely, S., and Fear, N. T. (2014). Does asking about suicide and related behaviours induce suicidal ideation? What is the evidence? Psychological Medicine, 44(16), 3361 to 3363. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0033291714001299