TPC Journal Volume 11 Issue 2

170 The Professional Counselor | Volume 11, Issue 2 suggesting that attention to VG within supervision is warranted, but further research is necessary to more completely understand the role of supervision in identifying and managing VG responses. Further, our exploration of VG is limited to an academic setting as we believe specific attention to these competencies lies in the inclusion of loss and grief training within counselor education (Doughty Horn et al., 2013). However, given the ubiquity of grief in life and within counseling (Chan & Tin, 2012; Doughty Horn et al., 2013; Hill et al., 2018), it would be remiss for us to not acknowledge that this discussion about doctoral student supervisors is just one of many situations in which a counselor or clinical supervisor may find themselves faced with experiences of VG. Our conceptualization of VG and many of our suggestions may even ring true for clinical supervisors at various stages of their career within that role. Further research must consider how supervision occurs in contexts outside of academia and the impact of VG for counselors and supervisors at more advanced stages of their career. Future Directions Given the continued pervasiveness of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is impossible to understand its long-term effects, but the immediate impacts to the profession of counseling speak to the necessity of recognizing reactions to grief within clinical work and supervision. Although the supervision literature abounds with approaches for supervising counselors, as highlighted by this article, the counseling literature lacks empirical studies on VG in supervision, despite its occurrence and impact on clinicians and supervisors alike. In the absence of such research, we call for VG in supervision to be an emerging area of focus for the profession of counseling, particularly within doctoral counselor education. However, although the scope of this article is aimed at recognizing and managing VG by doctoral student supervisors, it is our hope that drawing attention to the complexities of this experience brings further conversation to experiences of VG in all types of clinical supervision. It is of benefit to all supervisors, doctoral students, and clinicians both new to the role and with seasoned experience that increased attention is directed toward validating specific supervisory techniques developed to attend to counselors’ experience of VG in supervision. It is our goal that this discussion acknowledges the impact of VG on clinicians and promotes further research and development of best practices for managing VG in supervision, both within counselor education and beyond. Conclusion CITs and counselor educators face the possibility of experiencing VG in their respective work with clients and CITs who have experienced loss. Counselor educators in supervisory roles can help CITs mitigate VG through facilitating awareness of the impacts of grief-related clinical content into the supervision process and attending to CITs’ unique needs in the roles of teacher, counselor, and consultant. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic and its resulting landscape of increased loss and related mental health needs, it is especially critical for counselor educators and supervisors to be equipped to attend to the needs of CITs who are experiencing VG. In this article, we aimed to address this need by defining VG, discussing its potential impact on CITs and doctoral supervisors, and presenting a case study illustrating interventions that counselor educators can use when addressing VG in supervision. Conflict of Interest and Funding Disclosure The authors reported no conflict of interest or funding contributions for the development of this manuscript.