Good Grief

After her fiancee's father died, Erica Buist became terrified of death itself. Afraid to venture outside and anxious about the other people she loved dying too, her life narrowed to an alarming degree. She resolved that once she was able to go out of the house, she would explore the ways people around the world helped themselves through loss and grief. How did they handle it? In trips around the g...

Judy Lipson's family had more than their share of loss and no skills at talking about them. After the deaths of her two sisters Judy put her head down and went on, not believing she could face her grief. In the process, she was unable to come to terms with the losses or find a way to incorporate her only two siblings into her life going forward. But thirty years later, she finally allowed herself...

When we experience loss our first and most intense desire is to get back to who we were before the tragedy. When that isn't possible, we can become lost in an endless loop of desire for our old self. But it is in accepting the loss a building our new self that our hopes for a future self live. Michele Neff Hernandez learned the truth about this when her beloved husband died suddenly. Where was the...

Michelle Cleveland coaches her clients to be the best versions of themselves. The lessons she learned from two of her children who had learning differences taught her to meet her clients where they are and support them in their individuality. What informs her work even more deeply is what it took for her to create a good life after the suicides of two of her sons. She has been able to find meaning...

Differences are what make humans endlessly evolving, and interesting. But often people who are different are shunned, oppressed and misunderstood. Mickey Rowe was seen as different both because of being legally blind and because he is autistic. Getting the world to believe he had unique and powerful skills to offer took a superhuman effort. His different abilities were less limiting than other peo...

Over a lifetime, what has given you the gift of shift? There's no way around those painful and difficult circumstances that come to us all, but what ultimately allows us to move forward with new wisdom? Ann Papayoti has experienced deep sorrow and loss, painful circumstance and yes, transformation. All of it led her to her life work- coaching other people towards lives of meaning and self realizat...

Ken Ross grew up immersed in the work of his mother, Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Unlike most people in the West, he was immersed in a world where death, dying and grief wer openly talked about and explored. How did he come to view his unique experience with the pioneering author of On Death and Dying? We will talk about his mother's work, his childhood and how he carries her work forward, honoring the...

Living what he considered a charmed life, Ivan Maisel was completely unprepared for the unexpected loss of his 21 year old son from suicide. The decisions he made in those first terrible hours, days, weeks, gave him a way forward as he struggled to learn how to live with the unimaginable. He and his family would be open about the loss. They would not hide the cause of his death. He and his family...

Living a lifetime without his father, Jonathan Wess developed a clear vision of what he would have gained from that relationship. Only four years old when his father died, he missed out on the opportunity to learn from his father, to hear how he felt about his life and to receive the legacy of his father's memories. As an adult, this led Jonathan to a passion for collecting stories; stories to rem...

Creative expression is a powerful way to process the losses in our lives- and sometimes takes unusual forms. For Carol Finizza, trying to understand her daughter's addiction led her to write a murder mystery. How did writing about a crime help? Was she able to understand more fully her daughter's (and her own) experience? Join us to uncover the mystery behind the mystery!

How do our deepest experiences guide our lives after? For i.b. casey cui, a cancer diagnosis at a young age sent her life in a different direction than anyone expected, ultimately helping her to defy the demands of her family and become a writer instead of an attorney. Her novel, Groovy Girl, incorporates elements of her own story to tell a tale of immigration, family pressures and perils, and wha...

The profound experience of love and loss often lead an artist to a deep need to create. In fact, mourning itself is a creative process, helping us to evolve into our new selves. For Corey Madden and her husband, facing his end, capturing their relationship in a podcast offered the opportunity to express what they meant to each other, leaving a record of a deep love. The act of creating out of thei...

Kelley Skoloda was a very healthy woman until she was diagnosed with cancer. Along with the brutal treatment came a new way of looking at her life. As a successful MBA with a thriving career, adjusting to a period of health challenge felt out of step. However, over time she applied her considerable skills to navigating her cancer and ultimately becoming a support for others going through cancer an...

When Gina Harris' parents died, she tried to stay connected to them through memory and music. As a jazz singer, over time she began to sing her sorrow, and her healing. The music that came out of this deep place in her led her to offer it to others, in performances and a podcast series dedicated to them and to her own grief process. Join us as we talk about what compelled her to create the series...

Karen V. Johnson, a successful judge promised a lifetime appointment, was sure she would continue living the same way indefinitely. But when her son died of a heroin overdose she soon realized everything needed to change. Setting off on a quest to sooth her overwhelming grief, she found her way over time to a life she had never imagined, full of rich spiritual experiences, new practices and a free...

Little House on the Prairie personified a simple, pioneering and wholesome lifestyle, bringing love and family into our living rooms. It is still loved around the world long after the series ended. But what of the real people who created and starred in the show? Karen Grassle had struggled with building her acting career but was finding success in New York. She never imagined herself on t.v. until...

When Rachel Michelberg's husband crashed into a vineyard, suffering a severe brain injury, she'd been thinking about leaving the marriage and even entertaining the idea of an affair. How would she find it within her to take care of him and their children? Shouldn't a wife naturally rise to the occasion? But she didn't feel able to do so. She faced her own judgement and disdain from some of the peo...

An unconventional childhood led Jessica Vitalis, circuitously, to a career as a young adult fiction writer. In exploring themes of death and grief, domestic violence, and socio-economic disparities, she guides her young readers to grapple with the challenges that face them. Many of her stories create magic and fantastical environments that keep young readers engaged and helps to open them to the d...

When both of Meghan Riordan Jarvis' parents died within a short period of time she experienced what could only be called Post Traumatic Stress. As she moved through her experience she called on all her humor, wit and knowledge to go forward even when she didn't know how. What emerged was a new aspect of the work she was doing, dedicated to supporting other grievers. With her blog, podcast and soon...

Do you remember where you were when two jets plowed into the World Trade Center buildings? If you were at ground zero, you have a particularly harrowing story to tell. But that day affected most people no matter where we were. For the people who then navigated boats on the Hudson, their peaceful everyday world became a rescue operation. In interviews afterwards they shared the compelling drive tha...

What makes it possible for some of us to create the lives we dream of while others are held back by our life stories? Sherry Fernandez was always geared to growth. She never saw rough times in her childhood as a reason to fail. Even when she encountered bumps in the road she always looked for a way forward. Over many decades she noticed the skills that kept her on track. She studied with masters w...

Although a diagnosis of autism is not, by itself, a loss, many losses come as a result. Most autistic kids are bullied, kept out of activities they would enjoy and sometimes rejected by the people closest to them. Temple Grandin's mother decided early on to raise Temple with love but also to push her to have the best possible life. As a result, Temple has lived a life of meaning and purpose, helpi...

The impact of Peg Conway's mother's death, when she was just 7, reverberated through her life, impacting her sense of safety, her reactivity and her sense of alienation. Maybe even more than the loss, the failure of her family to keep her mother alive for her created a gaping hole in her. It also resulted in the loss of ongoing connection with her mother's family when her father remarried. It wasn...

As an OB-GYN, Dr. Kate White knew almost everything about the physical aspects of miscarriage and pregnancy loss. But it wasn't until she experienced it herself that she truly understood the emotional impacts of a pregnancy that does not result in bringing a baby home. She set out to combine her vast knowledge with her new realization and in the process created a complete guide for families who gr...

After a loss we're so aware of the missed opportunities, the things we'll never be able to do with the person we love. For Katie Russell Newland, her mother's death made their dream of touring every baseball stadium, all in one year, an impossibility. Or did it? Could Katie fulfill the dream as a way to honor her mom and their relationship? After her own cancer diagnosis and treatment, Katie took...