Good Grief

Aimee DuFresne lost her father and young husband within a year of each other. Devastated by the loss, she had to choose how to continue living her life. Ultimately, she found the courage not just to live but to create a life beyond what she had imagined. Her choice, to live life to the fullest, led to a career that has included a radio show, several books, and a coaching practice to help other wom...

How would you find your way through the pain and betrayal you would feel if you lost someone you loved to suicide? Robert Lesoine found his way through the agony of losing his closest friend; first by writing his pain into a journal and then, ultimately, by creating a book with Marilynne Chöphel, a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist who specializes in trauma. The result is Unfinished Conversat...

Melanie DeMore, an outstanding and internationally recognized vocal artist, embodies her own principle that music can be a force for social and political change. Join us as we talk about how she uses her powerful voice to heal and transform. What experiences in her own life responded to music's healing potential? What led her to dedicate her life to sharing her gifts with adults and children throu...

Join me when guest Ash Beckham talks about having the hard conversations. How did she learn about that? By coming out as a lesbian and, after the grief that comes from a profound lack of acceptance, learned to tell the truth, simply and well, about herself. What are the hard conversations we all need to have and what holds us back? What will we gain when we step over the precipice and take the cha...

Frank Ostaseski, a widely respected authority on compassionate end of life care, urges us to turn toward suffering. What does he mean by that and how can we overcome our fear to find our way there? Join me for this hour of exploration about how allowing our own grief to affect us builds our compassion and our capacity to listen and learn. Discover with me what Frank means when he says that the thr...

Julie Genovese struggled for the first several decades of her life with deep shame and self criticism as a result of the cruel bullying and medical torture she experienced as a child. Originally believing that her dwarfism and arthritis condemned her to a limited and lonely life, she found a way to love herself, with all her unique difference. Following every twist and turn of her own struggle, sh...

Already fascinated by the mysteries of death, sociologist Michelle Peticolas deepened her own understanding of death, and of grief, when she was faced with the deaths of both her parents within the same year. Join us as we explore the ways those losses opened her heart and led to her life's work as a filmmaker exploring death and as a coach facilitating grief. Together, we'll talk about how making...

Claire Bidwell Smith found out at 14 that both her parents had cancer. She spent the next ten years interweaving a halting journey to maturity with their declines and deaths (her mother when she was 14 and her father when she was 24). The many aspects of her grief led to a memoir, The Rules of Inheritance, which will soon be made into a movie starring Jennifer Lawrence. She is also a grief counsel...

What does a palliative care chaplain have to tell us about facing death and living life? Denah Joseph has sat with over a thousand dying people and their families. Her own early experiences with death led her to seek answers to the deepest life questions: Why are we here? What is important? How do we heal? Join me to learn more about what dying people have to teach us about what matters and what i...

Join me as we talk about how the worst time in Amikaeyla's life led to Music As Medicine, programming she developed which successfully helps people in the United States and around the world (including recently in Israel, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Sierra Leone) unlock their deepest inner voice. What links her work on national and international t.v., on recording...

Angelo Merendino is a photographer who started taking pictures of his wife as soon as he fell for her. His photo journaling became a calling when, five months after they were married, Jennifer was diagnosed with breast cancer. When he shared his photos in essay form, they went viral on Facebook, leading to appearances in the press and a TEDX talk. In this hour, Angelo will share what he wants peop...

I wouldn't ask my guests to do something I wouldn't do myself, so on this debut show, I've invited Marianna Cacciatore to interview me. Marianna is Executive Director of Bread for the Journey and host of Ordinary People Doing Extraordinary Deeds, a weekly radio program on VoiceAmerica. Why did I want to host a show on grief? How did losing my wife lead to less fear, more courage, a greater sense o...