The grief that results from losing relationships is profound, but it can feel especially isolating due to the guilt and shame often tied to it.

Barri Leiner Grant has experienced the grief of divorce from many perspectives -- as a child whose parents split up, as a spouse whose marriage ended, and as a grief coach who helps others navigate relationship loss.

In this conversation, Barri shares how her parents' divorce influenced her understanding of grief, shaped her approach to her own divorce, and how she uses these insights to support others.

Barri Leiner Grant is a well-respected grief specialist, author and founder of The Memory Circle: for those learning to live with loss. As coach, educator and advocate, she holds transformative gatherings and workshops to explore grief tending tools and techniques that foster community, hope and healing. She combines her writing background and yoga/meditation training to craft meaningful modalities for clients and groups. Her work has been featured in The Washington Post, and Psychology Today. Maria Shriver’s Sunday Paper among others. Her mother Ellen died suddenly in 1993, and Dad this past year and she honors them in this work. She is Mom to Emma and Quinn and lives with her husband Alex and their pup Bean in NY.

*Special Offer* Barri will be co-faciltitating a 3-day Learning to Live with Loss retreat with Meghan Riordan Jarvis at Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY on May 23rd-26th. For early bird pricing before March 8th, use code EB2 at checkout: Register Here

To connect with Barri and learn more about her work:

IG: @thememorycircle

Website: https://thememorycircle.com/

Substack: Permission Granted

After Kelli Holloway's mom died, she heard a very clear message from God: Build, Go, Rest. 

Her trust in this guidance not only shaped the way she grieved but also changed the entire trajectory of her life.

Kelli Holloway is a Raleigh, North Carolina native with a passion for community, connection, and purpose-driven work.

She is the creator and host of the Grief in the Raw Podcast, where she thoughtfully explores the role of grief in the Black community, and the CEO of Kelli & Co., a consulting firm that helps companies create meaningful community outreach initiatives. 

Kelli’s story is a testament to the power of transformation, resilience, and the choice to build a life that honors both personal healing and professional impact.

To learn more about Kelli and her work, visit https://www.kelliandco.com/

To listen to her Grief in the Raw podcast, click one of the links below, and follow along on instagram at @griefintherawpodcast.

Apple podcasts: LINK

Spotify: LINK

YouTube: LINK

Angela Schellenberg has become closely acquainted with the grief that accompanies an empty nest since her twin sons went through this transition of moving out one year ago. 

In this conversation, Angela is very honest about how hard that transition has been for her, and she also shares her extraordinary life story and makes some fascinating connections about how this current empty nest grief relates to previous losses.

Angela is a licensed Mental Health Trauma, Grief, Loss, Attachment, and EMDR psychotherapist. She is also a Mother Hunger®-trained facilitator, drawing from the insightful work of therapist and author Kelly McDaniel. Angela offers a range of therapeutic approaches and psychoeducation to meet the unique needs of her clients.

You can connect with Angela and learn more about her work by visiting:

• IG: @angelaschellenberg

And to learn more about or connect with me, please visit:

• IG: @juliannerollefson

The scariest part of the dying process is that, for most of us, it exists in the realm of the unknown.

Julie McFadden, aka Hospice Nurse Julie, spent 8 years as an ICU nurse, where she and her colleagues would talk about the likelihood of patients dying with each other and not with the dying person and their families, 

Julie’s desire to advocate for dying patients and their families led her to transition into hospice nursing, where she realized how natural and beautiful the dying process can be. 

Julie has brought death education into the social media space, garnering huge followings on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. Her new book, Nothing To Fear: Demystifying Death to Live More Fully is available everywhere this week, and her videos and writing work to alleviate the fear and stigma around death and dying in the hopes of helping people have better, more peaceful, deaths.

To learn more about Julie and her book tour, and to order her book, visit www.hospicenursejulie.com or follow her on social media @hospicenursejulie.

For more about The Art of Losing podcast and host Julianne Manske Rollefson, visit www.juliannemanskerollefson.com.

Stephanie Sarazin's life has a clear line delineating before and after. One day she was happily married with three children, and the next she made a devastating discovery that her beloved marriage wasn't what she believed it to be.

As she found her way through the pain of that discovery and subsequent divorce, Steph became a writer, an accidental grief researcher, a TEDx Curator, and ultimately, an experiential expert in ambiguous grief -- which is the term she uses to describe the challenge of grieving a loved one who is still alive.

In this conversation, Steph describes our cultural discomfort with suffering, defines the way in which hope can act as a double agent, and draws a fascinating similarity between finding meaning and forgiveness. 

Stephanie Sarazin, M.P.P., is the author of Soulbroken: A Guide for Your Journey Through Ambiguous Grief, a 2023 Nautilus Book Awards Gold Winner. She is a writer, researcher, and experiential expert in ambiguous grief who aims to support those grieving the lost of loved ones who are still living. As a Certified Grief Educator, Stephanie brings new resources to reframe disruptive, activating events as a gateway to discovering your highest self. Check out her work and other adventures at stephaniesarazin.com and follow her grief-and-joy journey on Instagram  @stephing_thru.

When Warren Kozak became a widower following the death of his beloved wife, Lisa, a lot of well meaning friends recommended books for him to read, but none of them were helpful in processing his grief.

So he decided to write the book he wished had been available.

Waving Goodbye: Life After Loss is part love story, part guidebook, and full of gratitude and heart. It provides candid truths about grieving while offering hope to others who have experienced profound loss.

This conversation covers the full gamut of grief, including the toughest moments, the role of religion, and the significance of special places.

Warren Kozak is an author and journalist who has written for television’s most respected news anchors including Ted Koppel, Charles Gibson, Diane Sawyer and Aaron Brown, among others. He was an on-air reporter for NPR, and his writings have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the New York Sun, and other newspapers and magazines. Warren lived and worked in China in the mid-1980s, and is the winner of the prestigious Benton Fellowship at the University of Chicago. His other acclaimed books include The Rabbi of 84th Street: The Extraordinary Life of Haskel Besser (HarperCollins, 2004), LeMay: The Life and Wars of General Curtis LeMay (Regnery, 2009), and Presidential Courage: Three Speeches That Changed America (2012). Born and raised in Milwaukee, he currently lives in New York City, where he has spent most of his career.

For more information about Warren, please visit his website at www.warrenkozak.com.

And to get in touch with Julianne, visit www.juliannemanskerollefson.com.

Lisa Keefauver is intimately acquainted with grief. In her professional life as a grief activist, social worker, podcaster, author, and speaker, she is committed to illuminating and dismantling the collective story of grief we’ve been told.

And as a young widow and recent cancer survivor, she brings her personal experience with grief to her work, as she holds space and bears witness to others who have experienced profound loss.

In this wide ranging conversation on grief, we discuss its relation to homesickness, its resemblance to scuba diving, and its connection to geography.

Lisa’s first book, Grief is a Sneaky Bitch: An Uncensored Guide to Navigating Loss, is being published by UT Press and will drop June 2024 and is available for pre-order now.

Visit www.lisakeefauver.com to learn more about Lisa, sign up for her Not-So-Regular Newsletter, register for an upcoming online grief workshop, find out if she is coming to a city near you for her book tour, or watch her TEDx talk, Why Knowing More About Grief Can Make it Suck Less.

What happens when someone whose job is supporting other people’s mental health is rocked by their own traumatic loss?

In this episode, Juliet Haas LPC, LMHC, shares her story, including the personal and professional impacts of her loss.

Juliet is an embodied trauma-informed counselor, registered dance-movement therapist, and owner of Mindful Counseling and Wellness LLC. Licensed in both Wisconsin and Massachusetts, Juliet supports adults through grief, both death and non-death loss, trauma, and anxiety. Her therapeutic approach is person-centered, mindfulness based, and integrative. Her approach includes a blend of traditional talk therapy, mindfulness tools, expressive movement and art, and humor. She has specialty training in Accelerated Resolution Therapy for Trauma and Mind-Body approaches to assist in nervous system regulation. Juliet is also certified in Laughter Yoga: bringing more laughter and joy to the Milwaukee area!

To learn more, visit: https://www.mindfulcounselingandwellnessllc.com/

Instagram: @mindfulcounselingandwellness

And to connect with Julianne, please visit www.juliannemanskerollefson.com

Is there room for humor in the world of grief and loss? According to Kathleen Wallace, creator of Grief: A Comedy, laughter can serve as a tool for connection as we navigate the losses in our lives.

Kathleen is an actress, writer, producer, and facilitator whose work spans both the entertainment and corporate worlds. Her short film GRIEF: A COMEDY was recently selected for the Stowe Story Labs - Sidewalk Narrative Lab and the Stowe Story Labs TV Writers Room with Derek Simonds (showrunner, THE SINNER) and David Pope (co-founder, Stowe Story Labs). Notable work includes her series SETTLING UP, which is available on Amazon, and her feminist comedy series THE EVAGELISTS, about evangelists for feminism, which was a finalist in the Raindance Pilot Competition and won a Made In NY Women’s Fund grant. She has facilitated classes and conversations for organizations including the Yale Alumni Association, World50, and Google.

To learn more about Kathleen and Grief: A Comedy, visit KathleenWallace.com and linktr.ee/griefacomedy 

And you can follow the project on Instagram @griefacomedy

To connect with Julianne, please visit www.juliannemanskerollefson.com

What is the cost of framing motherhood only in terms of its potential gains, without acknowledging its inevitable losses?

That’s one of the questions that Molly Milllwood addresses in her brilliant book, To Have and To Hold: Motherhood, Marriage, and the Modern Dilemma. A mix of research, client stories, and Molly’s personal experience, the book tells the truth about the realities of motherhood in an effort to normalize and validate the experience for women everywhere.

In this conversation, Molly discusses the current state of parenthood, its impact on mothers and their marriages, the role that social media and shame play in its difficulties, and its capacity to expand our emotional experience.

Molly Millwood is a licensed psychologist, author, speaker, singer-songwriter, mother, wife, and devoted advocate for women’s mental health and wellbeing.  She holds a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Montana and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University Medical Center.  After juggling an academic career with a part-time psychotherapy practice for over 15 years, Molly now practices therapy full time.  She works with adult individuals and couples, helping women rediscover themselves within the metamorphosis of motherhood and helping couples of all sorts improve their relational health.  Her 2019 book, To Have and To Hold:  Motherhood, Marriage, and the Modern Dilemma explores the emotional landscape of early motherhood and the inextricable link during this phase of life between women’s wellbeing and the wellbeing of their marriage or intimate partnership.  Her work has been highlighted by The Washington Post, Mother Untitled, WNYC Radio, and numerous other media outlets, along with dozens of podcasts.  She lives with her husband and two sons in the mountains of Vermont, where in her free time she can be found with a guitar in her hands, her nose in a book, or her feet on a steep dirt road. 

To learn more about Molly, visit www.mollymillwood.com

To purchase her book, visit https://bit.ly/mollymillwood

Follow Julianne on Instagram at @juliannerollefson

And to learn more about Julianne or to get in touch, visit www.juliannemanskerollefson.com