Grief counseling in Seattle, with room for however it shows up

What grief can look like

People often come to grief counseling worried they're doing it wrong: too sad for too long, or not sad enough, or fine for weeks and then flattened by a song in the grocery store. There is no wrong way. Some of what people bring to me:

• Waves of sadness or longing that arrive without warning
• Numbness, or feeling oddly fine and guilty about it
• Anger, at the person, at doctors, at people who've moved on, at yourself
• Trouble sleeping, eating, concentrating, or getting through ordinary days
• Grief that feels stuck, or that's resurfaced years later
• Losses others don't recognize: a miscarriage, an estrangement, a pet, a friendship, a job, a home
• Anticipatory grief while someone you love is still here

Grief is love with nowhere to go, and it changes shape rather than ending. The goal of our work isn't to "get over" it. It's to help you carry it in a way that lets you keep living.

How I work with grief

Mostly, I make room. Grief needs a place where it can be spoken without someone rushing to fix it or change the subject, and that's what our sessions are. From there, drawing on Internal Family Systems (IFS), we get to know the parts of you that are grieving, the parts that are trying to hold everything together, and the parts that might be angry or numb, and we help them stop fighting each other.

When the loss was sudden or traumatic, or when it has stirred up older losses, I bring in somatic tools for the physical weight of grief and, where it helps, EMDR to process the hardest moments, like the phone call, the hospital room, the last conversation, so they stop replaying. I'm trauma-informed throughout, and we go at whatever pace you need.

What to expect

We start with a free 15-minute consultation so you can get a feel for how I work. If it feels right, our first session is a gentle conversation about your loss and what you're hoping for, at whatever depth you're ready for. You don't need to have words for it yet.

Sessions are 50 minutes, weekly or biweekly, held online via secure, HIPAA-compliant video from wherever you feel most comfortable, which for many grieving people is home. Some people come for a focused stretch around a loss; others find longer support valuable, especially around anniversaries and holidays.