About Dr. Leslie

Few adults earn their daily bread doing something they love and I count myself most blessed to be among those few as I’ve have helped family members recover from devastating loss over the past 30 years as a Grief & Loss Specialist. While I firmly believe that survivors of loss CAN recover - otherwise I wouldn’t have stuck with my profession and the majority of my clients DO recover or I’d have quit! - I also agree that survivors are never the same as before. Losing the glue in your life does indeed forever transform, as little else in life can. That’s why experience is so important and why my years exclusively as a Grief & Loss Specialist matters greatly. Only experience can sensitize and teach the pitfalls and challenges of loss from suicide, homicide and fatal accidents. How those losses differ from long-or-short-term illness, divorce or the major transitions in life we all experience. Why adults and teenagers respond as they do and, most importantly, equip survivors of each type of loss with the emotional tools, so to speak, to effectively heal their mind, body and spirit. This meaningful and exciting journey began with receiving my Ph.D. from U.C.L.A in social psychology and family dynamics in 1981 while also working concurrently at Kaiser Permanente’s Hospice for 17 years helping families face terminal illness. Hospice is where I discovered bereavement and devoted the last ten of those 17 years helping surviving family members find a life after the death of their beloved. Establishing a private practice in 1995 as a grief counselor I have continued this amazing journey of growth, ever widening my experience of loss and grief. With the continued blessings of God, I hope to further assist in the healing of adults and teenagers whose lives have been forever reconfigured by loss from death, divorce and life’s ‘rites of passage’ transitions.