Support that fits your loss.
Grief support works best when the people in the room understand your specific loss. This directory is organized that way: by the seat that is empty. Every organization here is established, and every number was checked against their own site.
Directory verified 2026-07-09 · re-checked quarterly · in crisis?
Children and teens who are grieving
Grieving children do best with support built for them — peer groups, camps, and centers where a dead parent or sibling is an ordinary thing to talk about.
The Dougy Center
The pioneering center for grieving children and families — free resources by age and type of loss, and a directory of children's grief programs worldwide.
National Alliance for Children's Grief
Find children's bereavement support near you through their national directory of nearly six hundred programs.
Comfort Zone Camp
Free bereavement camps for children 7–17 who have lost a parent, sibling, or caregiver.
Losing a child — at any age
The losses no parent should carry, carried in company: pregnancy and infant loss, child loss, and the long years after.
The Compassionate Friends
877-969-0010
Peer support after the death of a child of any age, at any time — local chapters, sibling resources, and online communities.
Share Pregnancy & Infant Loss Support
1-800-821-6819
Support for families through miscarriage, stillbirth, and early infant death — groups, companions, and rituals of remembrance.
Star Legacy Foundation
Stillbirth-focused support, education, and research advocacy, including support groups for bereaved parents and grandparents.
Hand to Hold
Support for NICU families — during the stay, after homecoming, and after loss — including peer mentors matched to your story.
Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep
Free professional remembrance photography for families experiencing the loss of a baby.
Postpartum Support International
8AM–11PM ET1-800-944-4773 · Text "Help" to the same number
Emotional support for parents during pregnancy and after birth — including after miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss. This is a support line, not an emergency line; in crisis, call or text 988.
After a suicide or overdose loss
These griefs carry extra weight — stigma, unanswerable questions, sometimes trauma. Communities exist that understand them from the inside.
American Foundation for Suicide Prevention — loss survivors
Healing conversations with other survivors, support-group finder, and guidance for the first weeks after a suicide loss.
Alliance of Hope for Suicide Loss Survivors
A warm, moderated online community for suicide-loss survivors, active around the clock.
GRASP — Grief Recovery After a Substance Passing
Peer support for families who have lost someone to substance use or overdose, without shame.
Losing a partner, sibling, or parent
Support shaped to the specific seat left empty at the table.
Soaring Spirits International
877-671-4071
Peer-based programs for widowed people of every age — including Camp Widow, the 24/7 Widowed Village online community, and regional groups for people too young for anyone to know what to say to them.
TAPS — Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors
24/71-800-959-8277
Comfort and care for anyone grieving the death of a military or veteran loved one — a 24/7 helpline answered by people who have lived it.
The Compassionate Friends — sibling resources
Sibling loss is real loss at any age; TCF maintains resources and communities specifically for bereaved siblings.
What's Your Grief
A deep, honest library of grief articles by mental-health professionals — practical, unsentimental, and free.
Serious illness, dementia, and caregiving
For the long griefs that begin before a death — diagnosis, caregiving, and watching someone change.
Alzheimer's Association 24/7 Helpline
24/71-800-272-3900
Around-the-clock support for families living with Alzheimer's and other dementias — care questions, local programs, and a steady voice at 3am.
CancerCare
1-800-813-4673
Free professional support services for anyone affected by cancer — patients, caregivers, and the bereaved — including counseling by oncology social workers.
American Cancer Society
24/71-800-227-2345
Information and support for patients and families at every stage, including guidance for talking with children about cancer.
Eldercare Locator
1-800-677-1116
The federal service that connects families to local aging resources — respite care, caregiver support, and area agencies on aging.
Losing an animal companion
Pet grief is real grief. If someone made you feel foolish for mourning an animal, they were wrong.
Cornell Pet Loss Support Hotline
THU & SUN EVENINGS, 6–9PM ET (VARIES SEASONALLY)607-218-7457
Staffed by trained veterinary-student volunteers at Cornell's College of Veterinary Medicine. You may stay anonymous.
www2.vet.cornell.edu/about-us/outreach/pet-loss-support-hotline
Lap of Love resources
Veterinary hospice resources on anticipatory grief, quality-of-life decisions, and pet loss.
Finding a grief counselor
Hotlines are for moments; counselors are for seasons. Look for a licensed therapist (LCSW, LCMHC, LMFT, psychologist) who lists grief, bereavement, or loss among their specialties — many directories let you filter by exactly that, by insurance, and by telehealth.
Cost does not have to close the door: many therapists offer sliding-scale fees, hospice bereavement programs are typically free to the whole community (not only hospice families), and university counseling programs often run low-cost clinics. If the first counselor doesn't fit, trying a second one is normal, not rude — fit matters more in grief work than almost anywhere.
THE FORMATS, PLAINLY
- Peer support groups — led by people who have lived the same loss; free, and often the place people feel least alone.
- Clinician-led groups — a therapist guides a small group through grief work; structured, usually time-limited.
- Individual counseling — one-on-one, paced entirely to you; the right choice when grief is complicated by trauma or when a group feels like too much.
- Drop-in vs. cohort groups — drop-in welcomes you whenever you can come; cohort groups start and end together and go deeper. Both are legitimate; pick the one you will actually attend.
Near us: Wilmington & southeastern North Carolina
DearestEllie is a Wilmington organization, so we keep a closer eye on home. These are the local doors we know to be real.
Lower Cape Fear LifeCare — Grief Care
910-796-7900 (toll-free 800-733-1476)
Grief counseling and more than eighty no-cost groups and workshops a year, for adults and children — free of charge and open to anyone in the community, whether or not your person was in their care. Their children's program includes in-school groups, family days, and summer grief camps; call for the current schedule.
WILMINGTON & SOUTHEASTERN NC
The Compassionate Friends — Cape Fear Chapter
MEETS 3RD MONDAY, 7–9PM910-444-1844
Peer support for families after the death of a child of any age. Meets monthly at 5810 Oleander Dr, Wilmington.
WILMINGTON
NC 988 & Peer Warmline
24/7988 · Warmline 1-855-733-7762
North Carolina's 988 is answered in-state, and free mobile crisis teams can come to you anywhere in NC. The Peer Warmline connects you with a trained peer-support specialist when you need to talk but it isn't a crisis.
STATEWIDE (NC)
Coastal Horizons Center
910-343-0145
Crisis intervention, counseling, and treatment services in Wilmington, including a 24/7 rape crisis center serving the four-county region. For an immediate mental-health crisis, call or text 988.
WILMINGTON
Novant Health Behavioral Health Call Center
24/71-800-718-3550
Novant's system-wide behavioral-health line — a route into assessment and care, including at the New Hanover behavioral health hospital in Wilmington.
STATEWIDE (NOVANT HEALTH)
NC Project C.A.R.E. — dementia caregiver support
844-728-0191
Free support for families caring for someone with dementia: a caregiver navigator, respite options, and connection to local services.
ncdhhs.gov/divisions/aging/project-care-caregiver-alternatives-running-empty
STATEWIDE (NC)
Dementia Alliance of North Carolina
919-832-3732
Dementia navigators, a caregiver assistance fund, and support groups across the state.
STATEWIDE (NC)
NHC Senior Resource Center
910-798-6400
County services for seniors and family caregivers — ask the switchboard for a social worker.
NEW HANOVER COUNTY
UNCW Counseling & Psychological Services (CAPS)
910-962-3746 (after hours: same number, press 3)
Free counseling for UNCW students, including grief support — DePaolo Hall, second floor.
UNCW STUDENTS
Pregnancy & infant loss near Wilmington
We could not verify a currently-meeting local pregnancy-loss group, so we will not invent one. What is real: Share's free national online groups meet weekly (nationalshare.org, 1-800-821-6819), Star Legacy runs online groups for bereaved parents, and Novant's maternity bereavement program supports families in the hospital — ask the Women's & Children's unit what is currently offered locally.
WILMINGTON
Know a resource that belongs here, or found a number that has changed? Tell us through the help page — directory corrections jump the queue.