GRIEF AND LIGHT
This space was created for you by someone who gets it – your grief, your foundation-shattering reality, and the question of what the heck do we do with the shattered pieces of life and loss around us.It’s also for the listener who wants to better understand their grieving person, and perhaps wants to learn how to help.Now in its fourth season, the Grief and Light podcast features both solo episodes and interviews with first-hand experiencers, authors, and professionals, who shine a light on the spectrum of experiences, feelings, secondary losses, and takeaways.As a bereaved sister, I share my p...
Life Beyond Deep Grief: A roundtable on living fully after loss
What happens when grief isn’t as heavy as it once was?
This candid, multi-voice conversation explores what it means to live fully after loss.
While much of the grief space centers on surviving, this roundtable makes space for what comes after the initial sorrow that follows loss and life-altering change, when life begins to expand again, often in unexpected ways.
Together, grief and resilience leaders, podcasters, and grief-informed creators explore meaning-making, post-traumatic growth, and the nuanced reality of carrying grief while also reclaiming joy, purpose, and possibility.
This is the conv...
Friend-Loss Grief Is Real: Disenfranchised grief with Hannah Rumsey of Friends Missing Friends
In a world where grief is often tied to family ties and romantic relationships, the loss of a friend can feel isolating and unrecognized.
Hannah Rumsey is a writer, certified Grief Educator, and the founder of Friends Missing Friends. After losing her best friend Lauren in 2015, Hannah went searching for support and found almost nothing. No grief groups. Not even a Google search result that addressed her experience directly. What she found instead was disenfranchised grief, a term that changed everything.
In this episode, Hannah and Nina explore why friend-loss is...
Staying Human in the Era of AI: Storytelling, Grief & Change with Patrice Poltzer
What does it mean to stay human in a world increasingly run by AI?
In this episode, Nina sits down with Patrice Poltzer — Gracie Award–winning former TODAY Show producer and co-founder of My Story Pro — about the everyday griefs and shifts of our era: the loss of certainty, the erosion of critical thinking, and the disappearing line between who we are and the tools we rely on.
Patrice shares how a cross-continental move from New York to Lisbon, a vanished family income, and a launch that flopped led her to "acciden...
Women’s Health & Self-Advocacy: How to Be Heard in Healthcare | Spencer Moore
What does it mean to advocate for yourself as a female patient, especially in healthcare systems that often overlook women’s pain, symptoms, and lived experiences?
In this episode we welcome Spencer Moore, founder and host of The Hairy Chin, certified women’s health coach, certified breast health educator, and certified breathwork specialist, for a powerful conversation about women’s health advocacy, chronic illness, breast cancer, medical dismissal, and learning how to navigate healthcare systems with confidence and clarity.
After years of chronic health struggles and being passed from doctor to doctor...
Losing Both Parents Changed Everything | Tara Accardo on Navigating Life With Grief
How do you navigate life after multiple losses and still make space for joy, purpose, love, and hope?
In this deeply honest conversation, grief and soul purpose coach Tara Accardo joins Nina Rodriguez to explore what it means to live through layered grief, traumatic loss, and major life transitions while rebuilding your sense of self.
After losing both of her parents to cancer within six months, navigating the isolation of the 2020 pandemic, experiencing heartbreak, grieving the loss of her beloved 19-year-old dog, and enduring a traumatic birth and NICU stay with her daughter...
Food Allergy Anxiety & Chronic Illness | Dr. Amanda Whitehouse on Trauma-Informed Care & Not Feeding Fear
What does grief look like when it lives inside a body that can't always feel safe? Dr. Amanda Whitehouse joins Nina to explore food allergy anxiety, trauma, and the layered losses that chronic illness brings.
Summary:
Grief doesn't only come from death. Sometimes it comes from a diagnosis. From the life you imagined slipping away, from food becoming a source of fear, from watching your child struggle to breathe and feeling helpless. That is grief, too.
In this episode, Nina Rodriguez welcomes Dr. Amanda Whitehouse, a licensed psychologist who...
Life After Sibling Loss: Identity, Faith & Following Your Destiny | Destiny Rael
What happens when grief doesn’t just take your person, but reshapes your identity, your faith, your career, and your sense of what’s possible?
In this episode of Grief and Light, Nina Rodriguez sits down with Destiny Rael, a trauma-informed life and grief coach, group facilitator, and sibling loss survivor, for a deeply personal and expansive conversation about what it means to live with grief and still create a meaningful life.
Destiny lost her brother Joseph who she describes as her best friend, creative partner, and fellow musician, two days after his 34th b...
Grief Doesn’t Have to Rule the Show: Living Alongside Compounded Grief with Sylvia Wolfer
Sylvia Wolfer has lived through a lifetime of loss. Her father died suddenly when she was seven. Her younger brother, Johan, at sixteen. Her older brother, Stefan, in 2019. Her mother in 2023.
She has navigated decades of layered grief. Through neuroscience, mindfulness, and work in the body, she has come to understand that grief can be in your life without running your life. In fact, you get to be "the boss."
In this conversation, we explore what it means to live alongside loss without being consumed by it. We talk about the weight of s...
Grief as the Highest Form of Intelligence: Paula Gasparini-Santos on Trauma, Transformation & Sitting with the Unknown
Paula went into "the void," and returned with a question that changed her life: What if grief is actually the highest form of intelligence?
In this episode of Grief and Light, I sit down with trauma and grief therapist and artist, Paula Gasparini-Santos, to explore a different way of understanding grief, one where loss becomes a portal, and "the void" transforms us.
Paula's work sits at the intersection of trauma therapy and grief, and she brings a framework that honors how intelligent grief actually is. She shares how grief operates as a form...
When Loss Becomes Initiation: Somatic Grief, Ancestral Practices, and Sacred Healing with Sundari Malcolm
What if grief wasn't something to survive, but something to move through with presence, ritual, and the full weight of your body?
In this episode, Nina Rodriguez sits down with Sundari Malcolm, a birth, grief, and death doula, yoga and breathwork teacher, author of Grief Gems, and founder of A Healing Doula Academy. Raised by Yogi parents, Sundari brings a deeply embodied and ancestrally grounded lens to loss.
After seven years caregiving for her mother before losing her to breast cancer at 27, and later losing her father to brain cancer, Sundari wasn't just...
The final "goodbye": Estrella Quiroz on losing her father & co-founding Last Farewells
Before he passed, Estrella's father left her a message worth more than billions:
✨ "I hope a million angels look after you." ✨
Those seven words changed everything.
They carried her through grief. They inspired her to travel to over 50 countries. And they ultimately led her to co-found Last Farewells — a platform helping people leave their own meaningful messages for the ones they love, even after they're gone.
In this inspiring episode, Estrella Quiroz, self-proclaimed "life enthusiast" and death tech entrepreneur, opens up about the moment her father's passin...
The Family Tree That Ends With Me: Reclaiming Legacy as a Childless, Childfree Woman
In this deeply personal reflection, Nina Rodriguez shares her experience with the profound grief and loss of her only sibling, and the realization that the family tree may end with her.
This emotional healing journey is further explored through her contributions to Get Griefy Magazine, offering a space for shared understanding.
Nina Rodriguez shares a powerful reflection on redefining legacy beyond lineage, revealing how our influence, choices, and relationships create a ripple effect that endures long after we're gone.
She dives into the societal stories that tie worth to...
Brotherhood Is Medicine: How Broreavement Is Changing the Way Boys and Men Grieve | Podcasthon 2026
Grief and Light is proud to participate in Podcasthon 2026, the world's largest podcast charity initiative, joining podcasters across the globe to amplify the organizations doing work that the world needs to hear about. Learn more: podcasthon.org
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What happens when men are never given permission to grieve?
In this episode, we hear from Daniel Ratchford, founder and president of Broreavement, and Quaheem Brooks, two men who are building something life-affirming: a brotherhood for men and boys of color navigating the turbulent, o...
Saving Lives Through Harm Reduction with Thomas Guerra | Podcasthon 2026
PODCASTHON SPECIAL EPISODE Part of the world's largest charity podcast event — raising awareness for causes that matter
What does harm reduction actually look like, and how is it saving lives right now?
In this impactful episode, we explore the realities of addiction, harm reduction, and the ongoing fight to save lives. Thomas Guerra of F-Fent.org shares personal insights, dispels common myths, and highlights the vital work being done in communities everywhere, from music festivals to college campuses and beyond.
This conversation explores:
The cu...Jewelry As a Voice: Empowering Survivors and Economic Resilience with Amanda Nicol
In this heartfelt episode, Nina Rodriguez interviews Amanda Nicol, a museum-quality jewelry designer and survivor of intimate partner violence (IPV), about transforming trauma into empowerment through her one-of-a-kind jewelry. Amanda shares her journey of resilience, community support, and the importance of storytelling and purpose in her work.
Jewelry One of a KIND is a Miami-based jewelry house creating one-of-a-kind pieces designed to be collected. Small batch. Handcrafted. Built to last.
Amanda’s jewelry and story highlight how art, purpose, and community can foster healing and resilience after trauma. Explore he...
Now That She's Gone: Mother Loss, Health Anxiety, and Legacy with Chelsea Ohlemiller
What does it mean to carry a mother’s love forward after she’s gone? How do you parent a child with life-threatening food allergies?
In this heartfelt conversation, Nina Rodriguez sits down with Chelsea Ohlemiller, author of Now That She’s Gone: A Daughter’s Reflections on Loss, Love & a Mother’s Legacy, to explore the enduring impact of mother loss.
Chelsea shares how the sudden death of her mother in 2017 reshaped her identity, her marriage, and her parenting, and how writing became both a lifeline and a way to honor her mom’s enco...
How Art Helps You Heal Grief (And Become Who You Truly Are) with Susie Stonefield
What if the mess you've been avoiding is actually the doorway?
In this episode, host Nina Rodriguez sits down with transformational creativity and grief coach Susie Stonefield to explore the powerful connection between grief and creative expression.
Susie believes creativity isn't a luxury or a talent reserved for the few. It's a birthright. And in times of loss and healing, it can become one of our most powerful companions.
Together, they explore how art-making without rules, outcomes, or expectations creates space for emotional healing and truth to surface. They m...
Year of the Fire Horse 2026: What it Means for Grievers
February 17, 2026 marks a rare cosmic convergence that happens once every 60 years.
In this solo episode, we explore the intersection of grief and the Year of the Fire Horse, a powerful metaphor for riding the uncontrollable momentum of loss while finding your center in the chaos.
We're standing at the threshold of three major energetic events: the Chinese Lunar New Year (Year of the Fire Horse), an Aquarius Solar Eclipse, and a rare planetary alignment that amplifies our ability to speak the truths of grief.
Whether you believe in astrology or n...
Grief, Poetry, and Resilient Leadership: Carl Manlan on Love, Loss, and Legacy
What does grief teach us about how to live, lead, and love? What happens when the work we do in the world meets what we’re carrying inside?
In this episode, host Nina Rodriguez sits down with development practitioner, global thought leader, and poet Carl Manlan, author of i can breathe, for a moving conversation on grief, legacy, resilience, and meaning.
Carl reflects on how loss reshaped his understanding of resilience, leadership, and what it means to honor those who came before us, and the grief that arises from li...
Hope is a Verb: Staying Human in Uncertain Times
In this solo episode of Grief and Light, Nina Rodriguez reflects on the ambient grief many of us are carrying in response to global, political, and collective uncertainty.
After taking a pause to tend to her own nervous system and grief, Nina shares a reflection rooted in presence rather than answers, exploring what it means to keep creating, caring, and staying human when the world feels overwhelming and dissonant.
Drawing on grief literacy, nervous system awareness, and the story behind Claude Monet’s Water Lilies, this episode gently reframes hope not as a feeling, but as...
Curating Grief: Charlene Lam on Choosing What to Keep vs Release After Loss
How do we decide what to keep after a loved one dies?
In this insightful episode, Nina Rodriguez is joined by grief coach, curator of The Grief Gallery™, and author, Charlene Lam, for a deeply human conversation about curating grief: the tender, often overwhelming process of choosing what to keep after loss.
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After the sudden death of her mother in 2013, Charlene found herself alone with the responsibility of sorting through her mom’s belongings. That experience became the f...
100 Episodes of Leaning Into Grief — Navigating Life Shifts with Matt & Nina
Episode 100 of Grief and Light marks a meaningful milestone shaped not only by consistency and care, but by the relationships formed along the way. Nina Rodriguez chose to honor this moment with a feed swap: a deeply personal episode originally recorded for The Life Shift Podcast, hosted by fellow podcaster and friend Matt Gilhooly.
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Read:
Grief and Light Podcast: Exploring Grief & Lighting the Way to Hope by Frank Racioppi, EAR WORTHY
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This episode reflects one of the most unexpected and beautiful ripple effects o...
Women Who Podcast: Kathy Barron on Grief, Creativity, and Building Community
An honest exploration of grief, creativity, and community with the visionary behind Women Who Podcast magazine—covering storytelling, anticipatory grief, and the movement to amplify women’s voices in podcasting.
In this conversation, Nina Rodriguez sits down with Kathy Barron, founder and Editor-in-Chief of Women Who Podcast Magazine, to explore the power of women’s voices, the complexity of grief, and the courage it takes to tell honest stories.
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Kathy shares the origin...
How solo travel helped this Latina find herself again with Bianca Alba
Sometimes, healing begins in motion. In this episode, Nina Rodriguez sits down with Bianca Alba, founder of This Latina Travels, to explore how grief, identity, and travel intertwine. What starts as a conversation about exploring the world becomes a deeper story about returning to yourself.
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Her story begins in a single-parent household where vacations felt like something other people did, faraway dreams that didn’t belong to families like hers. Today, Bianca has traveled to six continents and uses her pl...
Get Griefy With Us: A Grief Week Roundtable on How Loss Shakes Up Family and Community
What happens when you gather a circle of grievers, creators, and grief-literacy leaders around one table and ask them to tell the truth about how loss has reshaped their families, and their lives?
In this special Grief Week episode of Grief and Light, we find out.
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This episode is an offering for anyone navigating family changes after loss, for anyone bracing for the holidays, and for anyone who needs to hear that their grief makes sense, that their story matters, and that connection...
Evolving and Growing with Grief: A Grief Awareness Week Roundtable with 3 Grief-focused Podcasters
What happens when three grief podcasters sit down to talk about the happiest–saddest time of the year?
In this special Grief Awareness Week episode, three grief storytellers and space-holders — Nina Rodriguez (Grief and Light), Liz Quinn (Healing Hearts Podcast), and Tara Accardo (Life with Grief podcast) — come together for a conversation that’s equal parts honest, tender, and deeply human.
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What unfolds is a spacious, story-rich dialogue about the many faces of...
The Light That Shines Through Me: Tiriq Rashad on Grief, Family, and Spoken Word
Some stories are written in ink. Others are written in loss, love, and everything that comes after.
Today’s guest is Tiriq Rashad, spoken word artist, whose life has been shaped by the grief of losing his daughter, brother, and mother, and by the courage to transform that pain into poetry, music, and meaning. Through his books Shine Through Our Shade and A Diamond in God’s Dirt, and now his new album Kiss My Art, Tiriq invites us into the alchemy of survival where art becomes a way home...
How Digital Data Is Rewriting Suicide Prevention with Kim Burditt Barlett
Grief doesn’t just reshape us, it can redirect the entire course of our lives in ways we never saw coming.
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For Kim Burditt Barlett, that redirection began the day her brother Jon, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, died by suicide in 2010. What followed was a profound transformation that eventually led her into suicide prevention work and, ultimately, to her role at Stop Soldier Suicide.
In this episode, Kim sits down with Nina to explore the layered reality of suicide loss—the silence, the s...
Sibling Loss and Disenfranchised Grief with Dr. Angela Dean
How does life shift when you lose the only person who shared your beginnings — your earliest memories, your inside jokes, your sense of home?
In this tender and illuminating conversation, host Nina Rodriguez sits down with Dr. Angela Dean, a licensed psychologist, thanatologist, and founder of The Broken Pack™—an organization and podcast created to validate and support adults grieving the loss of a sibling.
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After the unexpected death of her brother, Tony, Dr. Dean channe...
Healing in the Himalayas: Motorcycle Therapy and Making Meaning After Sibling Loss with Ben Forman
When Ben Forman lost his brother Sam, his world shifted overnight, leaving him with survivor’s guilt, grief for what could have been, and a search for meaning.
In this episode of Grief and Light, Ben shares how a 10-day motorcycle therapy trip through the Himalayas became a transformative journey of healing, reflection, and connection. Along the way, he immersed himself in nature, friendship, and mindful practices, and drew on conversations with monks and his heritage to navigate loss.
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This episode is also available in video here.
<...No Man Walks Alone: A Journey Across America for Men’s Mental Health with Robb Pollard
No man should have to carry it alone.
Many men are hurting in silence, and Robb Pollard knows that silence well.
In this deeply human conversation, Nina Rodriguez sits down with Robb Pollard, founder of Walk With Me Brother, a nonprofit devoted to men’s mental health and connection.
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Robb shares his journey of living with bipolar disorder, navigating bullying and alcohol, and learning to face the parts of himself he once tried to outrun. What emerges is a...
Turning Pain Into Poetry: Sara Rian on Grieving and Healing After Loss to Suicide
When Sara Rian’s mother unexpectedly died in 2018, her world, and her words, changed forever.
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This episode is available in video here.
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What began as a private act of survival through poetry slowly became a bridge to others who were grieving too. Her poems, often found reaching grieving hearts through social media feeds, give voice to what so many can’t yet name: the ache, the confusion, the beauty, and the brutal honesty of grief.
In this conversation, Nina and Sara trace the ways grief reshapes not only t...
Parenting a Child in Hospice while "Sucking the Joy Out of Life" with Dr. Tasha Faruqui
A mother’s story of love, advocacy, and finding joy while parenting a child in hospice.
What happens when the life you imagined for your child suddenly changes forever?
For Dr. Tasha Faruqui, that question became her reality when her daughter, Soraya, was born with a rare and little-known genetic condition.
A doctor herself, Tasha thought she knew how to navigate the medical world. But nothing prepared her for the mix of love, fear, and relentless uncertainty that came with parenting a child whose life would look very different from what sh...
Grieving While Parenting: Mindfulness, Mental Health, and Motherhood with Reshma Kearney
How do you grieve while parenting? How do you tend to your own heartbreak and hold space for your children’s?
In this heartfelt conversation with Reshma Kearney, a Trauma-Informed Mindfulness and Healing Guide, shares her journey after losing her husband, Sean, to suicide. She opens up about navigating grief as a solo parent, communicating loss with honesty, and finding moments of presence through mindfulness in the first three years of grief.
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Reshma’s story touches on the...
Honoring Your Grief: a mini meditation for grievers by Hannah Castillo
This week, I’m honored to share something special with you—a guided meditation created exclusively for Grief and Light listeners by Hannah Castillo, host of the Love Your Calm podcast.
Hannah has been a Mental Health Counselor for over 20 years and is passionate about making meditation approachable and supportive, especially in tender seasons of life. After her own health challenges led her to discover the power of daily meditation, she began sharing these practices with her clients, helping them find balance and calm. Her meditations are short, beginner-friendly, and designed to make the practice feel...
Permission to Pause: 7 Types of Rest for Your Own "Pause Week"
What if you gave yourself permission to pause?
This episode explores why rest is essential, not optional, covering the seven types of rest, the cost of burnout, and practical ways to create your own “pause week.” Consider this your reminder that what doesn’t bend, breaks; and that even small pauses can refill your cup.
Rather than a luxury, rest is a necessity for our mental, emotional, and physical well-being
Key Takeaways:
Pause is rest, and rest is essential for survival and life.There are seven distinct types of rest as iden...Grief and Light: A Podcast About Life After Loss + Living in the 'and'
You just lost your loved one. Now what?
Welcome to Grief and Light, a podcast about the honest truth of life after loss. Hosted by Nina Rodriguez, whose world was forever changed after the sudden death of her only sibling, this show explores the reality of grief, not as something to fix, but as a lifelong companion we learn to live with.
On Grief and Light, you’ll hear:
Honest reflections on the complexity of griefConversations about post-traumatic growth without bypassing painStories that remind us grief and joy can coexist...
What if Death Wasn’t the End? Healing Through Mediumship with Karen Docherty
What if death wasn’t the end of the conversation?
In this episode of Grief and Light, Nina Rodriguez sits down with psychic medium and mentor Karen Docherty to explore how mediumship can become a powerful source of comfort, connection, and healing after loss. With warmth and clarity, Karen shares her own journey of discovering and embracing her calling, and how she now supports both the grieving and the departed through spirit communication.
Together, they unpack what mediumship really is (and isn’t), why discernment matters when seeking a practitioner, and how the messages that come...
Award-Winning and Grieving: A Conversation with Women Who Podcast Magazine's founder
And just like that, we're an award-winning podcast!
In this special episode, I’m sharing a replay of my conversation with Kathy Barron, founder and editor-in-chief of Women Who Podcast Magazine. We talk about the journey behind Grief and Light, the power of being recognized as an award-winning podcast, and why grief isn’t a linear process—it’s deeply personal, unpredictable, and life-changing.
We dive into stories of life after loss, the sneaky ways grief shows up in everyday life, and how giving yourself permission to feel can...
Healing Through Journaling: Grief & Joy After Addiction Loss with Shawn Dinneen
If you’ve ever wondered how to keep living, and even loving, after losing someone you can’t imagine life without, this episode is for you.
I sit down with Shawn Dinneen, creator of HeartStrings Journals, to hear her deeply personal story of grief, resilience, and rediscovering life and new love after the devastating loss of her fiancé to an overdose in 2022.
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Shawn shares how journaling became a lifeline during her healing journey, inspiring her business and mission to suppor...
