BOULDER, Colo. — The Naropa Community Counseling Center is offering a free 6-week counseling program for anyone still working through trauma from the Boulder grocery store shooting.
In March, 10 people were shot and killed at the King Soopers on Table Mesa Drive. A memorial was created along a fence that spans the length of the store and stops just a few yards away from the Naropa Community Counseling Center.
"I never imagined that something like this would happen in our beautiful community," Joy Redstone the center's clinical director said.
Redstone and many of her employees paid regular visits to the King Soopers just across their parking lot. When the shooting occurred, Redstone was not in the office, but two of her employees were. They sheltered in place for hours, until authorities gave an all-clear.
Since the shooting, the counseling center reopened its doors. They are now offering a free six-week counseling program for anyone still processing their trauma. Redstone has volunteer therapists from across the country and Spanish interpreters on hand to help people express their emotions in their own language.
"They want to know what to tell their kids about the kind of world this can happen in. I mean there's still a lot of pain with this," Redstone said as she explained why they were offering the service. "There's a little saying, 'you have to feel it to heal it' and that's where I think we're at."
Naropa Community Counseling Center is partnering with Whole Connection, a therapy group, for the sessions. Redstone said anyone can drop in or out. The sessions are broken into sub-groups so that everyone has time and space to talk.
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