Welcome to Your Peak Grief Season
November 1st is one of those days that is a day of mixed emotions. On one hand, Merry Christmas! Halloween is over and those of you that know me personally know that my Christmas decor is going up this weekend and it brings me GREAT joy. On the other hand, November 1st starts all the […]
What Grief Books Do I Get My Kids?
Well I am glad you asked! You have come to the right place! I love using books in my practice and often am asked what my favorites are by my friends and colleagues when kiddos near them are grieving. Below you will find some of my favorites with a short explanation of why I love […]
Task Three: Adjusting
We have reached week three of our series on Worden’s Four Tasks of Mourning. This week we are talking about the third task which is to adjust to an environment where the deceased is missing. This task focuses on working on finding a new normal without our loved one with us. If you have not […]
Task Two: Work Through the Pain
Last week, I started a series in which we are discussing Worden’s Four Tasks of Mourning. If you haven’t read last week’s post, I would encourage you to do so to be able to have a better understanding of the tasks. This week we are continuing this series by talking about Worden’s second task of […]
The First Tasks: Acceptance
There are many approaches that people have created to illustrate how people process grief. Some talk about stages, some talk about steps, and one talks about tasks. William Worden provides for us four tasks of grief in order to achieve equilibrium in our life again. These four tasks can be completed in the order the […]
Review: Coco
This blog post contains spoilers about the movie “Coco”. If you haven’t watched it yet, I would suggest reading this after you have! Covered in Marigolds, bright colors, spirit guides, and family, this film is a great way to educate as well as entertain all ages. This sweet story tells us about Día de Muertos, […]
My Grand Baby Grand
“My mother bought it secondhand from a silent movie star It was out of tune but still I learned to play And with each note we both would smile forgetting who we are And all the pain would simply fly away” Well, my mother did not buy our piano second hand. In fact, it was […]
Back to School: A Guardian’s Guide to Helping a Grieving Child
As I discussed in my last blog post, my dad died on the fourth day of fourth grade. I took days four through nine off from school and Monday I was expected to go back. “What? My dad just died. I’m not leaving my mom for 7 hours a day to just go to school. […]
4th Day of Fourth Grade
In August 2000, I went back to school on August 4th. It was a Thursday and my dad had been in the hospital for almost 10 months straight. At this point, he had suffered from two heart attacks and multiple organs had started to fail. My mom and I were guessing his time left on […]
The Keepsakes
Throughout our relationships with people, we hold onto little things. A movie stub from seeing a movie you both loved, pictures, or a special birthday card are just some of the small keepsakes we hold onto. When our loved one dies, we tend to put these items all in one place and tuck it away. Our […]