GRIEF THERAPY IN SAN DIEGO & ACROSS CALIFORNIA
You don't have to be over it by now.
Grief doesn't move on a schedule. If you're still carrying something — a loss, an absence, a version of life that won't come back — we can help you make sense of it, at your own pace, without leaving yourself behind.
Something happened. And it's still with you.
WHO THIS IS FOR
Maybe you lost someone — suddenly, or after a long time of watching them go. Maybe you've lost something that's harder to name: a relationship, a future you planned on, a version of yourself you can't quite find anymore.
You're still functioning. Still showing up. And underneath all of it, something hasn't shifted the way you thought it would.
People told you it takes time. You've given it time. And you're still surprised by how heavy an ordinary Tuesday can feel. Still pulled under by a song, a smell, a date on the calendar. Still carrying guilt about things said and unsaid, choices made, time you can't get back.
You've pulled away from people without quite meaning to. You find yourself anxious about the people still living — as if knowing this kind of loss is possible has made the world feel less safe. You're tired in a way that sleep doesn't fix.
And you're not sure what you're supposed to do with any of it.
Talk to someone who won't look away.
This is how we think about grief.
We don't believe grief is a problem to be solved or a process to be completed. We don't hand you a list of stages and tell you where you should be by now.
What we believe — and what shapes everything about how we work — is this:
Just like your relationship with someone's presence would be dynamic and changing, so is your relationship with their absence.
That relationship doesn't end. It evolves. And learning to be in it — rather than fighting it, outrunning it, or waiting for it to be over — is what grief work is actually about.
The goal isn't to stop missing them. It isn't to "move on." It's to find a way to carry this loss without being pinned under it. To hold the love and the absence at the same time. To come back, slowly and unevenly, to yourself and to the people who are still here.
We also know that grief rarely comes wearing its name. It shows up as exhaustion. Anxiety. Guilt that loops without resolution. Numbness where feeling should be. A creeping fear about everyone else you love. If that's where you are, you're not broken. You're someone who has been through something real, and you've been holding it longer than anyone should hold it alone.
HOW WE’LL WORK TOGETHER
What you can expect in grief therapy with us.
We work at your pace — which doesn't mean we stay on the surface. Grief therapy here is real, engaged, and clinically grounded.
Melanie Wolf, LMFT, has formal training in Complicated Grief Treatment (CGT) — a structured, evidence-based protocol designed specifically for grief, not just general therapy applied to loss. She also brings genuine personal familiarity with loss to this work. She has sat with people in some of the most difficult moments of their lives. She's comfortable there, and she won't look away.
Brandon Wong, ASW, works with individuals navigating loss alongside major life transitions — the kind of grief that arrives wrapped around a life that's otherwise still moving. His approach is warm, direct, and grounded in the belief that you don't need to have the right words to get started.
Psychoeducation is part of the work. Understanding why grief does what it does — why the second year is often harder than the first, why certain days arrive with disproportionate weight, why the fear of forgetting someone can become its own kind of grief — gives you something solid to hold onto when things feel formless.
We'll also help you with what's harder to talk about: the guilt, the relief, the complicated feelings about the person or the relationship or the loss itself. Nothing you bring in here will be too much. Neither of us will tell you you're taking too long.
Together we'll work on:
Processing the acute weight of a significant loss — especially one that was sudden or unexpected
Guilt and regret that loops without resolution
Anxiety about people still living — the fear of more loss
Feeling untethered from yourself or your life
Invisible grief: losses that others didn't witness or recognize
Grief that's been carried for a long time, quietly, without support
The anniversary effect — when unresolved pain resurfaces with new intensity
We won't ask you to minimize what happened or move on before you're ready. We'll help you make sense of it, process what's been left unresolved, and find a way to carry it differently.
People often come to grief therapy later than they might have — sometimes months later, sometimes years. There's a cultural message that you should be better by a certain point, and arriving at therapy can feel like an admission that you aren't.
There is no expiration date on grief. Whether you're in the first raw weeks or the quieter, lonelier stretch of the second year — whether this loss is recent or one you've carried for a long time — you're not behind.
You don't need to be in crisis to reach out. You just need to be ready to stop carrying it alone.
There’s no wrong time to ask for support.
You've been holding this long enough.
Reach out today. We'll take it from there.
In-person in Mission Valley, San Diego · Telehealth across California. We typically respond within 1–2 business days.
FAQs
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The first session is less about diving into the deep end and more about getting oriented together. We'll talk about what brought you in, what you're carrying, and what you're hoping for. You'll get a sense of how we work and whether it feels like a fit. There's no pressure to share more than you're ready to, and nothing you need to prepare or figure out in advance. Most people leave the first session feeling like they can breathe a little more than when they walked in.
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Grief therapy isn't just about telling the story of what happened — it's about understanding how the loss is living in you. We help you access and process the emotions that are hardest to sit with, make sense of what's shifted in your sense of self and your world, and find a way to move forward that feels honest rather than forced. It's the difference between recounting your experience and actually working through it.
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Grief and trauma often overlap, and you don't need to arrive with a clear diagnosis of either. Grief is typically the response to loss — of a person, a relationship, an identity, or a life you expected to have. Trauma is what happens when an experience overwhelms your ability to cope and gets stored in ways that continue to affect you.
Many people are navigating both at once. What matters most isn't the label — it's that something is affecting your life and deserves attention.
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Not necessarily. We'll always move at a pace that feels safe, and you'll have agency over what you share and when. The goal is never to push you back into something painful without support — it's to help you process it in a way that actually leads somewhere.
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It depends on what you're carrying and what you're working toward. Some people find meaningful relief within a few months. Others find that deeper trauma work or complicated grief takes longer — and that's okay. We'll talk about your goals early on and check in as we go. There's no fixed timeline, and there's no pressure to be done before you're ready.
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It doesn't have to be. Grief is the word we use for loss — but loss takes many forms. People come to grief therapy after the death of someone they loved, and also after a marriage that quietly ended, a career that didn't unfold the way they planned, a diagnosis that changed everything, a version of themselves they can no longer find. If something significant has shifted and you're still carrying it, you belong here — whether or not it fits neatly into a category.
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No. You can reach out directly — no referral, no prior authorization, no paperwork before we've even spoken. The first step is simply scheduling a free consultation, which is a real conversation to see if we're the right fit for what you're going through. You can do that here: Schedule a Consultation
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We are a private-pay practice, which means we don't bill insurance directly. Our fees are set and available when you reach out. If you have a PPO plan, you may be eligible for out-of-network reimbursement — we can provide a superbill (a detailed receipt) that you can submit to your insurance company directly. We're happy to answer questions about this when we connect.