Grief 2 Growth

What happens when the person you used to be doesn't exist anymore — not because they died, but because a diagnosis, a surgery, or a health crisis rewrote who you are? In this episode, Loni Fagel joins me to talk about a grief almost nobody names: the grief of losing yourself while you're still here.
Loni knows this from both sides of the therapy room. A genetic cancer mutation, a mysterious chronic illness, and a health crisis that landed her at Mayo Clinic didn't just interrupt her graduate studies in psychology — they became the reason she does this work at all. We talk about her "D-Day" framework for naming the moment a diagnosis changes everything, why medical trauma is as much about what comes after the event as the event itself, and why people are so often invalidated by the very doctors meant to help them.
We also get into some of the tools Loni uses with clients: externalizing an illness by giving it its own name, expressive arts as a way to process what words can't touch, and why "post-traumatic growth" doesn't mean pretending the hard part didn't happen.
About Loni Fagel
Loni Fagel is a licensed professional clinical counselor, EMDRIA-approved consultant, expressive arts therapist, children's book author, and international speaker specializing in medical trauma, grief, and identity loss. Her work is shaped by her own experience with a genetic cancer mutation and a health crisis that upended her life and career.
Website: lonifagel.com
Instagram/social: @loni_fagel
LinkedIn: search Loni Fagel
In this episode, we cover:
Why illness and diagnosis create a real, nameable grief
The "D-Day" framework for marking when everything changed
Why medical trauma isn't about the event — it's about everything after
Learning to advocate for yourself when doctors dismiss your symptoms
Grieving a double mastectomy and genetic cancer risk
Invisible illness and the cruelty of judging what you can't see
Naming your illness to protect your identity ("is this you, or is this Patricia?")
Making meaning without needing to believe "everything happens for a reason"
Finding the glimmers of light in the middle of a health crisis
We want to hear from you: Have you ever grieved a version of yourself you didn't expect to lose? What resonated most with you in this conversation? Drop a comment — we read every one.
Continue the conversation at grief2growth.substack.com.
You've been listening. You're doing the work. But there's still this feeling that you're circling the same place.
Maybe you've thought about working with me one-on-one. Maybe something's held you back. 
I get that. And I want you to know there's still a place for you.
All of it, pay what you want. You decide what it's worth. Nobody gets turned away because of money.
https://grief2g
Want to go deeper? My Substack is where I share solo essays on grief, consciousness, and continuing bonds — thoughts that don't always make it into the podcast. It's also home to a community of listeners who get it, because they're living it too. Free to subscribe. Find it at substack.com/grief2growth.
I've been studying Near Death Experiences for many years now. I am 100% convinced they are real. In this short, free ebook, I not only explain why I believe NDEs are real, I share some of the universal secrets brought back by people who have had them.

https://www.grief2growth.com/ndelessons
Support the show
🧑🏿‍🤝‍🧑🏻 Join me on Substack- connect with others and me
👛 Subscribe to Grief 2 Growth Premium (bonus episodes)
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📅 Book A Complimentary Discovery Call
📈 Leave A Review

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What if the "guardian angel" you've prayed to and the "spirit guide" you've been told to fear are the exact same presence, just described through a different lens?
In this episode, Brian sits down with Michael McAdams — a man raised in a family soaked in Pentecostal conviction who discovered he had the gift of psychometry, the ability to receive information simply by holding an object. Michael shares the story of his mother, Wilma Jean Jones, a devout Christian who sat down at her typewriter in 1977 and began receiving dictated messages from what she called "spirit teachers." Those sessions continued for 22 years and became the book An Angel Told Me So.
This conversation goes places you might not expect from two men raised in the church: the real story behind the money changers in the temple, why the Salem witch trials might have been genuine spiritual communication mistaken for evil, how the Urantia Book lines up with the Bible's account of Jesus, and why fear has been used for centuries to keep people from trusting their own spiritual experiences.
About Michael McAdams
Michael McAdams grew up in the Cincinnati area in a family steeped in Pentecostal faith — his uncle was a preacher who planted churches across three states, and his grandmother entered ministry convinced God spoke directly into her heart. Michael discovered his own gift of psychometry as a young man, and later helped his mother recognize and record the messages she was receiving from spirit teachers. He is the author of An Angel Told Me So and runs spiritspeaks.com, where he offers free preview messages from the upcoming second volume.
🌐 Website: spiritspeaks.com
📖 An Angel Told Me So (Volume One) — available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and through Ingram at independent bookstores
Key Topics Covered
Growing up Pentecostal and the questions neither of them could shake
What psychometry is and how Michael developed the ability
How Wilma Jean began receiving channeled messages — and the confirmation message that convinced her to publish them
The Urantia Book and its account of the life of Jesus
Why the Bible's history and politics matter for understanding what it actually says
Fear as a tool of control in organized religion
How to protect your mind while opening it — establishing a spiritual "filter"
Practical advice for recognizing your own spirit guidance
Reincarnation, "graduation" instead of death, and what may come next
What resonated with you? Drop a comment below — we'd love to hear whether this reframes anything about your own faith journey, or if you've had experiences like Michael's you've never shared before.
You've been listening. You're doing the work. But there's still this feeling that you're circling the same place.
Maybe you've thought about working with me one-on-one. Maybe something's held you back. 
I get that. And I want you to know there's still a place for you.
All of it, pay what you want. You decide what it's worth. Nobody gets turned away because of money.
https://grief2g
Want to go deeper? My Substack is where I share solo essays on grief, consciousness, and continuing bonds — thoughts that don't always make it into the podcast. It's also home to a community of listeners who get it, because they're living it too. Free to subscribe. Find it at substack.com/grief2growth.
I've been studying Near Death Experiences for many years now. I am 100% convinced they are real. In this short, free ebook, I not only explain why I believe NDEs are real, I share some of the universal secrets brought back by people who have had them.

https://www.grief2growth.com/ndelessons
Support the show
🧑🏿‍🤝‍🧑🏻 Join me on Substack- connect with others and me
👛 Subscribe to Grief 2 Growth Premium (bonus episodes)
📰 Get A Free Gift
📅 Book A Complimentary Discovery Call
📈 Leave A Review

Thanks so much for your support

What if the strangest moments at the end of life are actually the most meaningful?
In this episode, Alexandra Grabbe joins Brian to talk about the seven months she spent caring for her 96-year-old mother, Bea, at home — and the deathbed visions that changed how she understands what happens when we die. Alexandra shares the exhaustion, the tenderness, and the moments of unexpected grace that shaped her new memoir, Seeing Joy. If you've ever cared for a dying parent, sat with someone in their final days, or wondered what those "hallucinations" near the end of life really mean, this conversation will stay with you.
About Alexandra Grabbe
Alexandra Grabbe has lived many lives — talk show host in Paris, eco-friendly innkeeper on Cape Cod, and lifelong writer. After graduating from Vassar College, she raised three children in France, worked in journalism and broadcasting, and assisted literary figures Barbara Chase-Riboud and Marge Piercy. For two decades she ran a green bed-and-breakfast in Wellfleet, Massachusetts. When her mother's health declined, Alexandra became her full-time caregiver — an experience that became the caregiving blog "By B's Bedside" and, nearly two decades later, her home care memoir Seeing Joy: A Story of Life, Death, and What Comes Next (Koehler Books, March 2026).
🔗 Alexandra's website: https://alexandragrabbe.com
🔗 Seeing Joy at Koehler Books: https://www.koehlerbooks.com/book/seeing-joy/
📷 Instagram: @AlexandraGrabbeBooks
In This Episode:
What it really means when a doctor calls something a "hallucination" and a hospice worker calls it a "visitation"
The physical and emotional toll of caregiving — and the sleep deprivation Alexandra says was the hardest part
Deathbed Visioning: the pattern hospice workers see again and again near the end of life
Why Alexandra's mother's fear of dying gave way to tea parties with deceased visitors
How the role reversal between parent and child reshaped their relationship
The 19-year journey to publish a book publishers once said was "too afraid" to touch
What her mother's final moments — and the arrival of Alexandra's father and grandmother — taught her about how we're not meant to be alone at the end
What resonated with you in this episode? Have you witnessed a loved one's deathbed visions, or cared for an aging parent at home? Share your story in the comments — Alexandra's experience may be more common than you think.
You've been listening. You're doing the work. But there's still this feeling that you're circling the same place.
Maybe you've thought about working with me one-on-one. Maybe something's held you back. 
I get that. And I want you to know there's still a place for you.
All of it, pay what you want. You decide what it's worth. Nobody gets turned away because of money.
https://grief2g
Want to go deeper? My Substack is where I share solo essays on grief, consciousness, and continuing bonds — thoughts that don't always make it into the podcast. It's also home to a community of listeners who get it, because they're living it too. Free to subscribe. Find it at substack.com/grief2growth.
I've been studying Near Death Experiences for many years now. I am 100% convinced they are real. In this short, free ebook, I not only explain why I believe NDEs are real, I share some of the universal secrets brought back by people who have had them.

https://www.grief2growth.com/ndelessons
Support the show
🧑🏿‍🤝‍🧑🏻 Join me on Substack- connect with others and me
👛 Subscribe to Grief 2 Growth Premium (bonus episodes)
📰 Get A Free Gift
📅 Book A Complimentary Discovery Call
📈 Leave A Review

Thanks so much for your support

What does an ICU doctor see when he's present at the exact moment someone dies?
Dr. Adam Rizvi has spent his career in critical care medicine, standing at hundreds of bedsides during life's most sacred transitions. Trained as a physician but grounded early in comparative religion, Adam has watched patients return from clinical death with vivid experiences medicine can't explain, felt rooms fill with light, and even witnessed a whirlpool of light appear at the exact moment a patient passed away — something his nurse saw too.
In this conversation, we talk about what happens when a man of science makes peace with the sacred: the medical case for consciousness surviving the body, what dying patients have taught him about forgiveness, and a simple nightly practice that can change how you live starting tonight.
About Dr. Adam Rizvi
Dr. Adam Rizvi is a critical care physician and author of Love Does Not Know Death: Stories of Death, Dying, and the Miracles of True Forgiveness. He writes about the lessons he's learned at the bedside on his Substack, Adventures in Kindness.
📖 Book: Love Does Not Know Death
✍️ Substack: AdamRizvi.substack.com — Adventures in Kindness
In This Episode, We Cover:
How a comparative religion major ended up in ICU medicine
The cardiac arrest patient who returned with a story that shouldn't have been possible
Why "brain as receiver" of consciousness makes more sense than "brain as generator"
The moment two people in the same room witnessed the same unexplainable light
Ancient wisdom on death — from the Tibetan Book of the Dead to the story of Nachiketas
Why forgiveness is something you do for yourself, not the person who hurt you
A nightly deathbed meditation practice you can start using tonight
What Resonated With You?
Did Adam's story about the whirlpool of light stay with you? Have you had an experience with a loved one that science couldn't explain? Share your thoughts in the comments — I read every one.
If this episode moved you, head over to grief2growth.substack.com for more reflection and to connect with other listeners walking this same path.
You've been listening. You're doing the work. But there's still this feeling that you're circling the same place.
Maybe you've thought about working with me one-on-one. Maybe something's held you back. 
I get that. And I want you to know there's still a place for you.
All of it, pay what you want. You decide what it's worth. Nobody gets turned away because of money.
https://grief2g
Want to go deeper? My Substack is where I share solo essays on grief, consciousness, and continuing bonds — thoughts that don't always make it into the podcast. It's also home to a community of listeners who get it, because they're living it too. Free to subscribe. Find it at substack.com/grief2growth.
I've been studying Near Death Experiences for many years now. I am 100% convinced they are real. In this short, free ebook, I not only explain why I believe NDEs are real, I share some of the universal secrets brought back by people who have had them.

https://www.grief2growth.com/ndelessons
Support the show
🧑🏿‍🤝‍🧑🏻 Join me on Substack- connect with others and me
👛 Subscribe to Grief 2 Growth Premium (bonus episodes)
📰 Get A Free Gift
📅 Book A Complimentary Discovery Call
📈 Leave A Review

Thanks so much for your support

Miist was five years old when her parents removed themselves from her life. Not through death — through choice. As she tells me in this episode, that distinction made the wound deeper, not shallower. She knew they could come back. They simply didn't.
By 28, she had a terminal cancer diagnosis and doctors telling her she had a month, maybe three. And here's the part that stopped me: she still doesn't hold any bad feeling toward that diagnosis. It's the thing that finally brought her family back into the room with her.
She picked up a ukulele during treatment. She didn't write her first song until she was 34. Today her music has charted on Billboard, she's the first native Chinese artist to reach the Pop AC chart, and she hosts a top-ranked mental health podcast.
This conversation goes somewhere I didn't expect. We talk about loneliness after loss — the grief that arrives with no funeral, no casserole, no one checking in — and what it actually takes to come back from it.
Miist wrote a song for a young man who passed alone in his apartment in Japan. He had food. He had shelter. He had nobody. She kept thinking about all the strangers he must have walked past on any given day, and how one moment of real eye contact might have been enough to hold him a little longer. That song, "Could You Lend Me a Smile," now exists in 16 languages.
Out of it came the idea we spend much of this episode on: the 15-second action. Small enough that nobody can claim they don't have time. Smile at someone. Be silly. Be grateful. Say a kind word. Remind someone that you love them.
We recorded this on my 65th birthday, which made one part land hard for me. Miist asked when the last time was that someone called you for no reason at all, just to say they love you. I told her about the most viral Substack post I've ever written — it was about calling my father on an ordinary day, for no occasion. It went everywhere because almost nobody does it.
WHAT WE COVER
Why abandonment can cut deeper than death, and how the earliest wound becomes the root of everything built on top of it
How Miist pushed away her closest childhood friends, and the apology she eventually wrote as a song
Choosing, in advance, to sit inside the grief of losing her dog rather than reaching for anything that would make it stop
The three days she asked her vet for, and what her whole family learned from them
Reconnecting with and forgiving the father she hadn't seen in over 20 years
Being discovered by producer Narada Michael Walden — and being asked to sing at the piano where Aretha Franklin recorded "Respect"
The Kindness Kube and the five actions on it
Using music intentionally to move through anger, sadness, and back toward joy
Why losing an old habit that no longer serves you can feel like its own kind of loss
Why both of us say plainly: we are still healing
ABOUT MIIST
Miist is a multilingual recording artist, songwriter, and podcast host who began her professional music career at 34 after being discovered by acclaimed producer Narada Michael Walden. She's a Teen Cancer America Ambassador and the founder of the World Smile Initiative, a nonprofit built around bringing moments of relief and light to people who are struggling. Her podcast, Make Me Smile with Miist, blends original music, personal storytelling, and research, and each episode closes with a 15-second action listeners can take that day. The book of the same name is now available.
🎵 Website: https://www.miistthesinger.com
🎙️ Podcast: Make Me Smile with Miist — available wherever you listen
📖 Book: Make Me Smile with Miist
🧊 The Kindness Kube: available on her website
A FEW THINGS TO SIT WITH
Which of the five actions would be hardest for you right now — and what does that tell you?
Is there someone you've been meaning to call for no reason at all?
Is there a loss in your life you've been outrunning rather than sitting with?
JOIN THE CONVERSATION
I'd love to hear what landed for you in this one. Head to https://grief2growth.substack.com to read the companion article, leave a comment, and connect with me and with other listeners walking a similar road.
If this episode helped, share it with someone who's feeling disconnected right now. That's a 15-second action of your own. 💜
CONNECT WITH BRIAN
🔗 All my links: https://pages.grief2growth.com/profile
🔗 Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/grief2growth
📰 Email list: https://pages.grief2growth.com/join-the-club
⏰ Free consult: https://grief2growth.as.me/30-minute-consult
👛 Tip jar: https://www.grief2growth.com/tipjar
Approve and I'll move to Step 5: the blog article outline.
You've been listening. You're doing the work. But there's still this feeling that you're circling the same place.
Maybe you've thought about working with me one-on-one. Maybe something's held you back. 
I get that. And I want you to know there's still a place for you.
All of it, pay what you want. You decide what it's worth. Nobody gets turned away because of money.
https://grief2g
Want to go deeper? My Substack is where I share solo essays on grief, consciousness, and continuing bonds — thoughts that don't always make it into the podcast. It's also home to a community of listeners who get it, because they're living it too. Free to subscribe. Find it at substack.com/grief2growth.
I've been studying Near Death Experiences for many years now. I am 100% convinced they are real. In this short, free ebook, I not only explain why I believe NDEs are real, I share some of the universal secrets brought back by people who have had them.

https://www.grief2growth.com/ndelessons
Support the show
🧑🏿‍🤝‍🧑🏻 Join me on Substack- connect with others and me
👛 Subscribe to Grief 2 Growth Premium (bonus episodes)
📰 Get A Free Gift
📅 Book A Complimentary Discovery Call
📈 Leave A Review

Thanks so much for your support