Content warning: discussion of miscarriage and assault.

Some losses come with a funeral, a death certificate, a community that gathers. And some losses happen in silence — without a name, without a ritual, without anyone to say: I see what you've lost. Cole Imperi has spent nearly two decades building language for that second kind.

Cole is a thanatologist, researcher, and the originator of Shadow Loss Theory, the idea that the death of something, not someone, deserves the same recognition as any other grief. She's also the founder of the School of American Thanatology and a pioneer in Thanabotany, the study of how humans use plants to navigate death and loss.

In this conversation, Cole talks about why grief isn't the enemy (the loss is), what composting can teach us about healing, and why she, a multi-credentialed grief expert, ...