Teresa Wagner

Teresa has loved and lived with animals all of her life. It is being with them that brings her to the core of her soul while here on earth. Animals and animal issues provide the meaning, guidance, joy, and purpose in her life.

She has had a private animal communication and flower essence practice since 1991, and is author of the audio book Legacies of Love, A Gentle Guide to Healing from the loss of Your Animal Loved One. Since 1999 she has facilitated whale swim trips to bring whales and people together in sacred communication and love.

Her entry into the fields of grief recovery and traumatic stress began when she lost her first cat in 1985. Unable to easily come to terms with her grief, she sought therapy and began a rigorous review of the grief literature and grief workshops. Over time, these sources helped her heal and understand the grief recovery process. This motivated her to design and offer grief workshops to help others through this disenfranchised loss. Since then, Teresa has worked with thousands of grieving humans, individually, in workshops, and in bereavement support groups. In a year long consulting project with a hospice, she conducted research to identify the competencies needed for effective grief support, resulting in the Grief Support Competencies Profile. In conjunction with FES (Flower Essence Society) Teresa developed a flower essence formula, The Animal Relief Formula, to address the issues unique to the post traumatic stress of animals.

Teresa is passionately concerned about the pet overpopulation epidemic and the trauma this creates for both the animals and animal welfare employees as well. She also designed and conducted compassion fatigue workshops for animal shelter workers throughout the U.S. Teresa also developed a section on her Web site as a place of solace and compassion fatigue education for animal care workers.

Her traditional education includes a master's degree in counseling from Villanova University, studies at the Grief Recovery Institute in Los Angeles, and post graduate work in counseling and organizational development at Columbia University, Wharton, and with Carl Rogers at the University of Nottingham, England. She has also completed the Clinical Training Program in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder at the National Center for PTSD, Dept. of Veterans Affairs.

Her healing arts education includes animal communication with Jeri Ryan, flower essence training at FES, Perelandra, and Desert Alchemy, energy healing training in Reiki, Tellington-Touch and TherapeuticTouch, and psychic studies with Evelyn Isadore.

In the 1980's, Teresa held a series of management positions with RCA, heading training and organization development departments in New York City and New Jersey. In the late 1970's she was a counselor and trainer for the National Training Institute of the Juvenile Justice Center in Philadelphia.

She has been named to Who's Who of American Women, Outstanding Young Women of America, is the recipient of the RCA President's Award, and an American Society of Training and Development Award for Outstanding Contribution. She has also received the Gwendolyn May Award for Humanitarian Work Extending Beyond Monterey County by the SPCA of Monterey County, CA.

She has been a regularly invited speaker to national conferences for organizations such as The Humane Society of the United States and the Association of Death Education and Counseling. She has served on the faculty for The American Humane Association and on the boards of Horse Power International, The Assisi International Animal Institute, and is Past President of the Wildlife Auxiliary of The SPCA of Monterey County in California.

Born near Philadelphia, Teresa has lived on the central coast of California since 1989. She considers herself very blessed to to swim with her beloved humpback whales every year in the Caribbean and to live with her cherished cat Olivia. They live in a log cabin in a Big Sur redwood forest, among banana slugs, foxes, bats, raccoons, birds, chipmunks, the flowers in the garden, and the whales and otters across the road in the Pacific Ocean.