Jennifer Jurlando

Jennifer Jurlando (Thistle Community Death Care) is a death doula, grief support group facilitator, a ritual facilitator, and a death educator. Jennifer is an adjunct instructor in VCU’s Rehabilitation and Mental Health Counseling Department. She leads grief support groups for preschoolers and in assisted living communities.Her writing on loss, survival, and worth can be found on her Patreon and has been published online at RVAMAG and Life in 10 Minutes and in the anthologies, Unspoken: Writers on Infertility, Miscarriage, and Stillbirth, and Nine Lives: A Life in Ten Minutes Anthology. In 2025, she presented workshops on death at Twin Oaks Women’s Gathering, Panorama’s Death Fest, and at Hallowed Homecoming. She believes that mindful conversations and experiences about death make it possible to live life more authentically. Jennifer has a years-long ancestral veneration practice, facilitates monthly self-care ritual groups, and is driven to help people plan for the sacred space linking the end of life, death’s arrival, and body blessing rituals. Jennifer is the founder of Richmond-based Thistle Community Death Care.