After the Death of a Child: Living with Loss through the Years

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After the Death of a Child: Living with Loss through the Years (Reprint) Pub. Date: 5/28/1998 Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
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After the Death of a Child: Living With Loss Through the Years Pub. Date: 5/28/1996 Publisher: Free Press

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Overview

After a child dies, the parent's world changes entirely. Years later, this new world has changed the parents. The exact nature of this change—the long-term effects of the death—illuminates the nature of the bond between parents and children.

Ann Finkbeiner lost her son in a train accident when he was 18. Several years later, she noticed she was feeling better and wondered whether this feeling was what was meant by "recovery." As a science writer, she read the psychological, sociological, and psychiatric research into parental bereavement. And as a bereaved parent, she asked hard questions of thirty parents whose child had died at least five years before, of all causes and at all ages.

In this book, Finkbeiner combines the research and the parents' answers into a description of the parents' new lives. The parents talk about their changed marriages and their changed relationships with their other children, with their friends and relatives. They talk about their attempts to make sense of the death and about their drastically changed priorities. And most important, they talk about how they still love their children, how the child seems to see through their eyes and live through their actions. They move on through their grief, they get on with their lives, but they never let go of their children. Their wisdom is here presented to any in need of it.

What People Are Saying

Camille Wortman

By focusing on the long-term impact of losing a child, Ann Finkbeiner has raised issues and concerns that are rarely addressed. Her book is thought-provoking, deeply moving, and filled with insight and hope. I recommend it enthusiastically to parents and professionals.

— Camille Wortman, State University of New York at Stony Brook

Robert S. Weiss

The book is beautifully written and deeply felt... It can be of value for bereaved parents who can by helped by it to understand their pain and sorrow and to understand the different ways fathers and mothers grieve. It should be required reading for professionals who would help bereaved parents and who would understand how deeply invested are parents in their children.

— Robert S. Weiss, University of Massachusetts, Boston

Therese Goodrich

This book is just excellent. Ann Finkbeiner has found a way to investigate her own grief and perhaps find some resolution to this difficult task of grieving. Thousands of bereaved parents and professionals will benefit from her work."

— Therese Goodrich, former executive director of The Compassionate Friends, member of Bereaved Parents of USA

Editorial Reviews

Baltimore Sun

The first book to examine the long-term nature of parental grief through the tales of those who suffer it. Although the book includes most current grief research, its authorities are parents.

Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic

The bravery that Ann Finkbeiner must have had to write this book is incredible... By using her own and other parents' experiences, the author makes the issues speakable, and a sense of peace through connectedness with these parents is conveyed to the reader.

— Marceil Bauman-Bork, MD

More Reviews (6) Fewer Reviews

Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

Enriching. One is struck by the mysterious power of attachment and love in the parent-child bond.

— Holly Perkins, M.D.

New York Times

Like mourning itself, this powerful book, much of it in the words of bereaved parents, evokes a series of reactions... It illustrates the hard fact [of human suffering] but also our resilience.

Newsletter of the Compassionate Friends

[W]ritten with warmth, depth, and sensitivity... it will be a comfort to those some way down the road, helping them understand their sorrow and pain, and affirming their own individual way of grieving.

— June Gooch

We Need Not Walk Alone

Find a copy... It will exhaust and replenish you.

— Gary Grant

New York Times Book Review

This powerful book, much of it in the words of bereaved parents, evokes a series of reactions...It illustrates the hard fact [of human suffering] but also our resilience.

Publishers Weekly

Finkbeiner, a medical and science writer in Baltimore, lost her son, T.C. (Thomas Carl), in 1987 in a train wreck, when he was 18. Determined to learn what researchers had to say about the long-term effects on parents of a child's death, she found that data on the subject was sparse and focused mainly on recovery steps taken immediately after the death. So she placed an ad in the newsletter of a local chapter of Compassionate Friends, a self-help organization for bereaved parents. She then interviewed respondents who had lost one (or more) offspring, stipulating that the death(s) had to have occurred at least five years before the interview. She met individually with 30 parents: Did they feel guilty? Did they feel better over time? Did their relationship to God change? The two main things she learned are that a child's death is disorienting indefinitely and letting go of a child is impossible. The author makes no claims to scientific rigor - interviewees were self-selected by virtue of having answered the author's ad. Those who have lost a child will find corroboration of many of their feelings in this enlightening and heartrending study.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780801859144
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date: 5/28/1998
Edition description: Reprint
Edition number: 1
Pages: 288
Sales rank: 247,685

Meet the Author

Ann K. Finkbeiner is an award-winning science journalist and regular contributor to Science, The Sciences, and USA Today and coauthor of The Guide to Living with HIV Infection, also available from Johns Hopkins.

	Introduction
1	At First	1
2	Marge Ford's Marriage	24
3	Fathers and Mothers, Husbands and Wives: Changes in the Marriage	37
4	Brandt Jones's Family	54
5	Brothers and Sisters, Sons and Daughters: Changes in the Relationship with Other Children	63
6	Leight Johnson and His Fellow Man	86
7	Janet Wright's Bad Friends	94
8	Changes Toward Other People	98
9	Chris Reed	120
10	On Guilt	130
11	Delores Shoda and the Uncertainty of Life	142
12	Job's Children: Changes Toward God	150
13	Diana Moores' World	173
14	The Zero Point : Changes in Perspective	182
15	Anne Perkins' Priorities	198
16	Surface Ditties and Carpe Diem : Changes in Priorities	207
17	Walter Levin	219
18	The Nature of the Bond	226
19	One Person Now: The Continuing Trajectory	244
	Suggestions for Further Reading	265

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BarbieO

Posted February 20, 2010

Losting a child-the worst thing that can happen to a parent.

I lost my 15 year old son 2 1/2 years ago in a tragic accident. Every feeling I have felt is in this book. It is a must read for every parent who has lost a child and a must read for every parent who knows someone who lost a child--it explains things to parents on how to act and how we, who are grieving and will grieve forever, can sometimes be hurt by the smallest things.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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After the Death of a Child: Living with Loss through the Years

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All Available Formats + Editions

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More About This Book

Overview

Related Subjects

Editorial Reviews

Baltimore Sun

Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic

Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

New York Times

Newsletter of the Compassionate Friends

We Need Not Walk Alone

New York Times Book Review

Publishers Weekly

Product Details

Meet the Author

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Losting a child-the worst thing that can happen to a parent.