Book Review: The Worst Loss

Barbara D Rosof’s book The Worst Loss is probably the most helpful book I’ve read.  Rosof just *gets* it.  She goes in-depth at the subject of grief work, as opposed to simply listing the familiar steps of grief.  Also, she addresses the grief felt by different members of the family, giving parents a glimpse in to what their surviving children might be facing.

Someone once told me to keep asking ‘why’ until I no longer needed to.  In her book, Rosof has included a section addressing the ways in which parents lose children.  While that might seem a bit macabre to people who have never faced this situation, to a bereaved parent hearing about children who have died in the same way their child died can be very helpful.  It makes us feel less alone and helps make sense of our situations.  Finally, like many authors writing on the subject of parental grief, Rosof ends her book with a section looking towards rebuilding your life after your child’s death.  Her compassionate and realistic tone, as well as the inclusion of first-person stories related by families, makes her book a great resource to families facing the death of a child.

I would recommend this book to parents and families at any stage of grief, as well as to those in a position to support grieving families.

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Rosof, Barbara D.  The Worst Loss: How Families Heal from the Death of a Child. Henry Holt and Company, LLC, 1994.

ISBN: 0-8050-3241-X

Book Review: The Bereaved Parent

This book is said to be the definitive guide for parents who have lost children.  I didn’t find it particularly helpful, though.  In my opinion it is a bit too dry and reads a bit too much like a how-to manual.  I’m sure many have found it helpful, and the to-the-point tone might be exactly what some bereaved parents need, especially in the early stages when thinking about anything that *isn’t* explicitly spelled out is difficult..

The book is divided in to sections covering various issues bereaved parents face and is arranged in somewhat chronological order in that it starts with a discussion of funerals and ends with a long-term look at parental bereavement.  The sections are relatively short, making it a quick read.  In that sense, it’s something like a reference book.

This would be an appropriate book for parents at all levels of bereavement.
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Schiff, Harriet Sarnoff.  The Bereaved Parent.  Penguin Books, 1977.
ISBN: 0-14-005043-4

Book Review: When the Bough Breaks

I just finished reading When the Bough Breaks, by Judith R Bernstein, and overall it was a helpful book.  Although the tone is a bit on the scientific side, the material is straightforward and rang true to me.  Bernstein herself is a bereaved parent.

The book’s premise is that there is no such thing as ‘recovering’ from the death of a child– instead, Bernstein focuses on living with the loss.  I really appreciated that.  So often, we’re given time frames, charts, and things like that to tell us how we *should* be grieving.  Bollocks.  As Bernstein’s research shows, life is about coping with the loss.  She presents her research, which was done through interviews with other bereaved parents, in the form of profiles of the families and summaries of their interview responses.  The book is categorized loosely, making it easy for readers to choose the sections that will be most helpful to them.

I recommend the book to people who are through the first year of grief.  The book is brutally honest in its portrayal of the difficulties parents face even years after the death of a child, and that might be difficult for the newly-bereaved to take in.

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Bernstein, Judith R.  When the Bough Breaks: Forever After the Death of a Son or Daughter.  Andrews McMeel Publishing, 1998.

ISBN: 0836252829