Lesleigh Tolin, MS, CPDC
Foundational Certification
Online Capabilities Trained
Advanced Grief Recovery Method Specialist
Email Specialist
Programs Presented In
English
Hello and thanks for the courage to reach out to me!
Many of my clients are curious about my past losses because they feel more comfortable when they align with a Specialist who has walked through similar pain.
I'm a youthful senior woman, living in Los Angeles, who has lost both my parents. My loss of my late father was the most painful because we had been able to make amends for our past behaviors - due to his alcoholism - before he died in 2000. We were able to share four years of wonderful friendship together before his death and had become so emotionally close again. This program works wonders!
I was deeply devastated with my "Popo's" loss. His participation in his own 12 step recovery program in the latter years of his life was
admirable and life giving to everyone he loved, largely family!
GRM gave me even greater acceptance and peace following my father's death which I never even knew was possible. All due to the rejuvenating, compassionate and science based work from John James!
My mother died in 1996. We had an emotionally complex relationship. Today I remain eternally grateful for the GRM steps for my healing post her loss. I am free today of past resentments and have expressed forgiveness for what I wished would have prevailed between us when she was alive!
My only regret with experiencing the Grief Recovery Method is that I didn't have a mentor to introduce me to this transformational experience 35 or even 40 years ago!!
I have lost loved ones to suicide, a plane crash, too many to overdoses, auto accidents and chronic illnesses. I have said final farewells to each of my many aunts and uncles. I worked in hospice services for 12 professional years and experienced the grace of losing a multitude of wonderful patients to their final days and the unspeakable grief of the families left behind. Today as a senior, I'm saying farewell to high school classmates often and am ever so grateful for the healing work of John James's small and structured steps...
I know how personally empowering the Grief Recovery Method can effect us if we engage in it fully! This Method is not therapy! What is empowering is the therapeutic effects that it can have for any adult who fully participates in it: more daily spontaniety in life, being present with love ones, engaging in supportive exercise for self care rather than isolation from others, understanding that the antidote thru any heartbreak is via participation and connection rather than isolation!
I have now worked the steps of this program for perhaps 50 different relationships whether via death, divorce, estrangement and marriage challenges.
The absolute beauty of this educational and compassionate process is that it is as transformative for intangible as well as tangible losses!
When we move from Los Angeles to another city and leave our community of friendships behind, this too is an enormous loss to our children with their friendships and familiar surroundings as well!
I walked through a painful divorce early in life. I have been married to a former widower, later in life. At first I experienced rejection by my now husband's only adult daughter. She was still grieving her mother when George and I first met 16 years ago. Today due to GRM we are warm to one another in each family visit.
My work in my community is an ongoing joy. Due to the ongoing challenges of growing up in a home with a highly functioning
alcoholic father, I needed to unlearn many unhealthy coping skills later in life.
It my privilege today, to work a few afternoons per week teaching the principles of grief recovery to clients who are in addiction recovery residential and rehab treatment and to witness their ongoing emotional breakthroughs from the depth of this educational program. I know my beloved, late father is smiling from ther other side! My father became sober at age 77! It is never, ever too
late! When he passed on, he had 14 years of sobriety! I am now a Qualified Mental Health Specialist in the addicition professionals
world so that I can continue my offer of service in my community.
Two years ago I chose to return to class again and earned my Professional Coach Certification. My passion is coaching women
especially who date widowers. It is a very unique process of entering a relationship with a man who was married and might
have a young or adult child (or children) who is/are not in immediate favor of accepting your presence in their father's life because
of their own grief which truly could grow leaps and bounds through GRM!
My Specialty with GRM is one to one sessions with each of my private clients. We can meet by Tele-health on Zoom, in my Encino adjacent office or in the privacy of your home in the surrounding Los Angeles area. I am an Advanced Specialist and now work with clients across the nation and overseas. I've had the privilege of working in over 10 states in our nation .
It is an honor to offer each of my prospective clients a half hour complimentary consultation. The purpose of our consultation is so that you can learn about a rare emotionally uplifting possibility of living a life you can love again after loss.
From my heart to yours,
Lesleigh J Tolin, MS, AGRMS, CPDC, QMHS
Advanced Grief Recovery Method Specialist
310-570-1337
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This program is for people who prefer to work one-on-one rather than in a group setting. The 7-session format utilizes the same proven materials as the group programs and can be completed in-person or online with a Grief Recovery Method Specialist specifically trained to help people move through loss with dignity and respect.