The Modern Loss Handbook: An Interactive Guide to Moving Through Grief and Building Your Resilience

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One moment managing, and going about the business of living, the next sobbing with a pain out of nowhere unable to breathe and then like the clouds parting, a wonderful memory and I am able to go on. And then it repeats. Surprisingly I noticed I was more aware of everything like the clarity and sweetness after a rain storm. In the book, you encourage readers to be in both the happy memories and the more complicated moments they may have shared with their person. Why was it important for you to emphasize both? She recognizes that one size does not fit all. Everyone mourns in unique ways. This is a handbook of many tools and perspectives on the process. I included a lot more information than I intended to, but I just couldn’t stop writing. There are so many things that work together to help somebody to build resilience when they’re moving through grief, whether that’s community support, individualized support, or personal reflection. In the end, this book is something that you really can use over the course of years. You don’t have to fill it all out in one sitting; it should be something that’s really part of your experience.

We are also, like many of you, deeply concerned that a medical recasting of the very human and universal experience of loss will adversely impact our society’s perception of how grief “should” be versus how it’s actually experienced. Rebecca Soffer’s new book is called T he Modern Loss Handbook: An Interactive Guide to Moving Through Grief and Building Your Resilience, published by Running Press. For more information about Soffer’s work, visit www.modernloss.com. Another idea: Discuss with your boss a two- or three-month period that will not count towards your annual performance review. This year on Mother’s Day (May 8), social media tributes and corporate advertisements could sting (although as previously reported by TODAY Parents, businesses are steadily offering customers opt-out tools). If you’re struggling, Soffer offered these coping tips: Find a 'grief buddy'Corporations are still muddling their way through this era, because grief is such a delicate emotional issue. So if you are going through it on a personal level, you can help them understand what employees need and what they do not, suggests Soffer. The internet is terrific, in that it really allows for very accessible storytelling. But a book is different. It’s tactile and weighty in your hands; it feels good to have something meaningful and comforting you can hold. Our first book, Modern Loss: Candid Conversation About Grief. Beginners Welcome came out of that wish to create something physical, and working on it really allowed us to pull in a lot of different contributors for conversations around these themes. We were able to write extensively ourselves and to experiment with art and illustration. Doing that was a huge challenge and, ultimately, an amazing experience. If you have a performative role, like being a professor, maybe you could switch into a more administrative role for a period of time,” Soffer says. “That way you won’t feel so exposed.” Modern Loss is a place to share the unspeakably taboo, unbelievably hilarious, and unexpectedly beautiful terrain of navigating your life after a death. Beginners welcome.

This is one of the best grief resources for mental health, helpful and funny. This book is meant to help us stay connected to our people, stay connected to ourselves, and stay connected to the world around us even in grief. I think the "handbook" title doesn't really define the book. Even though it is a handbook and workbook you can use, it is also a deep and personal guide that provides a box of tools we can use in different situations of grief. So much loss at such a relatively young age un-tethered Rebecca. There were husbands yet to meet, puppies yet to adopt, and so many other miles yet to stone—but all of it would have to be done without her own parents’ guidance, along with dealing with the logistical aftermath of each of their deaths. Dear reader, it was bad.

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It’s important to recognize that not every situation can be summed up by saying, “Oh, we had a great relationship and everything had closure.” Human dynamics are very complex. That’s why I make a case for remembering the tough stuff. When you remember it, maybe it can teach you some lessons about how you might like to live your own life. I certainly have takeaways from my own experience of losing my parents. Maybe it’s something that you realize you’re still struggling with, but you didn’t realize you were having a hard time until being asked a blunt question. At that point, you might like to speak with a therapist about it. If you work with the right therapist, and have the right conversations, and join peer to peer groups with people who really understand and are willing to listen to you, then you can really work through those tough things. It’s never going to be resolved with your person, because they’re dead. But you can resolve it with yourself to the best of your abilities by giving yourself the chance to examine it and sit with it. You deserve to live with as little weighing on you as possible. Because if Rebecca couldn’t have parents, dammit, she could at least have chocolate cake—not to mention friends who understood the particular nuances of going through profound loss way before they expected to.