Bearing the Unbearable: Love, Loss, and the Heartbreaking Path of Grief


Joanne Cacciatore - 2017
    Cacciatore is featured in the 2021 documentary series The Me You Can’t See, from Oprah, Prince Harry, and Apple TV. Bearing the Unbearable is a Foreword INDIES Award-Winner — Gold Medal for Self-Help. __ When a loved one dies, the pain of loss can feel unbearable—especially in the case of a traumatizing death that leaves us shouting, “NO!” with every fiber of our body. The process of grieving can feel wild and nonlinear—and often lasts for much longer than other people, the nonbereaved, tell us it should. Organized into fifty-two short chapters, Bearing the Unbearable is a companion for life’s most difficult times, revealing how grief can open our hearts to connection, compassion, and the very essence of our shared humanity. Dr. Joanne Cacciatore—bereavement educator, researcher, Zen priest, and leading counselor in the field—accompanies us along the heartbreaking path of love, loss, and grief. Through moving stories of her encounters with grief over decades of supporting individuals, families, and communities—as well as her own experience with loss—Cacciatore opens a space to process, integrate, and deeply honor our grief. Not just for the bereaved, Bearing the Unbearable will be required reading for grief counselors, therapists and social workers, clergy of all varieties, educators, academics, and medical professionals. Organized into fifty-two accessible and stand-alone chapters, this book is also perfect for being read aloud in support groups. Now available as an online course from the Wisdom Academy.

Tell Me More: Stories about the 12 Hardest Things I'm Learning to Say


Kelly Corrigan - 2018
    But that’s just what Kelly Corrigan has set out to do here. In her New York Times bestselling memoirs, Corrigan distilled our core relationships to their essences, showcasing a warm, easy storytelling style. Now, in Tell Me More, she’s back with a deeply personal, unfailingly honest, and often hilarious examination of the essential phrases that turn the wheel of life.In “I Don’t Know,” Corrigan wrestles to make peace with uncertainty, whether it’s over invitations that never came or a friend’s agonizing infertility. In “No,” she admires her mother’s ability to set boundaries and her liberating willingness to be unpopular. In “Tell Me More,” a facialist named Tish teaches her something important about listening. And in “I Was Wrong,” she comes clean about her disastrous role in a family fight—and explains why saying sorry may not be enough. With refreshing candor, a deep well of empathy, and her signature desire to understand “the thing behind the thing,” Corrigan swings between meditations on life with a preoccupied husband and two mercurial teenage daughters to profound observations on love and loss.With the streetwise, ever-relatable voice that defines Corrigan’s work, Tell Me More is a moving and meaningful take on the power of the right words at the right moment to change everything.

Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide


Kay Redfield Jamison - 1999
    Night Falls Fast is tragically timely: suicide has become one of the most common killers of Americans between the ages of fifteen and forty-five.An internationally acknowledged authority on depressive illnesses, Dr. Jamison has also known suicide firsthand: after years of struggling with manic-depression, she tried at age twenty-eight to kill herself. Weaving together a historical and scientific exploration of the subject with personal essays on individual suicides, she brings not only her remarkable compassion and literary skill but also all of her knowledge and research to bear on this devastating problem. This is a book that helps us to understand the suicidal mind, to recognize and come to the aid of those at risk, and to comprehend the profound effects on those left behind. It is critical reading for parents, educators, and anyone wanting to understand this tragic epidemic.

When Breath Becomes Air


Paul Kalanithi - 2016
    One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi's transformation from a naïve medical student "possessed," as he wrote, "by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life" into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality. What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir. Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. "I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything," he wrote. "Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: 'I can't go on. I'll go on.'" When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.

Grieving a Suicide: A Loved One's Search for Comfort, Answers & Hope


Albert Y. Hsu - 2002
    It is one of the most serious public health crises of modern times, claiming over one million lives worldwide every year. Those who have lost a loved one to suicide experience tremendous shock and trauma, with a confusing mix of emotions--anger, guilt, grief and despair. Suicide also raises heartrending questions: Why did this happen? Why didn't we see it coming? Many also wonder if those who choose suicide are doomed to an eternity separated from God and loved ones. Some may even start asking whether life is worth living at all. After his father's death by suicide, Albert Hsu wrestled with the intense emotional and spiritual questions surrounding suicide. While acknowledging that there are no easy answers, Hsu draws on the resources of the Christian faith to point suicide survivors to the God who offers comfort in our grief and hope for the future. If you have lost a loved one to suicide or provide pastoral care to those left behind, this book is an essential companion for the journey toward healing.

Sheet Music: Uncovering the Secrets of Sexual Intimacy in Marriage


Kevin Leman - 2002
    Kevin Leman offers a practical guide to sex according to God's plan. This frank and practical book is a perfect resource for married and engaged couples. Dr. Leman addresses a wide spectrum of people, from those with no sexual experiences to those with past sexual problems or even abuse. Using frank descriptions, this book has a warm and friendly tone that will help couples overcome awkwardness in discussing an issue important to all married couples.

Final Gifts: Understanding the Special Awareness, Needs, and Communications of the Dying


Maggie Callanan - 1992
    In this moving and compassionate book, hospice nurses Maggie Callanan and Patricia Kelley share their intimate experiences with patients at the end of life, drawn from more than twenty years experience tending the terminally ill. Through their stories we come to appreciate the near-miraculous ways in which the dying communicate their needs, reveal their feelings, and even choreograph their own final moments; we also discover the gifts—of wisdom, faith, and love—that the dying leave for the living to share.Filled with practical advice on responding to the requests of the dying and helping them prepare emotionally and spiritually for death, Final Gifts shows how we can help the dying person live fully to the very end.

The Siren's Dance: My Marriage to a Borderline: A Case Study


Anthony Walker - 2003
    Her sorrow and embarrassment at her outbursts were real, and her attempts to control her anger so earnest that I knew she was trying for me, for herself, and for us. I had to remind myself that I had known that she was intense to the extreme in her experience of life, and that her struggle was my struggle. We would share anger, but we would also share love.No one could ever love Michelle enough. Not her family, not her friends, and certainly not the men (and women) she so easily attracted, like moths to a flame. But when a final-year med student falls for her while she's recovering from a suicide attempt over her latest breakup, they both may be in for more than they bargained for. Hoping to help cure her of her debilitating fears and explosive rage, Anthony marries Michelle in a secret ceremony that alienates him from his family, and ultimately from himself. Initially mesmerized by her seductive smile, her surprising sensuality, and the why behind her wildly unpredictable behavior, the author comes to realize that he will have to sacrifice his career--and more--in order to be with her.This achingly honest and true account of Anthony and Michelle's whirlwind year-and-a-half together provides a window into the emotionally intense world of someone suffering from borderline personality disorder, a condition seen in an estimated 2 percent of the general population and 10 percent of mental health outpatients. It also offers the perspective of those most affected--the sufferer's loved ones, whom despite all the upheaval are still compelled to care. So concludes the author: "I hope that my story will be seen more as a case study in such a relationship than as a cautionary tale."

A Host of Voices


Doris Stokes - 1980
    During her lifetime she worked tirelessly to reunite the bereaved and their loved ones, and helped bring joy and happiness to thousands of people. This second collection of her bestselling books brings together many more of her remarkable and moving experiences.In Innocent Voices In My Ear, Doris tells of her special relationship with children and her psychic communications with children of every age; from the heroic young men of the Falklands War, to the sixteen-year-old hostage of a ruthless gunman and the tragic stars who died too young: John Lennon, Marc Bolan and Richard Beckinsale.Whispering Voices recalls the extraordinary, sometimes amusing and often emotional situations she has found herself in; of how her gift brought her into contact with famous names such as Princess Anne and Freddie Starr, but also the ordinary folk who inspired her with their courage, and to whom she offered a new sense of hope.

When Our Grown Kids Disappoint Us: Letting Go of Their Problems, Loving Them Anyway, and Getting on with Our Lives


Jane Adams - 2003
    She listens to a generation that “did everything right” and expected its children to grow into happy, healthy, successful adults. But they haven’t, at least, not yet—and meanwhile, we’re letting their problems threaten our health, marriages, security, freedom, careers or retirement, and other family relationships. With warmth, empathy, and perspective, Dr. Adams offers a positive, life-affirming message to parents who are still trying to “fix” their adult children—Stop! She shows us how to separate from their problems without separating from them, and how to be a positive force in their lives while getting on with our own. As we navigate this critical passage in our second adulthood and their first, the bestselling author of I’m Still Your Mother reminds us that the pleasures and possibilities of postparenthood should not depend on how our kids turn out, but on how we do!

Healing Your Grieving Heart: 100 Practical Ideas


Alan D. Wolfelt - 1998
    Acknowledging that death is a painful, ongoing part of life, it explains how people need to slow down, turn inward, embrace their feelings of loss, and seek and accept support when a loved one dies. Each book, geared for mourning adults, teens, or children, provides ideas and action-oriented tips that teach the basic principles of grief and healing. These ideas and activities are aimed at reducing the confusion, anxiety, and huge personal void so that living their lives can begin again.

The Long Goodbye


Meghan O'Rourke - 2011
    In the first anguished days, she began to create a record of her interior life as a mourner, trying to capture the paradox of grief-its monumental agony and microscopic intimacies-an endeavor that ultimately bloomed into a profound look at how caring for her mother during her illness changed and strengthened their bond. O'Rourke's story is one of a life gone off the rails, of how watching her mother's illness-and separating from her husband-left her fundamentally altered. But it is also one of resilience, as she observes her family persevere even in the face of immeasurable loss. With lyricism and unswerving candor, The Long Goodbye conveys the fleeting moments of joy that make up a life, and the way memory can lead us out of the jagged darkness of loss. Effortlessly blending research and reflection, the personal and the universal, it is not only an exceptional memoir, but a necessary one.

The Death Class: A True Story About Life


Erika Hayasaki - 2014
    Each year, Kean University in Union, New Jersey, offers an exclusive class called Death in Perspective. Led by Professor Norma Bowe, the objective of the class is to “develop an understanding of the nature and experiences of the stages of dying, death, and bereavement.” It has a three-year waiting list.But as acclaimed journalist Erika Hayasaki discovers, by teaching mortality, Dr. Bowe is quietly rescuing students from tragedy. As she takes her students to cemeteries, prisons, morgues, and hospitals, she shows how the contemplation of the end can change an adult’s beginning. Over the course of two years, she intervenes with one student and her suicidal mother, mentors another with a mentally ill brother, and redeems a third from his life in a gang. And in the end, the students themselves heal Dr. Bowe herself from the lingering pain of a childhood she has long repressed. On one level, The Death Class is about the loss of life; on another level, it’s a celebration of what the human spirit can conquer. It’s about how we can survive and learn to live a meaningful life.

The Beauty of What Remains: How Our Greatest Fear Becomes Our Greatest Gift


Steve Leder - 2021
    Yet even after having sat beside thousands of deathbeds, Steve Leder the rabbi was not fully prepared for the loss of his own father. It was only then that Steve Leder the son truly learned how loss makes life beautiful by giving it meaning and touching us with love that we had not felt before.Enriched by Rabbi Leder's irreverence, vulnerability, and wicked sense of humor, this heartfelt narrative is filled with laughter and tears, the wisdom of millennia and modernity, and, most of all, an unfolding of the profound and simple truth that in loss we gain more than we ever imagined.

A Grace Disguised: How the Soul Grows through Loss


Jerry Sittser - 1995
    In an instant, a tragic car accident claimed three generations of his family: his mother, his wife, and his young daughter. While most of us will not experience such a catastrophic loss in our lifetime, all of us will taste it. And we can, if we choose, know as well the grace that transforms it. A Grace Disguised plumbs the depths of sorrow, whether due to illness, divorce, or the loss of someone we love. The circumstances are not important; what we do with those circumstances is. In coming to the end of ourselves, we can come to the beginning of a new life one marked by spiritual depth, joy, compassion, and a deeper appreciation of simple blessings.