I’m Laurenne, founder of Don’t Send Flowers.
I created this space because I wanted something that helped people the way I wish I could have been helped back when I was 16 and my dad took his life.
I wish I’d had someone who could just drive me around and let me scream my lungs out.
But nobody I knew really wanted to talk about it, so we all brushed it under the rug, and I tried not to mention it for 12 years! For all that time, I could feel the anguish of an untold story trying to get out, but I buried it deep inside. Finally, I made a friend whose brother had also taken his life. She understood me, and it changed everything. I began writing about my father’s death, publishing pieces here and there. Through telling my story, I met more and more people who understood. It felt like such a relief to be with people who got me. We had similar stories and feelings. I wasn’t this weirdo with a sob story. I was a person with trauma and sadness. And I was so ready to process that.
I became a “workshopaholic,” studying all kinds of healing modalities to try and figure out how to help me deal with the unprocessed grief I had stuck inside. I spent a month meditating and doing Chi Gong in Bali. I dissected a cadaver to understand death better. I studied narrative therapy and reiki and yoga and breathwork and Tsa Lung– all of the things.
Finally, I went back to school to get my Masters in Spiritual Psychology, and I trained in trauma recovery and studied nervous system regulation, as suicide loss is almost always traumatic. I began leading suicide loss support groups. I helped create the curriculum for the program at New Hope in Long Beach. Yet, I saw that I could develop an even more helpful system of processing grief by using all of my skills. This means we might shake our bodies to release trauma. We might scream together. We might write letters and burn them. Most of all, I will listen and hear about what you are feeling and what you need. We will decide together how best to help you process. And one day, you might even look back at our time together and say, “Oh yeah, that was a time when I was so sad and deep in grief. Thank goodness I feel better now.”
I have several openings a week for quick chats if you need to tell your story or just want to feel heard or understood. Schedule one below. I’m glad you’re here, but I’m so sorry you have to be here.
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