Hi there, I’m Lauren.

I’m Lauren Gil Hayes (she/her), a PhD student, social worker, researcher, grief therapist, and end-of-life doula. My work sits at the intersection of care, disconnection, and institutional response. I study how loneliness, estrangement, and fractured relationships shape the ways people experience caregiving, grief, and death—particularly for those who die alone or without traditional family support.

This work is personal to me. I have lived experience with loss, estrangement, and the particular grief of knowing someone I loved died alone. That experience, and the questions it left me with, continue to shape how I research, write, and build community.

We are living in a moment when more people are at risk of dying in isolation. Community institutions that once ensured intergenerational care and witnessing have broken down. More elders are facing housing precarity and social disconnection. Family estrangement—a once-taboo subject—is emerging as an increasingly common, yet underexamined, social reality. My work seeks to name these fractures and trace their impact on how we die, grieve, and care for one another.

I use mixed-methods research—including qualitative interviews, large-scale data analysis, and ethnographic fieldwork—to examine how systems of care respond to the people they often overlook. Beyond my academic work, I bring years of experience as a therapist, case manager and community health leader. I believe that grief, loss, and end-of-life care are not just personal experiences; they are shaped by the policies, histories, and social structures we live within.