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Grief and loss counseling in Orange County
Loss can take many forms, and each experience of grief is unique. It might be a person and it also might be a marriage, a friendship that ended without a conversation, a career, a body that used to work differently, or a life you imagined.
Grief also doesn't behave the way people expect. It arrives late. It arrives sideways. It shows up as irritability, or numbness, or an ordinary Tuesday that takes you apart in a grocery aisle. Nothing about that means you're doing it wrong.
Grief that doesn't get acknowledged
Some losses get flowers, sympathy cards, and time off work. Others don't get acknowledged at all – not because they matter less, but because they don't fit the way people expect grief to look. That doesn't make the loss any less real, and it doesn't mean you're overreacting. There can be sadness and pain when a relationship ends and you're grieving not only the person, but the future you hoped you would have together. There can be grief when your body changes in ways you didn't expect and you lose abilities or parts of your life that once felt familiar. There can also be grief when you expect to be somewhere different in your life by a certain age and find yourself wondering if you'll ever get there. Loss can take many forms, and each one deserves space to be acknowledged and explored.
How I work with grief
Together, we'll create space for your experience, wherever you are in the process. Practically, that means a few things.
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Room to say the parts you can't say elsewhere. Relief. Anger at the person who died. Guilt about the timing. There is nothing you can bring here that will be too much.
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Attention to what grief is doing in your body. Grief is physically exhausting, and it disrupts sleep, appetite and concentration in ways people often don't connect to the loss. Somatic work gives us a way to tend to that directly rather than only talking about it.
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Curiosity about the parts of you that are managing it. Often one part is holding everything together so you can function, while another has nowhere to put what it's carrying. Internal Family Systems gives us a way to let both exist.
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No pressure toward closure. Grief doesn't necessarily go away, but it can change over time. The goal isn't to stop missing them, but to find ways to carry the loss while continuing to live your life.
Read more about somatic therapy Read more about IFS-informed therapy Read more about trauma therapy in Orange County
When to start therapy
There is no right amount of time to wait before starting. Some people come in the first month, some come two years later when it stops being socially acceptable to still be struggling. Both are reasonable. If you cry during the whole session, that's exactly what this space is for – you don't have to hold your grief together for my comfort. You also don't have to know exactly what you need from therapy before you come in. We can figure that out together.
If you're having thoughts of not wanting to be here, that is more common in grief than people admit and it deserves real support. Please tell me. If you need someone right now, call or text 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
Not sure which fits?
Most people don't arrive with a clean label, and the thing you came in for is often not the whole story. You don't need to decide now. The other places people start:
Trauma therapy Childhood trauma therapy Parents who couldn't be there for you Anxiety and depression Couples and family therapy