Grief Counselors
The loss of a loved one can have a profound impact on the rest of one’s life. For many people, speaking with a trained grief counselor has helped them navigate the grieving process and the wide range of emotional challenges that come with loss.
At Alive, our team of grief counselors has experience working with a full spectrum of ages and life experiences. Thanks to our donors, services are offered on a sliding scale, and no one is turned away.
To learn more contact us at 615-963-4732 griefsupport@alivehospice.org.
Stephanie Larson, LMSW
MSSW, University of Tennessee Knoxville
Clinical Highlights: Stephanie is a licensed master social worker with a passion for person-centered, strengths-based care. She supports grievers of all ages through individual and group counseling, with a special focus on children and adolescents. Her work includes school-based grief support across Middle Tennessee and contributions to Alive’s children’s programming. Stephanie integrates clinical expertise with creative, developmentally appropriate approaches and is trained in the Companioning Model, Multidimensional Grief Therapy, and Trauma and Grief Component Therapy.
Quote: “Grief, I say, come in. Sit down. I have tea. There is honey. This will take as long as it takes.”
– This Hallowed Wilderness
Sherri McLario, LPC
MS, Georgia State University; Graduate Diploma in Christian Counseling from Psychological Studies Institute
Clinical Highlights: Licensed Professional Counselor with extensive experience working with adolescents and adults. As a practitioner, Sherri utilizes a companioning model to support grieving clients. She provides trauma-informed, client-centered grief care in her groups and individual counseling.
Quote: “Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”
― Jamie Anderson
Teresa Yarbrough, RN, LPC
BSN, University of Texas-Arlington; MA, Colorado Christian University
Clinical Highlights: Experienced group facilitator including sudden loss and spouse loss. Trained in the Companioning Model of grief treatment with special proficiency in anticipatory loss, and grief in patients with advanced illness. Utilizes a Narrative Therapy approach to grief counseling with a special interest in poetry.
Quote: “We grieve and heal in community.”
– Unknown
Rebekah Near, LCAT, CAGS
Clinical Highlights: Rebekah is a licensed creative arts therapist (LCAT), artist, author, teacher, and dreamer. She has worked for several years in the Hospice and pediatric palliative care arena integrating expressive arts into the field of Thanatology, with a research focus on how expressive arts therapy can transform the grieving process with children/ adolescents who are dying and or bereaved. Rebekah is an international and national presenter on the expressive arts and grief. She takes a person centered humanistic, creative and somatic approach to engage with clients of all ages. Rebekah believes that unlike any other method the arts offer unique ways of understanding ourselves and the world around us. The arts allow us to enter our grief, building bridges between our emotions and intellect. (Near, 2012)
Quote: “Art is the language of the grieving heart.”
― Rebekah Near
Dr. Joy Samuels, LPC/MHSP
Alive Volunteer
Clinical Highlights: Dr. Joy R Samuels is a Licensed Professional Counselor (Mental Health Service Provider), a Fellow in Thanatology, and ordained in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ, retired) She teaches in the graduate Clinical Mental Health Psychology Department at Lipscomb University, and presents the 1 Day ‘’Counseling Grief Clients’, and the 2 Day Treatment Certification Course: Evidence-Based Strategies for Helping Clients Make Meaning After Loss’‘ for PESI. Joy has over 35 years of experience as a licensed professional counselor, chaplain, and ordained minister.
Quote: “We tell ourselves stories to remind ourselves who we were and who we are becoming.”
― Joy Samuels
Pino Marchetti, LMSW
MSSW – University of Tennessee, Knoxville; BA – McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Clinical Highlights: Pino approaches grief work with compassion and curiosity, honoring the uniqueness of each person’s story and the many ways we carry love and loss. A native of Nashville, he has also spent many years living and working with international communities both here and abroad, which has deepened his appreciation for how people of different backgrounds experience grief. His clinical practice is grounded in Internal Family Systems (IFS), also known as “parts work,” which helps clients listen more deeply to their inner experience and cultivate a steadier sense of wholeness. Pino also draws from more than fifteen years of mindfulness practice across contemplative traditions and is certified in Compassionate Bereavement Care® through the MISS Foundation. Before joining Alive as a therapist, he volunteered with the organization for several years, supporting patients and their families. He provides bilingual therapy in Spanish and English and offers an affirming space for LGBTQIA+ individuals and families.
Quote: “When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives means the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving much advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand.” Henri Nouwen
