Description: Facing the sudden, tragic death of her 40-year-old husband, Gael Garbarino Cullen was forced to navigate a future for herself and her four young daughters alone. Owning Grief is a story of overcoming adversity, achieving resiliency and working from post-traumatic-stress to post-traumatic-growth as a result of this intensely personal loss.

“Grief is not a linear process that you move through step by step to some appointed conclusion. You may think you’ve moved beyond a certain memory, or emotion, or challenge in your grief journey, only to have it overwhelm you again at some point or points down the road,” Garbarino Cullen says.  “The paradox of finding gifts and even joy in loss is one that we can all draw strength from after the death of someone we love.”

About the speaker: Gael Garbarino Cullen is an accomplished writer and video producer as well as a longtime Milwaukee TV and radio news reporter who covered everything from presidential politics to World Series baseball during her career.  She loves rock and roll music and is an avid Detroit Tiger baseball fan, a nod to her hometown roots.  She’s passionate about running, not too far or too fast, although she did manage to muscle through two marathons.

She lives and works in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where she is lucky enough to share time with her four daughters and their families, including a growing cache of grandchildren.