Therapy for Ambiguous Grief
You're Grieving Something
the World Doesn't Have a Word For
Therapy for Ambiguous Grief
& Life Transitions
Something ended —
and you haven't been the same since
Maybe it was a parent you were estranged from — and the grief arrived wrapped in guilt, relief, anger, and a complicated silence where the relationship you always hoped would change used to live. The phone call that came too late. Everything that went unsaid. The version of them you kept hoping would show up and never did.Maybe it was a marriage that slowly stopped feeling like yours — not a dramatic ending, just a long, quiet unraveling.Maybe it's watching a parent disappear into dementia while their body stays. Grieving someone who is still here. Mourning in real time with nowhere to put it.Maybe it's a career that was your identity. A friendship that ended without explanation. A version of your life you planned — the one that quietly became impossible.Maybe it's the woman you used to be before everything changed.This is ambiguous grief. And it is one of the loneliest kinds of loss — because the world only makes room for grief it can see. Grief with a casserole and a clear before and after. Grief that looks like grief.Yours doesn't always look like that. And it still counts.
Misery loves to tell you your problems are unsolvable - Misery is a liar.
You're in the right place if...
You feel sad but you can't explain why — or you feel nothing, which somehow feels worse
You're mourning something that hasn't fully ended yet — and that ambiguity is its own kind of torture
You feel guilty for grieving something other people don't recognize as a loss
You're stuck between the life you had and the life you're building — and neither feels like home yet
You keep waiting to "get over it" but the timeline everyone else expects doesn't match what your body is still carrying
You've been strong for so long you're not sure you'd recognize yourself if you stopped
You're grieving a relationship that was already lost long before the person died — and no one around you understands why that's harder, not easier
You feel things you're not supposed to feel — relief, anger, numbness — and the shame of that makes the grief even lonelier
You don't need a reason the world recognizes to deserve space to grieve.
grief doesn't follow stages
What makes this grief different
There's no clear before and after. No closure. No casserole on your doorstep.
Just a slow, quiet unraveling of something that used to anchor you — and the disorienting work of figuring out who you are now that it's gone.
Narrative therapy is particularly powerful here because ambiguous grief is at its core a story problem. The old story no longer fits. The new one hasn't been written yet. And the in-between is where most women get stuck.
Our work together is about finding language for what you've lost — and beginning, slowly and without pressure, to write what comes next.
"You will lose someone you can’t live without,and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.”
― Anne Lamott
How I work with ambiguous grief
Ambiguous grief is at its core a story problem. The old story no longer fits. The new one hasn't been written yet. And the in-between — that disorienting, untethered place — is where most women get stuck.
I use narrative therapy to help you name what you've lost — even when the world hasn't given it a name. To find language for the grief that lives in the margins. To separate the loss from your identity so you can begin to see yourself beyond it — not by erasing what happened, but by understanding it in a way that gives you more room to breathe.
Where the grief has roots in trauma — relationships that hurt, losses that compounded, transitions that came too fast — I bring in EMDR to help your nervous system process what's been stuck. Not to relive it. To release it.
This isn't about moving on.
It's about moving forward — with the full weight of what you've been carrying, finally acknowledged.
Frequently asked questions
What is ambiguous grief?
Ambiguous grief is loss without clear closure — grief that the world doesn't always recognize or validate. It includes the death of an estranged parent, the end of a relationship that was already broken, watching someone you love disappear into illness, losing an identity, a career, a version of your life you planned for. It's grief without a casserole. Without a clear before and after. And it's just as real as any other kind of loss.
Is it normal to feel relief after someone dies — even if I also feel sad?
Yes — completely. When a relationship was painful, estranged, or complicated, grief often arrives alongside relief, anger, numbness, or even nothing at all. Those feelings don't make you a bad person. They make you someone who had a complicated relationship with a complicated person. Therapy is a place where all of those feelings can be held without judgment.
What's the difference between grief and complicated grief?
Grief is the natural response to loss. Complicated grief — sometimes called prolonged grief disorder — is when grief becomes stuck, interfering with daily functioning for an extended period. Ambiguous grief often becomes complicated because there's no recognized ritual, no social permission to mourn, and no clear ending. Therapy can help you process what's stuck and find a way forward.
Can therapy help with grief from estrangement?
Yes — and it's one of the most underserved areas in mental health. Estrangement grief is particularly complex because you're often grieving a relationship that was already lost, a parent who is still alive but gone, or a version of a relationship you always hoped for and never had. Narrative therapy is particularly effective here because it helps you make meaning of a story that never got a clean ending.
I'm not sure what I'm feeling is grief. How do I know if I need support?
If something has changed — a loss, a transition, an ending — and you haven't felt like yourself since, that's enough. You don't need to be in crisis to deserve support, you just need to be carrying something that's getting heavier.
Your grief is real —
even if no one else can see it
The discovery call is a conversation about what you're carrying and whether I'm the right person to help you find your footing again. No pressure. Just an honest conversation.
