Sarah Kroenke & Daena Esterbrooks

Daena Esterbrooks, MA, LPC

I have known the pain and heartache that death can bring. I remember so vividly how suffocating my grief, at times, would feel. I also remember the obstacles I faced as I began my own journey towards renewed hope and healing. But as I sit here today, over six years out from the death of my twin daughters, I am a stronger person for the experience. Because of my own grief journey I am a different Mother to my daughter and a different counselor to the many students I work with.

As a counselor with the Park Nicollet Growing Through Grief program, I have one of the greatest jobs in the world. It is an honor and privilege to be invited into someone’s life as they experience such raw heartache and pain and as they gradually rediscover hope and happiness in their lives.  These are the people that have inspired us to create Hope Heals.

Sarah Kroenke, BA, LSW

Pain and healing…I have experienced them both.  I’ve coped with many deaths in my life, the most significant being the death of my mother when I was a teenager. Being a motherless daughter for over 20 years has provided me sadness and challenges beyond words.  However, because of my mother’s death, I have been enriched with a deeper appreciation for love, life and all of its gifts. 

Through my career, with Park Nicollet, as a hospice social worker and a counselor with Growing Through Grief I have had the privilege to witness the courage and power of the human spirits ability to transform suffering into strength.  I am constantly reminded that just as grieving is a life-long process and an extension of love, so is healing.  And, so we heal…