The loss everyone expects you to handle
A parent dies and the world treats it as sad but ordinary. You get a few days off. People say they lived a good life. Within a month, most of the check-ins stop.
Meanwhile something has shifted under you. The person who knew your whole history is gone. The family has lost its center and may be splintering over the house, the money, or thirty years of unspoken resentment. You’re now the oldest generation, which you weren’t ready for. And you keep reaching for your phone to call them.
What we work on
- The grief itself, whether the death was sudden or came after years of illness. I approach it the way I approach all grief counseling in Houston: as something to carry, not something to fix.
- Grieving a difficult parent. Estrangement, abuse, addiction, or a relationship that never became what you hoped. This grief is heavy with relief and anger, and it needs a place to go.
- What comes after caregiving. If you spent years caring for your parent, their death can leave a hole where your whole schedule used to be. Many people come to me from caregiving straight into grief.
- Family fallout. Siblings, estates, roles, the parent who’s still alive and now depends on you.
- The identity shift. Becoming the one people call. Facing your own mortality. Deciding what of theirs you carry forward and what you set down.
- The first year: their birthday, your birthday, the holidays, the anniversary.
Online, from wherever you are in Texas
Sessions are by secure video. If you’re back and forth between Houston and a parent’s house in another city settling affairs, therapy comes with you.
Book an online grief counseling session, or contact Laura with a question first. Costs are listed on the insurance and fees page.