Whitehall, Pennsylvania, United States
I am a grief counselor, writer and speaker who is passionate about dispelling common misconceptions that interfere with healthy grieving and healing after loss. My professional background was in education, but I found my true calling in the death, dying and bereavement field. I am a former hospice volunteer, former family caregiver and a suicide loss survivor. I write and speak about the landscape of loss. Some of the topics I've presented include: What is good grief, how children grieve, death in the workplace, talking to dementia, the art of life review, and sharing the caregiving role in the family.
I am a writer, grief counselor and speaker. In addition to working with clients individually, I facilitate a monthly grief support group in the Lehigh Valley and write about many aspects of grief and loss. I am a member of Lehigh County's Suicide Prevention Coalition. Currently I am seeking literary representation for my book, The Man from Glad: A Journey of Forgetting and Remembering. When my father goes into renal failure, I reluctantly assume the role as his medical power of attorney, revisiting not only our turbulent past but also the secrecy surrounding my mother's illness decades earlier. This is a story about ambiguous loss, second chances and dementia's silver lining.