Joan Hitchens, B.A., Founder, Storybooks for Healing

Joan Hitchens is founder of Storybooks for Healing, a program for overcoming loss through writing in the bereavement industry. She was most recently owner of Mosaic Tributes, a family history production company utilizing video, audio and storybooking media. She teaches workshops and classes in writing, organizing and preserving memories, and social media. She has worked in the communications and graphics fields for more than 13 years. Her education emphasized psychology, and dance movement studies, and she has extensive education and experience in child development.

Joan is an active volunteer providing hospice respite care for Providence SoundHomeCare and Hospice in Olympia.

Joan’s inspiration for bereavement work arose after the suicide of a teenage friend of her daughter’s, when a multi-media slide show inspired celebrating her life rather than focusing on her death. Over the years of preserving family memories for clients, she found memorial work was the most rewarding. Through evolution of her work in organizing photos, developing story for individuals and groups, and interspersed with her personal understanding of grief and group processes, Storybooks For Healing was created.

Joan is a member of the Association for Death Education and Counseling (ADEC), National Alliance for Grieving Children (NAGC), and  the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHCPO).

SFH Advisory Board

presented alphabetically…

Storybooks for Healing is supported by a volunteer Advisory Board who provide ongoing input into the educational program and business development. The Advisory Board is comprise of volunteers who support the mission of Storybooks For Healing in creating effective online and local communities to provide peer support to those experiencing loss. SFH believes that grief and loss can be lessened when consciously approached through writing, art, group discussion and creating story. Sharing these stories of lessons learned through loss (finding meaning) and capturing the memories of character, value and relationship of a loved one are important cathartic steps in managing the pain of grief. The Board is comprised of individual professionals who represent bereavement and hospice, education, heritage, social media, and more. Each member also brings his or her own stories of loss to share that is a personally inspiring insight for joining our special community.

Gina Bailey, Ph.D., International Communication

Gina holds a MA in clinical psychology, a MA in cross-cultural communication, and a Ph.D. in international communication. During her years in private practice, she treated many clients with varying grief disorders (individually and in groups) as well as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Gina currently teaches psychology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and owns Cornucopia Consulting, which provides multiple mental health services.

Gina is the biological mother of a child she surrendered for adoption after his birth.  She was united with her son and adopted family in 2007. Gina is actively engaged with Adoption Circle of Hawaii. Adoption has a lifelong impact on the triad – those who are adopted, those who have relinquished children for adoption, and those who have adopted children.

David L. Hitchens, Ph.D., American History, Founding Faculty Member, The Evergreen State College

David has taught at the college level for over 45 years, 40 at The Evergreen State College (TESC) in Olympia, WA.  TESC is an innovative Arts and Sciences college featuring interdisciplinary studies presented through small group seminars. David’s expertise includes history, print and broadcast journalism, religion, literature, creative and expository writing, psycho-history, race, class, and gender studies and more. Through team teaching he has additional educational  experience in economics, physics, psychology, human development and other disciplines. David’s overarching approach to teaching is in the field of “reading, writing, thinking, and talking” which provides the fundamental skills for life-long learning and personal  insight.

David is a survivor of Hodgkins Lymphoma, kidney cancer and a rare spinal stroke spanning the past 20 years.

Janet F. Ott, Ph.D., Neurophysiology

Jan began her early career in gerontology and decided on her doctorate in neurophysiology after she became fascinated watching stroke victims recover function while working in a nursing home. She found herself more drawn to teaching than research, and spent 23 years at The Evergreen State College, teaching physiology to pre-med students, and then venturing further and further into alternative health and wellness. She ended up in the yin and yang of spirit and science teaching women’s spirituality, energy medicine and experiential wellness programs. After a long illness, Jan retired from the college to become a business and life coach, where she connects people to their personal power.

Today, Jan is starting a new career at The Chinquapin School in Houston, Texas teaching college preparatory science to inner city kids. Here, Jan feels all her talents can be used in one place!

Jan’s inspiration to assist the SFH Advisory Board  comes from a long history of related experiences. Speaking with relatives while at the nursing home about their mentally impaired parents; having a mother with Alzheimer’s Disease; and, losing her beloved father all are part of why she feels so committed to the mission of Storybooks For Healing. Also, as a Certified Wealth Consultant with The Heritage Institute, Jan has seen what happens with families after someone, particularly of wealth, dies. There is not just grief, but all manner of emotions about what was left (or not left) behind.

Michelle Schuyleman, M.A., Counseling, Licensed Mental Health Counselor

Michelle is currently Family Support Coordinator for a children’s grief program and has a private practice in grief counseling. She has worked in the field of hospice and bereavement with families for over 10 years, as an individual and group counselor, family grief program coordinator, and grief and loss/ trauma consultant. Michelle has trained others to facilitate grief groups, has given several presentations on children and grief for school districts and community organizations. She has organized bereaved parent gatherings, memorial events, summer day camps, sudden loss support groups, and small grassroots grief programs in Washington and South America.

Michelle is currently authoring a storybook on the life of her grandmother, whom she misses every day.

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Storybooks For Healing is grateful to the family and memory of Brynn Marie Davis, whose short seven months on this earth was inspirational in the origin of this program.