Joanne Harpel, JD + 1

Message from Joanne

Joanne L. Harpel, MPhil, JD, President of Coping After Suicide, LLC, is an international authority on suicide bereavement and postvention response, with 20+ years of experience addressing the questions, emotions, and fears that arise in the aftermath of suicide. She has a full-service practice: • working directly with grieving individuals, couples, and families • facilitating numerous national and international suicide bereavement support groups • advising schools, colleges, and universities; workplaces; and faith communities • educating mental health clinicians, health care professionals, clergy, funeral directors, first responders, and educators • speaking as an invited presenter and media guest
 A former attorney and the survivor of her own brother's suicide, Joanne co-chairs the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline’s Lived Experience Committee and was a founding co-lead of SAMHSA's National Survivors of Suicide Loss Task Force, whose work culminated in the creation of national guidelines on responding to grief, trauma, and distress after a suicide. A Professional Career Suicidologist with the American Association of Suicidology, she is the recipient of their Survivor of the Year Award and is a member of their Survivors of Suicide Loss Task Force and Workplace Committee. She is also a professional member of the Association for Death Education and Counseling and the National Alliance for Grieving Children. Joanne is a seasoned guest lecturer, including at the United Nations, on Capitol Hill, and for the American Psychiatric Association, American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, International Association for Suicide Prevention, and Bereaved Parents of the USA. She's trained the chaplains of the U.S. Army and Veterans Administration, the psychologists affiliated with the South Korea National Police Agency, the crisis response team of a large public university, and the psychiatry and social work departments of major medical centers. She has been a featured speaker for the New York State School Boards and Funeral Directors Associations, and has collaborated with hundreds of organizations, including the NIMH, WHO, Columbia University Schools of Social Work and Journalism, the University of Melbourne, HBO, and Sesame Street. Joanne is the former longtime Senior Director for Public Affairs and Postvention for the world's largest nonprofit dedicated to the issue (the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention) where she created the most well-respected, far-reaching array of programs and resources in the field, including International Survivors of Suicide Loss Day (which now takes place annually in 300 cities on 6 continents); a toolkit utilized by schools across the country facing real-time crises; a primer explaining suicide to children; and national support group facilitator and outreach training programs attended by thousands of individuals across the country over two decades. A cum laude graduate of Amherst College, she also holds graduate degrees from Cambridge University and the New York University School of Law. She lost her younger brother, Stephen, to suicide in 1993.

About Joanne's practice

Availability

Weekdays After 5pm

Weekdays 9am - 5pm

Fee

$$$

Sliding scale

Style

Directive

Reflective

Body-based

Method

In-person available: No

Virtual available: Yes

Expertise

Grief and Bereavement

Insurance

Out of network providers

State

National

Why state matters