Sounds silly, but what if you printed off a page with basic bulleted points (minimal text if possible) about the symptoms of someone going through the grief process. Ask him when you sit down and when he is peaceful to just take 2 min of his time and commit to reading the sheet. If he identifies with the points on the sheet, then he is self-aware enough to go to step 2: letting him know you are feeling the same way and would like to work TOGETHER to address the despair. Let him know you already have a possible plan (therapist) and you just need him to agree to participate just once and then he can reassess. Step 3: ongoing therapy IF he will agree to it. He needs to know he is committing his whole life to therapy and open wounds first, that is why I would try to get him to go just once and see if he is ok with it. baby steps?