Grief Biography

Rebecca Spiegel is working as a teacher in New Orleans when she learns of her sister’s suicide. Only after the funeral does shock give way to grief—and to many questions. How could Emily do this to herself? How could she have abandoned all those who loved her? And what could have been done differently to prevent this devastating loss?

Losing a child is an experience beyond this world. In her seminal work, The Flight, Cammie Wolf Rice shatters reality — and in the process, reshapes our perspectives on pain, suffering and the meaning of it all. The Flight displays her struggle to make sense of losing her son to opioids. In this journey, you will find your own.

On a February day in 2008, Forrest Church sent a letter to the members of his congregation, informing them that he had terminal cancer; his life would now be measured in months, not years. In that remarkable letter, he wrote: "In more than one respect, I feel very lucky." He went on to promise that he would sum up his thoughts on the topics that had been so pervasive in his work-love and death-in a final book.

In the mid 1980s, Canada's worst public health disaster was unfolding. Catastrophic mismanagement of the country's blood supply allowed contaminated blood to be knowingly distributed, infecting close to two thousand Canadians with HIV. Among them was Melanie Brooks's surgeon father who, after receiving a blood transfusion during open-heart surgery in 1985, learned he was HIV positive. At a time when HIV/AIDS was misunderstood and public perception was shaped by fear, prejudice, and homophobia, victims of the disease faced ostracism and persecution. Wanting to protect his family from this stigma, Melanie's father decided his illness would be a secret they'd all keep.

As a troubled teenager, Tamara Laroux just wants the pain to go away. Crying out to God for forgiveness, she makes the heart-wrenching decision to end her life. As she plummets from her body to a place of vast darkness, torment, and agony, Tamara instantly realizes the finality of her rash decision and begs God to save her.

Andrzej (Andrew) Stanisław Kawczak was born in Poland in the mid-1920s. After the war, Andrzej studied and practiced law. However, he preferred to pursue an academic career in philosophy and obtained a doctorate from the University of Warsaw in 1960, specializing in logic. In 1960 he obtained a Ford Foundation scholarship to study at Columbia University in New York City. After twenty years of living under Nazi and Soviet totalitarianism, he and his wife opted to stay in the West. In 1961 he obtained a position as a professor of philosophy at Loyola College in Montreal. It was a position ...

A 29-year-old son and only child passes. He nudges his mother to open up to spirit so she can build a new relationship with him. Letters to David unlocks a door to spirit and offers hope for parents who have suffered tragic grief. There is an immediacy and accessibility to Claudia and David's relationship that provides laughter, tears, and hope to those grieving what they see as the "end" of a relationship. Enclosed, you will find valuable tools for healing and growth. We don't die, and our loved ones remain with us forever.

Within six months Barbara Schoichet lost everything: her job, her girlfriend of six years, and her mother to pancreatic cancer. Her life stripped bare, and armed with nothing but a death wish and a ton of attitude, Barbara pursues an unlikely method of coping. At the age of 50, she earns her motorcycle license, buys a Harley on eBay from two guys named Dave, and drives it alone from New York to Los Angeles on a circuitous trek loosely guided by her H.O.G. tour book and a whole lot of road whimsy.

One day in December, Natasha Walter's mother Ruth took her own life. At first, the grief and guilt that Natasha felt were overwhelming. As the author of feminist books and the founder of the charity Women for Refugee Women, Natasha had always been active in movements for social justice. But in the aftermath of her mother's suicide, her personal grief intertwines with a sense of political despair. Gradually, she starts to search back through Ruth's history, trying to understand how her life led to this death.

It happened out of nowhere. Diana and her high school sweetheart Chad were living an ideal life. They were raising kids, working in public service, travelling, and watching their daughter compete in gymnastics. When everything just changed. Soon, they found themselves embarking on an 18-month battle to save Chad's life after a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer at only 44. Full of hope, they travelled the country searching for treatments and begging some of the best doctors in the world for help. They never gave up, but the monstrous cancer beat them anyway.

For most of her adult life, Sloane and Russell worked together and played together as they navigated the corridors of office life, the literary world, and the dramatic cultural shifts in New York City. One day, while Russell is still alive, Sloane's apartment is broken into. Along with her most prized possessions, the thief makes off with her sense of security, leaving a mystery in its place. When Russell dies exactly one month later, his suicide propels her on a wild quest to right the unrightable.

On a summer day in New York, Jonathan Santlofer discovers his wife, Joy, gasping for breath on their living room couch. After a frenzied 911 call, an ambulance races across Manhattan, and after hours pacing in a hospital waiting room, a doctor finally delivers the fateful news. Consumed by grief, Jonathan desperately tries to pursue life as he always had - writing, social engagements, and working on his art - but finds it nearly impossible to admit his deep feelings of loss to anyone, not even his to beloved daughter, Doria, or to himself. Includes a Bonus PDF of author drawings.

I wrote this book during one of the most difficult years of my life. This is my journey through the grieving process of losing my 27 year relationship and trauma work before and after. It is a glimpse into how I used the therapeutic processes of Compassionate Inquiry and Internal Family Systems to navigate through the year, as well as chronicle how my childhood shaped my life and how I show up in relationship, my worldview, coping mechanisms, and more.

Do you feel like you are barely holding on? Let the golden thread of God's presence be the calm on the other side of chaos. It could be that he is weaving a brilliant new beginning in the middle of your mess. Join beloved worship leader Darlene Zschech as she traces God’s goodness through her recent transitions. No matter what we're going through, Darlene urges us to maintain joy in the middle of it all.

In 2018, 34 people were shot at a high school in Parkland, Florida. Jaime Guttenberg, a 14-year-old, was the second to last victim. That she and so many of her fellow students were struck down in cold blood galvanized many to action, including Jaime's father, Fred, who has become an activist dedicated to passing common-sense gun-safety legislation. This book is not about gun safety or Parkland. Instead, it tells the story of Fred Guttenberg's journey since Jaime's death and how he has been able to get through the worst of times thanks to the kindness and compassion of others.

Kate Braestrup's life was transformed by the loss of her husband; now Kate faces the possibility that she may lose her son. As a young mother, Kate Braestrup discovered the fierce protectiveness that accompanies parenthood. In the intervening years - through mourning her husband and the joy of remarriage and a blended family - Kate has absorbed the rewards and complications of that spirit. But when her eldest son joins the marines, Kate is at a crossroads.

The two women named Tamar, whose lives are detailed in the Bible (Genesis 38 and 2 Samuel 13), form the backdrop of heart-tugging stories by these powerful women. In The Tamar Stories Sisterhood, nineteen women tell compelling stories of grief, mental illness, divorce, domestic violence, and so much more. Like Tamar I and Tamar II in the Bible, the sister authors share intimate stories of profound loss and pain from their own lives. Each woman has overcome so much because of the power of God through Christ Jesus, bringing redemption, healing, forgiveness, empowerment, hope, peace, and joy. ...

On July 23, 2007, Dr. William Petit suffered an unimaginable horror: Armed strangers broke into his suburban Connecticut home in the middle of the night, bludgeoned him nearly to death, tortured and killed his wife and two daughters, and set their house on fire. He miraculously survived, and yet living through those horrific hours was only the beginning of his ordeal. Broken and defeated, Bill was forced to confront a question of ultimate consequence: How does a person find the strength to start over and live again after confronting the darkest of nightmares?

A stunning blend of the personal and professional, The Archaeology of Loss is Sarah Tarlow’s first memoir. An accomplished archaeologist, much of Sarah’s work is concerned with the ritual and belief behind the practice of grief. In 2012, she was awarded the Chair in Archaeology at the University of Leicester. But in the years that followed this appointment, Sarah’s husband, Mark, would begin to suffer from a progressive but undiagnosed illness, finally resulting in his inability to drive, to walk, to taste or to care for himself.

In this exquisite story of family, food, grief and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter and guitarist. With humour and heart, she tells of growing up the only Asian American kid at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother's particular high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother's tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food.