Debi Jenkins Frankle

She/Her | M.S. | LMFT #32961

Debi Jenkins Frankle, LMFT, is a seasoned grief therapist, educator, and trainer with over 30 years of experience. She co-founded a grief center to serve a long-standing need in her community and currently teaches practicum at Pepperdine University. She provides clinical training in grief and loss for therapists and mental health professionals.

Her clinical work focuses on individuals grieving death, addiction, mental illness, chronic illness, and family estrangement. She specializes in working with disenfranchised grief, including clients marginalized by race, sexual orientation, or relational status. Therapeutic modalities include narrative therapy, meaning reconstruction, psychoeducation, and structured writing exercises. She is also trained in the Columbia Prolonged Grief Disorder protocol.

Debi’s approach is deeply informed by her personal experiences with grief, including the deaths of her parents, brother, and multiple infertility losses. These experiences guide her therapeutic presence and her belief in the value of experiential knowing. She uses selective self-disclosure to reduce client isolation and reinforce that healing is possible.

Debi integrates personal rituals, community connection, and professional transparency into her grief work. She believes grief therapists should not ask clients to do any work they haven’t done themselves and is committed to modeling this integration in all aspects of her practice.

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Specialities

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a powerful, evidence-based approach for healing trauma, grief, and distressing life events. By using bilateral stimulation (like eye movements or tapping), EMDR helps the brain reprocess overwhelming memories so they feel less charged and more resolved. Whether you're navigating traumatic loss, anxiety, or long-held emotional pain, EMDR offers a path toward deeper relief and integration.
Grief can be quiet or consuming, predictable or surprising. Whether you're mourning a recent death, grieving a past loss, or adjusting to the absence of someone or something meaningful, therapy offers a place to be held in it all. There’s no timeline for grief — just a need for space, compassion, and a process that fits you. Together, we’ll explore what’s been lost and what might still be found.
Losing someone to suicide can bring a distinct kind of grief — layered with shock, guilt, anger, confusion, and unanswered questions. This kind of loss is often isolating and misunderstood. You don’t have to make sense of it alone. In our work together, we make space for the complexity of your experience, while gently supporting healing, remembrance, and meaning-making.
Later life brings unique transitions—retirement, caregiving responsibilities, health changes, the loss of loved ones, or shifts in identity and purpose. I offer therapy that supports older adults as they navigate these changes with dignity and meaning. Whether you're facing grief, anxiety, relationship shifts, or simply seeking a safe place to reflect, I provide compassionate, age-affirming care that respects the depth of your lived experience.
Estrangement can be an invisible loss—one that’s hard to talk about, yet deeply painful. Whether you’re estranged from a parent, child, sibling, or another loved one, this experience can bring up grief, guilt, confusion, and ongoing uncertainty. I offer a nonjudgmental space to process what led to the estrangement, explore the emotional impact, and consider what healing might look like for you—whether that involves reconciliation, boundaries, or acceptance. Your story is honored here, without pressure or assumptions.