This past March 5th marked 2 years since my fathers death. His passing was particularly traumatizing to me as I was the one to find his body and had to break the news to my mother and sister. With that in mind, I saw my counsellor at my college and she was (quite visibly) angry with me for being depressed. When I told her that I believed the reason was because I was grieving my dad's death for the time being she said to me, "That's not a reason for being depressed. You can't let it define you."

I was quite hurt by that comment as I have never properly grieved the loss of my dad and she was being quite harsh with me during the whole meeting. I was mostly upset by this because it's never defined me - if anything it's always been a surpressed memory and the fact that it was coming up at all was surprising and disturbing for me.

Since this incident I have worked things out with this counsellor, however, I am still hurt by this comment. Am I overreacting? Am I letting it define me by acknowledging it at the anniversary? If I can't talk to my counsellor about it, who can I talk about it with?

Any thoughts or suggestions are appreciated....