Please Settle Things Down: What Your Children Want You to Know About Divorce

Did you catch this short, heartfelt video this past week of this sweet little girl, sitting on the stairs at her house explaining to her mom how she wants her divorcing parents to behave? Several friends who are also therapists brought it to my attention, and I think it's well worth watching. It comes straight from her heart.

This little girl also causes me to reflect on the many children and teens I have seen the last 25 years as a family therapist who shared many of these same feelings with me. If we listened to children's feelings, here are a few points to keep in mind as you make this transition:

1. Your child or children didn't make this decision. You and/or your partner did. You might be happier, but you have to respect your children's own grief process. It's a huge loss for them of their intact family. Their grief process can take a very long time, and get reawakened as they pass significant life events and you are not together as a family. This would include their graduations, life passages like dances and learning to drive,holidays, weddings.

2.Be nice. Be respectful to the other parent, no matter what your feelings are for them. You do this as a gift to your children. Remember, you selected that other person to have a family with. Your children probably still strongly need and value that other parent you are no longer interested in or are dividing assets with. Your child will thank you down the road for being kind.

3. Keep the children out of the middle as much as you possibly can.  

4. Find an adult listener who is not your child. You have your own feelings---anger, fear, sadness and more but it's dreadful for your child to hear it.

5. Hold on to the adult/child boundaries. In separation and divorce, children can be scared and teens can test the limits to see if you're still parenting. Maintain bedtimes, homework time, mealtimes. Make it a point to still play with and enjoy time with each child and together as a household. Keep taking an interest in their lives. Divorcing parents can get so overwhelmed with their own feelings. Also, please keep everyone sleeping in their own bed.

6. Listen, deeply from your heart. Ask your children how they are doing. Find out if they want or need more support, like individual or family counseling or a divorce group for kids to get help adjusting. Remind them that anything they are feeling is okay. Be fully present when you are with your children, not being distracted by your phone.

7. Avoid badmouthing the other parent. Watch angry texting and emails as well because they create a tense environment between households that will impact the children. Try to avoid drama, like calling the police, unless it is a true emergency. It's traumatic for the children to watch that happen.

8. Wait to date. I've worked with teens whose parents are just barely separated and mom or dad are sharing their dating experiences on Tinder which is scary for them. Your children need to be your focus for quite a while. Usually, children want to be center stage and have parents be stable, supportive and available to help, not crazy in love.

9.Don't unload your stresses on the kids. Manage your stress with exercise, support from friends and family, a good therapist who can help you process your grief and understand your part. Don't worry the kids with your worries. Keep alcohol use to a minimum. Make a stress management plan for your own self-care.

10. Let the kids know things on a need to know basis, and as it is developmentally appropriate. It doesn't help kids to know the other parent cheated on you. On the other hand, if the other parent gets incarcerated don't tell the kids something vague like they are away or working out of town. Children need to feel like they know the key aspects of what's happening in their own families. If in doubt, call a family therapist or your pediatrician for advice.

11. Provide reassurance. Let the children know they didn't cause the divorce, and that you did love the other parent when you met. Let them know that you are still their parents and are still going to work together as a team on their behalf. Make custody change days as smooth as possible, or have custody changes occur from school pick up to avoid scenes.

12. Realize you aren't really getting rid of the person you are divorcing. When you have children, you are connected through those children, and if you are so lucky, by grandchildren later as well. Act accordingly.

13. Limit the changes as much as you possibly can. If you can keep the children's schools the same, do it. It would be great if you could stay in the same residence, and the other parent move nearby. If you can't, stay as close to the children's friends, school and grandparents as you can.

Divorce is hard for children. You have it in your power to minimize the pain for your children. You'll be so happy you chose a  mutually respectful and child-centered way to navigate this family transition.

Necessary Losses: Getting Good at Getting Through Grief

Necessary losses are a part of our lives. Loss softens us, and causes us to reexamine our lives. Many changes come with the loss of someone you loved. It can take many months, or longer to adjust to life without that beloved person. One has to recreate your sense of self.

There is no one correct way to grieve. Recently, I've had patients reflect that in a grief group at a local hospital they were told to sit in a chair and do an hour of grieving each day, but that's not what I would generally recommend. I have found that grief is as individual as your thumb print or a snowflake. Many people report that grief comes in waves of 20-30 minutes, and can be triggered by many different things. You need to grieve your way, and have support for doing so.

Many feelings are normal as we grieve: sadness, anger, fear, relief, abandonment, shock, confusion, and emptiness.

What factors impact grief?

• Your relationship with the person you lost

• The suddenness or the expected nature of the loss

• Your temperament

• Your coping skills

• Your support system

• Your faith

• Your loss history and having resolved past grief

The more deeply you were attached to the individual, the greater the loss. When I am working with someone who has lost a baby or a child, that is a huge life-changing kind of loss. A couple can be married for 50 plus years, and depending on the quality of the relationship it could be a much more or less difficult transition. Losing your last or only parent can propel you into being the oldest generation in your family. The end of a friendship or the loss of a cherished pet can be very painful, and unearth other feelings of unresolved loss from earlier in your life. Loss is cumulative.

Grieving is hard work. It can make you feel physically and emotionally drained. When you are grieving, it's important to do extreme self-care and nourish yourself as much as you can. There are tasks of mourning to be done, including feeling the pain of the loss and adapting to your life without that person in it to call or spend time with.

Each individual has a loss history. I usually try to take information about previous loss in the first few sessions in counseling individuals. Your history of loss includes all the moves, break-ups, family divorces, job loss, loss of friends as well as loss by death that you have experienced in your lifetime. Looking at how you have coped with past losses and what was helpful can be a good place to start approaching the current loss you may be experiencing.

What helps people who are grieving?

• Support from friends and family

• Rest

• Eating healthfully

• Getting back into life as you can

• A place or person where you can process your grief

• A growth-oriented mindset

Loss is a part of our lives and while very painful, also allows us to grow and to reflect on our own lives and mortality. Getting good at letting yourself fully grieve allows you to go forward being more open, more loving and with a deeper sense of reverence for the delicate nature of our time here. Understanding how your own loss history informs your life can help you become more fully human and more empathic to others.

Plan B: When Resiliency Matters

Sheryl Sandberg, author of Leaning In and COO of Facebook, unexpectedly lost her husband Dave Goldberg this May in an accident while they were on a vacation together in Mexico. The couple were very close and shared roles as breadwinners and parents. She has just become a single parent with the task of finishing raising their son and daughter by herself.

In June, she finished sheloshim, the first thirty days of mourning for a spouse called for by their Jewish faith, and she is reentering many of her normal activities. Sandberg released an essay she posted on Facebook about her experience losing Dave, what motherhood means to her now, and what she has learned about how to respond with sensitivity when others experience loss. It's well worth reading.

I was particularly struck by a brave comment Sandberg makes about making plans for one of their children to go to a father/child event with a family friend who offered to step in for Dave. She wanted Dave, but their friend pointed out that Dave was not an option, so they needed to go to plan B. Sandberg discloses feeling so much loss at Plan A for her life not working out and grieving it deeply, but now committing herself fiercely to Plan B. I honor her resiliency.

The ability to come back from loss, disappointment, rejection and failure is one of the most essential character traits we need to develop and we need to help our children develop. I've been counseling individuals and families long enough to know that there is a random distribution of bad things that happen in life, even if you're making your best effort. Your partner can die prematurely. You can work hard in your marriage to be a faithful and loving partner and still see it end in divorce. You can have an infant or a child not survive. You can lose your home or your business. You or a family member can become disabled which can dramatically alter what you had planned. What are we to do?

Being resilient and going on after loss and disappointment takes courage, bravery and spirit. You have to make the decision to go on, rebuild and go for the joy again, despite what has happened. Life is full of unexpected things, and sometimes the best we can do is to experience and process the feelings of loss, work towards acceptance and throw ourselves hard into Plan B. Sandberg's essay includes thoughtful insights on what has just happened to her family, and also the tenacity that she expresses to go forward for herself and her children.

There are lessons here, too, to be shared with our children about not just striving to achieve and accomplish great things, but also the spirit to come back from difficult things. Perhaps we should celebrate most of all when they try again following challenges, failure, loss and disappointment. Encouraging our children to be real and also be strong and resilient are some of the best values we can role model or instill. We can't bubble wrap our children to protect them, but we can encourage and honor their lessons in bouncing back from adversity and not giving up.

Raising strong, kind and resilient children is a wonderful legacy to leave behind. Being a person and a parent who lives in this resilient way isn't easy at all. 

Loss and disappointment can open us up in the most amazing ways to the importance of living life well and cultivating close relationships. Loss makes us realize how fragile we are all, what's really essential and how precious life is. Significant losses can tenderize us and open our hearts even more than before. Being resilient, and going forward despite how we are changed, is what takes real courage.

Saying Goodbye

My family lost our matriarch and most senior member this week, as my grandmother passed just a few weeks short of her 100th birthday. I was glad that she could complete the end of her story, thanks to the wonderful hospice nurses who helped make it possible. She died peacefully in her own little apartment at the senior assisted living home which has been her home for a number of years.

Spending time with my grandmother this last month made me reflect on lessons I  first learned in my late 20s and early 30s, when I was doing hospice social work early in my career. This week's events just made those lessons about losing a loved one much more personal. Here are a few lessons about helping yourself and other loved ones let go and say goodbye when the time comes:

Loss is a part of life. It's a part of the family life cycle.

Exits and entrances into the family and out of the family are pivotal moments for everyone in the family. This includes deaths, but also divorces, births, adoptions, and marriages . They are nodal life events that cause adjustments.

People are generally happier dying at home if at all possible. It's more intimate.

Our sense of hearing becomes more keen in the days before we depart, so even if a family member is unresponsive you can talk to them, reassure them, let them know that its okay to leave this body and make their transition. Some of our family at a geographic distance got to reassure Grandma by phone even when she was in her last several days.

Death can sometimes provide an opportunity to mend fences between family members. Sometimes you've had a conflicted relationship with the dying person and it may be unrealistic to think you are going to resolve all your feelings before they pass. Try to accept it.

Include younger family members in ways that seems appropriate, but not scary. It felt especially meaningful to have my young adult daughters come and say their own goodbyes. In some ways, including younger family members in suitable, age-appropriate ways helps them be a part of what the older family members are dealing with. It's also good loss education for younger family members who will have other losses to cope with and mourn in future years.

Ask questions of the hospice nurses or other medical staff. It helps to know about the dying process and what is happening as change accelerates in the final days and hours. It's calming to be reassured about what's normal.

Palliative care helps keep a patient comfortable and out of pain. Since supportive, hospice care lasts for only a few days, weeks, or months, we are not concerned about addiction in a dying patient. Hospice and end-of life care is all about comfort measures and helping the patient to make a peaceful transition.

People seem to choose their own timing. Try not to feel guilty if you aren't present at the time of the death. Hospice nurses often notice that family can be holding constant bedside vigil for hours, leave for a moment, and the patient will often die as family are not in the room.

Make peace. Say anything you need to say to your family member; don't regret not saying it later.

Our civilization and culture is not as advanced in terms of dealing with death and dying as some others. It's okay to use the words death, die, etc. Some patients will want to talk about it, but aren't sure the family is up for it.

Tears are good, and healing. Real men cry, too, if they feel like it. I respect a man that can cry.

Loss is often experienced based on your degree of attachment to the person you are losing.

Different family members can express their grief differently.

Loving touch can be the right way to connect with a dying loved one.

Each loss is unique. It's not useful to compare them. Losing an elderly grandparent who lived until almost 100 is not all the same loss as losing a child or a person in the prime of their life, or still with small children. All losses do put us in touch with the temporary nature of this life, the power of connection at all stages of life, and the way that families need each other in times of loss. The finality of loss makes me aware to tell the people I love how I feel about them frequently, and not to let my appreciation of other people go unspoken.

Goodbye, Namo. We'll miss you.

No Greater Loss: Losing a Child

The events of last Friday at Sandy Hook Elementary School deeply affected me and every person I know. The heartbreak of losing 20 six and seven year old children, and 6 heroic educators, by a mass shooter at their school, is overwhelming. It has touched the universal consciousness and humanity of all of us, across the nation, and around the world. The randomness of the loss, that children could be dropped off for school in the morning and be murdered by lunchtime at the school, a place which should be safe, has made the world more anxious. It happened in Newtown, but it could have been our town.

If you get to middle age, you can't help but realize that life is full of losses, big and small ones. You can lose a love, a parent, a sibling, a friend, financial stability, a home, a job you enjoy, your health, a partner, or a marriage. Each of these losses can be very difficult. They each require a grieving process, and a rebuilding of an individual's life afterwards.

Of all the kinds of losses there are in life, I can think of no greater loss than the loss of a child. Even President Obama identified with the parents who lost their children so abruptly and needlessly on Friday, and was pausing to wipe his own tears at his press conference.

What makes losing a child so shattering?

Loss is almost always proportional to the degree that you were attached to that person that you lost. With babies and children, they are completely dependent upon their parents, so the identities of parent and young child are intertwined, not completely separate.

Losing your child at any age, but especially a young one, feels out of the natural order of things. This makes it harder to accept and process. While it is difficult to lose an older beloved family member, you are able to take some comfort at their having lived a full life. With the loss of a child, there is a surreal sense that this is wrong.

The grief continues in a sort of spiral over time as family members grieve again at every developmental milestone their deceased child will miss out on. There is grief at the time of the loss, but also when they should have graduated, driven a car, gone to college, married, and had children of their own. There is the grief for the life ahead of them they were robbed of, and your loss as parents and grandparents to share those later joys with that child.

Grieving parents need to go through the grief process--- the shock, anger, bargaining, sadness, and eventually acceptance. They need to find a way to go on, for themselves, for those who remain in their family, and to honor the child who was taken from them. Peer support is incredibly helpful for parents who have lost a child, offering a place to connect with others who truly understand the nature of this profound loss. Compassionate Friends is one such non-profit support group for parents who have lost a child.

Men and women grieve the loss of a child differently, and understanding this is essential to husbands and wives supporting each other non-judgmentally after the loss, even when what they need to heal may be different. Our grief is as individual as our thumbprints. It is helpful to know what is normal.

While both are challenging, sudden loss can be more difficult to accept and process than an expected loss. One can understand intellectually that the child is gone, but wake up the next day feeling that the loss is not real. There was no chance to prepare.

One of the last challenges with grief, after we have felt the pain of the loss, and adjusted to our world without that beloved child, is to put some of the energy that went into that relationship into other places. To effectively resolve grief, we may want to become involved in honoring the child's memory, perhaps by becoming involved in advocacy for change in the world.

In the Newtown case, using this horrific loss for creating more reasonable gun control laws makes perfect sense. I have had other parents I have worked with who helped themselves heal from their child's premature death through fundraising for research on the prevention and treatment of a disease that took their child. We can't bring our child back, but we may be able to save others. When we give action to our feelings of "enough," we help both preserve the memory of those innocents, and restore our own sense of agency, rather than powerlessness.

The death of innocent children is a profound assault to our sense of safety in the world, our sense of fairness, and a test of our faith. When bad things happen to good people, we struggle as human beings to understand the meaning. From across the US and around the world, we identify with the parents of those sweet young children who lost their lives last week at Sandy Hook. There is truly no greater loss, and it touches us all and calls us to action.

Losing Your Parents

It's been said that you are always a child at heart until you lose your parents. Losing one or both parents means taking a big step up the generational ladder, and redefining your role in the family. It means different things to different people, depending on what the relationship with your mom and dad meant to you. Were they supportive? Disinterested? In your corner? Critical? Available? Busy? Inspiring? Self-Absorbed? Strong? Needy? Missing? Based on your unique relationship with each parent, losing them may bring up a whole spectrum of feelings.
Your loss is also impacted by your age at the time of the loss of each parent.

In 1994, Hope Edelman wrote the excellent book Motherless Daughters about some of the feelings a woman can experience after the loss of her mother. Losing the connection with a mother you were close to can be a huge loss, which has to be processed. Over time, one can begin reinvesting the emotional energy from that strong relationship to others in your life. In doing so, you successfully work through grief, and get to the other side. If you were not close, or, worse, if your mother was destructive or toxic, losing her means the end to ever hoping you are going to have a better relationship.

I have often found in my counseling work that the loss of a parent or the last parent is a significant life event. It is a watershed moment that marks the end of an era, and the beginning of a new one. It makes one reflect on aging, mortality, and about life's meaning. The loss of a parent can spur spiritual growth, ego softening, and reflectiveness. It is a critical time when people need to be able to count on their support system: a partner, close friends, adult children, siblings. It seems people never forget kindnesses offered at these critical moments of loss. It seems that one of the few mistakes you can make is to do and say nothing, and fail to acknowledge the loss.

This week, I had the pleasure of reading a new memoir by writer/grief therapist Claire Bidwell Smith, called The Rules of Inheritance (Hudson Street Press, 2012). The book chronicles Smith's life, feelings, and experiences as she loses her mother during her first semester in college, when she is 18. Later, Smith loses her father at age 25. She feels totally alone. There are several poignant, but insightful things about Smith's book. She realizes over time that she was so busy individuating and resisting her mother at the end of adolescence that she couldn't fully grieve losing her until some years later. Sometimes our own developmental stage at the time of the loss makes it difficult to fully process. One especially misses a parent at key developmental moments in your life (graduations, wedding, birth of a child) when the parent is not present to share in the joy and be of support with new challenges.

I was also struck by Smith's self-reflection that by losing her mother first, she ended up knowing her dad better than she ever would have otherwise. They grew closer through sharing the tremendous loss of her mother, and learning more about her dad's story, including traveling back together with him to the village in the Czech Republic where her dad was shot down from a fighter jet in WWII. After growing close to her dad, his loss leaves her with words I found haunting, as she writes about becoming 'nobody's most important person.' Smith's chapters flip back and forth through time, much like our memories aren't always organized in chronological order. Instead, the chapters represent, and are book-ended by, quotes by Swiss grief expert and psychiatrist Elizabeth Kubler Ross. Chapters in Smith's book are themed around the stages of grief, such as anger, sadness, denial, bargaining, and acceptance.

Claire Bidwell Smith's book, The Rules of Inheritance, bares her own grief process with us as the reader. There are very personal and heart-wrenching moments, such as when, during grad school, Smith is forcing herself to feel and work through the grief with a deep, long cry in the bathtub each night that is years overdue. Smith comes all the way back, finding her way through and past the pain all the way to the other side of it. She realizes, and now helps others realize some profound but simple things. It's okay to feel sad. There isn't one right way to grieve. Grief is an individual experience, as unique as a snowflake, or a fingerprint. Grief takes time to fully process. There are stages, but they are not neat, orderly, or predictable. You have to walk through grief and experience it to get to the other side. Grief changes you. It makes you, hopefully, more present, more tender, and more able to discern what's really important, and what's the stupid stuff. There can be joy and lightness again later, when you work your way through the journey of grief.

Sorting out our grief, understanding the meaning of that person in our life, and what we take forward with us, has to be the point of growing through life's inevitable losses. Smith writes with great pain about her emptiness after the loss of both parents at such a young age. Later, there is a fullness and joy that Smith feels as she partners and becomes a mother herself, recreating a sense of connection and being somebody's 'most important person,' and it seems all the sweeter for the journey she has traveled. Loss, if understood, makes us more tender, more human, and more able to value loving those who are living. Grief opens us up in a beautiful way, if we can get all the way to the other side of the journey.

When Is Grief Over?

When grief hits you,it hits hard,and it feels like it will last forever.Whether it's the loss of a loved one through death,or the end of a love relationship,grief is an equal opportunity emotion that each of us experience during our lifetime.Grief changes you.

Having grieved a relationship with someone you loved dearly makes a person more tender,more appreciative of the sweet and happy moments,and more aware of the fleeting nature of time.It makes you keenly aware to not let your love go unexpressed.It reminds all of us to stay in the present as much as we can.

Over twenty years ago,I worked with hundreds of bereaved people when I interned at the Counseling Department at a large hospital here in Orange County,California.I got to experience walking beside many individuals as they took their journey through loss.It was an honor to do so. I still feel privileged today to walk beside my counseling clients as they grow through loss.Grief experiences can be very individual,like your fingerprint.There are,however,some things that can be generalized about living through loss.

The amount of grief you feel is in direct proportion to the amount of attachment you felt for that person.Losing a young child,for example,is extremely difficult because a parent and a young child have identities that still are intertwined.This is why one person can lose a sister,for instance,and it will have very little impact because they were not close,while it could be a profound loss for someone else who was quite attached to their sister.

The nature of the loss also impacts the intensity of the loss that is experienced.A sudden death or end to a relationship carries more shock,while a loss after an extended illness or years of fighting before a marital separation,allow for anticipatory grief.Expected loss is still difficult,you just have warning that it is coming,and hopefully have time to express yourself to the loved one you are losing.

Normal grief hits in waves.You can cry and fall apart when you see something or hear a song that reminds you of the beloved.Afterwards the tears pass.It helps to know that you are not depressed,or going crazy.This is grief.Grief does not normally impact self-esteem,like depression does.Remember,tears are good.That's why I have boxes of kleenex on every table in my counseling office;tears heal.

Your family and cultural background also impact the way you experience grief.Certain cultural groups,like Asians and Germans,for example generally show less emotion,and this is true for grief expression as well.Their experience is just as profound,but may be experienced more internally.In contrast,other cultural backgrounds may make the expression of grief more emotive,such as with Hispanics.Your cultural and religious faith may also guide and help direct some tasks of mourning,such as holding a wake,visitation at a funeral home,or the Jewish tradition of placing the grave marker a year after the death.Rituals are helpful with the mourning process.

Any unfinished business in the relationship also will impact grief.Death or divorce mean the end for whatever hopes you had for getting your needs met by that individual,so if it never met your needs some personal counseling may be in order to sort out your complicated feelings about the loss.Then you can heal and go on and pursue happiness afterwards.

When is grief finished? It's a wonderful question. There are subtle changes that over time begin to help you realize you are healing.You begin to enjoy things and people again.Your energy returns.(Grief is hard work for your body and spirit.)You find yourself smiling again.Over time,the healthy resolution of grief involves removing the emotional energy that was invested in the relationship with your loved one,and reapplying that energy in another place in your life.It's been said that grief and loss cause us to break a little,and that's where the light gets in.Loss provides the bittersweet contrast that makes the good times even more precious.

Resilency: Bouncing Back When Bad Things Happen

The creator of Rational Emotive Therapy(RET),Albert Ellis, Ph.D., taught us that life is unfair,everybody doesn't have to like you, and other rational ways to look at human relationships and life situations.It seems into every life a certain amount of bad stuff happens: loss,betrayal,financial distress,illness,disappointment and rejection.What is fascinating to me is the resilency of the human spirit, and how people can grow through these unwanted and unwished-for challenges.

As quickly as possible, I work with patients to move out of a victim role. It is healthy to grieve unexpected loss with its stages of grief. Most people experience shock,anger,sadness,and a period of wondering "what if"?(called bargaining) Actively working out these feelings is very important and can be done through talking it through,listening to music, and active exercise.Dealing with grief as soon as possible is always easier and less complicated than shutting it inside where it can remain unresolved. The goal is, over time, to withdraw the emotional energy in the lost dream or relationship, accept the reality of the loss, and gradually reapply that emotional energy in new places in your life.

Grief is not the same as depression. Grief is a normal reaction to a loss.Grief does not normally impact self-esteem as depression so often does. Grief hits in waves of intensity,and then passes. Getting support around you--- friends, family and a good therapist, can strengthen you and help you on your journey through the grief process and successfully moving forward with your life as you resolve the grief.

It is essential to look for your part in any situation, and learn any lessons possible, so that you do not need to repeat the lesson.Bones,when broken,can heal and be even stronger at that place. In a similar fashion, human beings can weather the storms of life, but actively seek to become stronger, wiser and more gentle in the process of coping with unexpected challenge and loss. Be like the willow, and bend and adapt,and not like the oak which breaks instead.In the end, all we can really control is our responses to some life events. We can choose to grow and move on in our lives with as much heart,grace,and resilence as we can.

Breaking Open: Growing Through Grief

I wish there was some way to wrap yourself and the people you love in protective bubble wrap, like they use to prevent fragile things from breaking in the mail. The human experience seems to include highs and lows, and most people get a turn at experiencing loss. While the journey of grief is difficult, people can grow and be tenderized by it if they work through it completely. I notice I am often drawn to people who have experienced some loss. I respect the personal growth that can develop when we let grief break us open, rather than let it harden and embitter us.

Early in my counseling career, I provided hospice counseling for individuals who were dying, and for their families, before and after losing their loved one. Those two years, and the meaningful conversations I was privileged to have with those people, changed my life forever. Facing your own death, or coping with the death of a close family member, really puts the rest of life into perspective. I was about thirty at the time and starting my family and career. I remember sitting with several individuals in their homes and gently reviewing their lives with them; the joys and the sorrows. I recall promising myself never to get caught up in the stupid little stuff in life and lose the big picture. We are all temporary here. So are the people we love.

At work in my counseling office this week, I was reminded how much loss is a part of our lives at every age. Losing a love through a break-up at 20 can be every bit as difficult as a divorce later in life. The hardest kind of loss is the one you are going through. Comparisons don't seem to be helpful.There are other kinds of loss that impact people as well: losses of jobs,moves,financial setbacks,homes, dreams,health challenges. Emotional support at thse pivotal life moments is of critical importance. If you don't have enough, getting grief counseling can be very helpful in resolving your feelings about the loss and not staying stuck.Loss is less complicated if you deal with it as soon as possible and don't numb it or avoid it.

When we experience a loss, we need to mourn. The degree of mourning depends on the amount of attachment that you felt.It is also influenced by the timing of a loss, whether it was sudden or expected, if you were at peace with the person you lost, your coping skills and personality, and the quality of your support system. Writer and psychologist J.William Worden identified 4 emotional tasks of mourning. They are:

1.To accept the reality of the loss

2.To experience the pain of grief

3.To adjust to your environment with the loved one missing

4.To withdraw the emotional energy from that relationship and apply it to other
relationships in your life.

Resolving grief is so important, because grief, like back pain, is cumulative.It will pop up again later if not dealt with.It can be useful to understand what normal grief looks like. Feel free to contact me if you would like specfic book recommendations on growing through grief. Loss comes to us uninvited, but if we can mourn and process it on a deep level it can give our lives so much meaning, and the sweet times even more precious. People that break open to the journey of grief, and go through it, find lots of good things on the other side of that valley.