Dr. Christina Zampitella, known as Dr. Z, is a licensed psychologist, Fellow in Thanatology, and founder of the Center for Grief and Trauma Therapy in Delaware. She originated the term "surviving sibling" in her 2005 doctoral dissertation, bringing recognition to one of grief's most overlooked populations. For decades she has published, taught, and spoken about sibling grief to professional and lay audiences locally, nationally, and internationally. She also hosts Phoenix Rising with Dr. Z. But beneath the credentials, she is a surviving sibling herself. Dr. Z lost her brother Damien to a drug overdose on Christmas Day when he was just 22, a loss that shaped her career, her calling, and her understanding of what it means to carry someone with you forever. She reminds us that healing is not about getting over it. It is about learning to carry it.

Earla Legault is the co-author and illustrator of Living with Sibling Grief: Imagining a Way Forward, written with her grief buddy Monica Murphy. She is one of three surviving siblings of her younger sister, Leigh-Ann. After losing Leigh-Ann to pancreatic cancer, Earla turned to writing, drawing, and nature, and now leads sibling grief peer support groups and creative expression sessions through her community @sibling.grief.buds. Retired from library work, Earla is a mother of two and bubba to five grandchildren, the 2024 recipient of The Compassionate Friends' Karen Snepp Outstanding Sibling Award, and lives in Harrison Hot Springs, British Columbia.

Nina Rodriguez is the creator and host of Grief and Light, a podcast and online grief support platform dedicated to fostering a more grief-informed, hopeful world through honest conversations about loss. After losing her only sibling, Yosef, to fentanyl poisoning in 2019, Nina turned her grief into a calling. Her work focuses on shining a light on the realities of life after loss, with a particular focus on sibling grief. Nina is based in South Florida and brings a background in public relations and real estate to her current work as a grief advocate, speaker, and content creator.

Susan Kellam is a journalist and the author of Brilliant Disguise, a memoir that traces her life from Rolling Stone Magazine to the Brookings Institution while reckoning with the loss of her brother Robert to suicide. What began as a rock and roll story became a sibling story when an agent pushed her to develop the brother she'd been keeping in the background. Susan lives in Maine with her two dogs, her seven and a half acres of land (and sometimes snow), and the memories she now carries as the last person standing in her family of origin.