Grief Counseling | Bereavement Therapy
You do not have to grieve alone, on a timeline, or in a way that was never built for the
complexity of what you are
carrying.
Loss does not follow a script. Neither does grief counseling here. Whether you are navigating a recent bereavement, anticipating a loss that has not yet arrived, weighing complex medical decisions, or carrying grief that never had a proper space to land, this is the clinical room where all of it is welcome.
This work was made for
moments like these:
You are grieving a loss. A person, a relationship, a future, and you have not found a space where the full weight of it is allowed to exist.
You are the one everyone else leans on, which means your grief has had nowhere to go but inward.
You are facing anticipatory grief: a terminal diagnosis, a loved one declining, an end-of-life decision you do not know how to hold.
You are carrying grief that happened years ago and was never given clinical attention, and it is showing up in your body, your relationships, or your sleep.
You want advance care planning support from a clinician who holds both the clinical and the cultural complexity of what you are navigating.
It is not just the loss. It is that grief has never been given the room it actually requires.
Grief is not a problem to be solved or a stage to move through on someone else's schedule.
Being brave enough to face your grief means you go from:
Holding it together at the funeral because everyone was looking at you, then going home and not knowing what to do with the silence, to having a room where the weight of that silence finally has somewhere to go.
Lying awake replaying the last conversation, the last visit, the last moment you had a chance to say something, to being able to sit with what was said and what was not without it consuming every quiet moment you have.
Watching a parent decline and not knowing whether to grieve the person they were or the person still in front of you, to navigating anticipatory grief with a clinician who understands that both losses are real and both deserve attention.
Carrying the grief of generations, losses that were never spoken, never mourned, never given a name, alongside your own, to finally having language for what you inherited and a clinical space to begin untangling it.
Telling everyone you are fine because grief makes people uncomfortable and you have spent a lifetime making rooms easier to be in, to being in a room where your grief does not have to be managed for anyone else's sake.
Feeling the loss in your body. The tightness, the fatigue, the way certain songs or smells stop you completely, to working with a clinician who understands that grief lives in the body as much as it lives in the mind.
That is exactly what
grief counseling and bereavement therapy is designed to do.
We’re ready to hold space for all of it. The immediate loss, the layered mourning, and the anticipatory weight of what has not yet arrived. We work with the full picture: what this loss means in the context of your history, your relationships, your culture, and your body.
Here is how the
work unfolds.
Step 1: Give the grief somewhere to land
The first sessions create space for the full picture of what you are carrying. There is no intake form dictating the agenda. We begin where you are, and we let the grief take the shape it actually has rather than the shape it is supposed to have.
Step 2: Work it at the depth it deserves
Using EMDR, Emotion-Focused Therapy, Attachment-Based Therapy, and somatic approaches, we address grief where it actually lives in the nervous system, in the body, and in the relational patterns shaped by loss. For clients navigating anticipatory grief, this includes advance care planning: the clinical work of preparing for end-of-life decisions before a crisis forces them to be made without support. What do you want for the person you love? What do you want for yourself? What conversations have not been had yet, and what will it cost to leave them that way? These are not logistical questions. They are deeply human ones, and they deserve a clinical space built to hold them with care, cultural fluency, and no rush.
Step 3: Carry your losses without being carried away by them
The goal is not to move on. It is to move forward with the full weight of what you have loved and lost. Without grief quietly running your health, your relationships, or your ability to be present.
Hi, I am
Olivia Sterling, LCSW
I specialize in grief counseling, bereavement therapy, and advance care planning for adults navigating loss in all its forms.
Grief is one of the most complex clinical presentations I work with, and one of the most underserved. I hold culturally competent grief and bereavement training and bring EMDR, somatic-body based approaches, and Advance Care Planning into grief work because loss does not live only in the mind. It lives in the body, the relationships, and the generations that came before. What you will find in this room is a space where nothing about your grief has to be simplified or rushed. The work moves at the pace you require.
You do not have to
keep carrying this quietly.
This is the space where the full weight of your loss is welcome. The consultation is a conversation.
Investment
- Free 15-minute consultation via Telehealth video
- Intake session (20+ minutes): $250
- Follow-up sessions (55 minutes): $225
“Olivia has walked with me from emerging to young adulthood, and in doing so I've become more present and assured due to her therapeutic process. Olivia's deep clinical expertise coupled with her worldliness forge an expansive approach to healing—a journey that's been a worthwhile investment of time and energy. Being under Olivia's care has allowed me to re-imagine life stressors and become reacquainted with joy. If there's any part of you that wants to come home to yourself, Sterling Counseling Services is the space to do so. Olivia's work feels more like a calling than just a duty, and I recommend her wholeheartedly. Thank you!”
— S.T.
“I have worked with Olivia since 2021 and cannot emphasize how transformative of an experience I have had over the last six years. I am immeasurably privileged to have had the opportunity to work with her through some of the most challenging years of my twenties. Olivia is one of my biggest supporters and confidants, and always there to listen without judgement. She has equipped me with tools and techniques to manage my anxiety and navigate turbulent moments and life changes. During a time when I felt truly "stuck," she was patient and compassionate. Through the years, she has encouraged me to develop the confidence to move forward and pursue some of my most lofty goals. We have explored topics like family dynamics, relationships, grief and career changes. One of the best things about my time working with Olivia has been her ability to help me reconnect with parts of myself that I felt like I forgot about. Olivia encouraged me to pursue one of my already existing but somewhat dormant hobbies, including running. I took up running again, which has brought me so much peace and mental clarity and I am pleased to say that I got into the New York City Marathon this fall. I highly recommend her services to anyone looking for trauma-informed care to help them feel "unstuck" and reconnect with themselves.”
— JP.
"Working with Olivia has been such a gift. She’s patient, kind, insightful, compassionate, adaptable, and attentive (aka everything that you’d want a therapist to embody). But something that makes working with her feel really special and safe is her cultural and sociopolitical fluency. She understands that just like trauma, our identities and our worlds are complex, and she does a brilliant job honoring and holding all of those complexities in balance. I feel really seen in her care, and through her guidance and support, I’ve been able to build my skill set and resilience for navigating life’s challenges, and find my way back to reclaiming my voice and sense of self.”
— CB.
“My experience with Sterling Counseling has been transformative. Olivia's style allows me to feel comfortable and safe while working through the toughest moments of my life. Therapy here doesn't feel like a chore, but an active part of my mental wellness routine with tools and recommendations that are easy to act on. No matter what I come into a session with - whether it is grief, depression, fears, work stress, or life changes - Olivia helps me work through it all with such care. I'm so grateful for everything Sterling Counseling has done for me.”
— R.C.
“Olivia has helped me thoughtfully navigate several major transitions in my romantic relationships, familial relationships, friendships, my career, and my mental and physical health. She has skillfully blended different therapeutic modalities to help me address my unique circumstances and challenges, so I always feel like I have a way to approach the things I bring to therapy that is tailored exactly to me. Olivia balances challenging me to think differently when necessary, while also remaining warm and non-judgmental. I have made significant progress with my overall mental health. Thanks to my work with Olivia, I know myself better, I am managing my challenges better, and I feel empowered."
— S.T.
“Olivia has walked with me from emerging to young adulthood, and in doing so I've become more present and assured due to her therapeutic process. Olivia's deep clinical expertise coupled with her worldliness forge an expansive approach to healing—a journey that's been a worthwhile investment of time and energy. Being under Olivia's care has allowed me to re-imagine life stressors and become reacquainted with joy. If there's any part of you that wants to come home to yourself, Sterling Counseling Services is the space to do so. Olivia's work feels more like a calling than just a duty, and I recommend her wholeheartedly. Thank you!”
— S.T.
“I have worked with Olivia since 2021 and cannot emphasize how transformative of an experience I have had over the last six years. I am immeasurably privileged to have had the opportunity to work with her through some of the most challenging years of my twenties. Olivia is one of my biggest supporters and confidants, and always there to listen without judgement. She has equipped me with tools and techniques to manage my anxiety and navigate turbulent moments and life changes. During a time when I felt truly "stuck," she was patient and compassionate. Through the years, she has encouraged me to develop the confidence to move forward and pursue some of my most lofty goals. We have explored topics like family dynamics, relationships, grief and career changes. One of the best things about my time working with Olivia has been her ability to help me reconnect with parts of myself that I felt like I forgot about. Olivia encouraged me to pursue one of my already existing but somewhat dormant hobbies, including running. I took up running again, which has brought me so much peace and mental clarity and I am pleased to say that I got into the New York City Marathon this fall. I highly recommend her services to anyone looking for trauma-informed care to help them feel "unstuck" and reconnect with themselves.”
— JP.
Testimonials
Frequently Asked Questions
What type of counseling is best for grief?
The most effective grief counseling is the kind built around the full complexity of your loss, not a standardized protocol applied to every client the same way. At Sterling Counseling, grief counseling draws on EMDR, Emotion-Focused Therapy, Attachment-Based Therapy, and somatic approaches, selected based on what your grief actually requires. The modality matters less than whether the clinical space is built to hold everything you are carrying, including the layers of ancestral, cultural, and relational loss that generic grief support often misses entirely.
Will insurance cover grief counseling?
Yes. We accept the following insurance plans for grief counseling services. If you're using out-of-network benefits, we can also provide a superbill for reimbursement. Out-of-pocket rates are available as outlined above.
Accepted insurance plans include:
- Aetna
- Oscar
- Optum
- United Healthcare
- Cigna
- Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield of New York
- Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts
- Carelon Behavioral Health
What is the hardest grief to overcome?
Clinically, the grief that tends to be hardest to process is grief that has never been given space to exist. Anticipatory grief, ancestral grief, collective loss, and the mourning of what was never had can be especially difficult because they are rarely named as grief at all. When loss has no language and no room, it does not disappear. It finds other places to live: in the body, in the relationships, in the exhaustion that rest cannot fix. Grief counseling at Sterling Counseling is built to address these layers, not just the most visible loss.
What is advance care planning and how is it different from grief counseling?
Advance care planning is the clinical and personal work of preparing for end-of-life decisions before a crisis forces them to be made without support. It includes navigating conversations about medical wishes, family dynamics, cultural and spiritual values, and the emotional weight of anticipating a loss before it arrives. Grief counseling addresses loss after it has happened. Advance care planning addresses the grief, fear, and complexity that live in the time before. At Sterling Counseling, both are held together as one connected clinical picture when the work calls for it.
Do I need to be actively grieving to work with you?
No. Many clients come to grief counseling while anticipating a loss, navigating advance care planning, or processing grief that happened years ago and was never given clinical attention. Grief does not follow a timeline, and you do not need to be in acute loss to benefit from this work. If you are carrying something that has never had a proper space, that is enough reason to begin.
What does the first session look like?
The first session is a conversation, not an assessment. We begin by understanding the full picture of what you are carrying, the losses named and unnamed, the history underneath them, and what you want from the work. There is no script and no standardized intake driving the pace. The goal is for you to leave the first session feeling met, not processed.
I am not sure I am ready to talk about this. Is that okay?
Yes. Grief is one of the hardest things to bring into a room, especially when you have been holding it privately for a long time. You do not need to be ready to begin — you need to be willing to find out whether this is the right space. The consultation is low-stakes and no-pressure. You will leave with more clarity than you arrived with, regardless of whether you decide to move forward.
Are sessions in person or virtual?
All sessions are currently offered virtually through a secure, HIPAA-compliant telehealth video platform. At this time, Sterling Counseling does not offer in-person appointments, allowing clients across New York to access care from the privacy and convenience of their own space.
What is your cancellation policy?
Sessions are typically 55 minutes long and are scheduled at a consistent weekly time, although session frequency may be adjusted based on your needs. If you need to cancel or reschedule, please provide at least 24 hours' notice. Appointments canceled with less than 24 hours' notice, or missed without notice, are subject to a $75 cancellation fee, unless circumstances beyond your control prevented you from attending. If availability allows, we'll do our best to help you reschedule. Please also plan to arrive on time, as sessions will end at their scheduled time.
The people we love
leave marks that do not go away.
This is the room where those marks finally get the attention they deserve. When you are ready to stop carrying it alone, reach out. The door is open.
