Unfinished Conversation: Healing from Suicide and Loss

by Robert Lesoine, Marilynne Chophel

Overview

Unfinished Conversations is a story of profound grief and the journey to healing that followed. Based on a journal Robert Lesoine kept during the two years following the suicide of his best friend, Unfinished Conversations will help readers through the process of reflecting on and affirming the raw immediacy of survivors’ emotions. Each short chapter focuses on a different aspect of the author’s experience as he transforms his anger and guilt to understanding and forgiveness.

Licensed psychotherapist Marilynne Chöphel brings her professional background to Robert Lesoine’s deeply personal story to create an accessible path to self-directed healing based on mindful awareness and sound clinical practices. Readers work through their own grieving and healing process with end-of-chapter exercises and activities. An appendix and website, unfinishedconversation.com, provide additional resources to survivors.

The tools and techniques in Unfinished Conversations will help readers release past trauma, honor their relationship with their lost loved one, and find greater perspective, meaning, and well-being in their lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781937006457
Publisher:	Parallax Press
Publication date:	08/27/2013
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Robert Emile Lesoine, MA, Ed. is an educator, musician, and writer living in Santa Monica, CA, where he’s been teaching music in primary schools for 35 years. He’s the creator of two full-stage musicals, Body Snatchers: The Musical, and Last Night at Playland.

Marilynne Chöphel has been a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist for over 20 years, and specializes in the treatment of trauma. A yoga and meditation teacher as well, Chöphel’s work with survivors incorporates mindfulness and body-mind awareness. She is the mother of two adult sons and lives in San Rafael, California.

Table of Contents

Preface Shoshana Alexander xv

Chapter 1 The Journey Begins 3

Journal Exercises 7

Beginning Your Journal

First Reactions

About the Tool Kit for Your Journey to Healing

Chapter 2 Shock and Disbelief 9

Journal Exercises 11

Telling Others

The First Day

Beginning the Conversation

Chapter 3 Disregarded Warnings 13

Journal Exercises 18

Signs of Suicide

Contributing Factors

Last Contact

Remorse and Regret

Chapter 4 Unanswered Questions 21

Journal Exercises 24

Creating a Place of Honor

Why?!

Attitudes about Suicide

Remembering Shared Pleasures

Meditation

Chapter 5 Delving Deeper 27

Journal Exercises 30

Fear and Fearlessness

Depression as a Disease

Physical Pain

Treatment and Medication

Contributing Factors

Chapter 6 An Absence 33

Journal Exercises 36

Your Loved One's Place

The Means

Talking with Others

Individual Ways of Grieving

Chapter 7 Farewells 39

Journal Exercises 45

Suicide Notes

Continuing in Another Form

Words of Inspiration

Gathering to Say Farewell

Chapter 8 Getting Real 47

Journal Exercises 52

Creating Dialogues

Talking about the Hard Stuff

Guilt and Remorse

Unfinished Business

Staying Connected

Chapter 9 Emotional Roller Coaster 55

Journal Exercises 57

A Prayer for Your Loved One

Crying

Break in Belonging

Highs and Lows

Chapter 10 Trying to Understand 59

Journal Exercises 62

Becoming Curious

Relationships with Animals and Pets

Grieving Around Strangers

Transforming Shame

Chapter 11 Gaining Perspective 65

Journal Exercises 67

Depression and Reprieves

But Things Were Getting Better

Further Investigations

Chapter 12 Transitional States 69

Journal Exercises 73

Being In-Between

Negative and Positive Influences

Their Soul's Mission

After Death Beliefs

Peace … Be Still

Chapter 13 Revealing the Shadow 75

Journal Exercises 80

Your Loved One's Shadow

Gifts of the Shadow

Exploring Your Own Dark Side

Chapter 14 Gathering to Remember 83

Journal Exercises 87

Remembering or Creating a Memorial

The Uncensored Eulogy

Chapter 15 Abandoned 89

Journal Exercises 91

Reflecting on Dreams

Betrayal and Abandonment

Remembering through a Song or Poem

Chapter 16 Missing Pieces 93

Journal Exercises 99

Relationships: Love and Challenge

Questions for Others

Finding Supportive Connection

Chapter 17 Tracking the Unraveling 101

Journal Exercises 106

Life Review

Defining Moments

Qualities and Contributions

Chapter 18 Turning Point 109

Journal Exercises 114

The Healing Story

The Power of Place

Gifts and Lessons

Turning toward Acceptance

Chapter 19 Discovering Interbeing 117

Journal Exercises 121

Living on Inside You

Forgiveness

The Good-bye Letter

Epilogue: Saying Good-bye to My Buddy 123

Journal Exercises 128

The Gift of Grieving Again

Recreating the Final Hours

Ongoing Conversation

Paying It Forward

Reclaiming Your Life

Appendices

1 Tool Bat for Your Journey to Healing 133

2 Creating Support 147

3 Clinical Theory Behind Unfinished Conversation's Healing Process 153

4 Resources for Survivors of Suicide 157

5 Resources for Suicide Prevention 163

6 Readings to Support Your Journey to Healing 167

Editorial Reviews

Expertly woven into the raw feelings expressed in the journaling of Lesoine’s loss are the tools and techniques of Marilynne Chöphel that will help to understand, heighten, experience and refine these emotions. The authors claim this journey will help anyone left after a suicide find greater perspective, meaning, and well-being in their lives. I agree without reservation…The willingness of Lesoine to share his feelings in such an honest and sometimes vulnerable manner disarmed me. I connected with experience in a way that made differences in vocation, stage of life, or spiritual views irrelevant…[Through his] shared spiritual experiences—though different than my own—that I was able to connect so deeply with the book…Unfinished Conversation: Healing from Suicide and Loss is a book that I will use in my own clinical practice and one that I will recommend to friends and family. The book helps to create some understanding out of an experience that is largely devoid of it. Most importantly, the book helps to believe that there really is hope that it gets better.”—American Association of Suicidology

“Unfinished Conversation chronicles a path of transformation from anger and despair to compassion and liberation. We may have lost a loved one, but with mindfulness, concentration, and insight, we have the possibility of helping ourselves and the many loved ones around us."—Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh

“Suicide is a pain that never quite disappears. This eloquent book is a personal companion for those left behind, a friend nudging us forward with compassion and wisdom to see below, behind, and beyond the limitations of our current understanding. Highly recommended for anyone who wishes to keep the heart open after losing a loved one in this way.”—Christopher Germer, Ph.D., author of The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion

“This compelling, raw and honest book follows one man’s emergence through the anguish of great loss—a best friend’s suicide. While accompanying him, we are given a powerful set of tools that can support us in navigating and healing from the suicide of loved ones. Beautifully written, this book is pure medicine for the grieving heart.”—Tara Brach, Ph.D., author of Radical Acceptance and True Refuge

“Unfinished Conversation is a wise, deep, and powerful book... pulsing with honesty… it offers a path through suffering to some resolution and understanding. The authors handle a difficult topic with Grace.”
—Fred Luskin Ph.D., Director, Stanford Forgiveness Project and author of Forgive for Good and The Nine Steps to Forgiveness

“An extraordinary piece of work. Tough to read, impossible to stop. Recovering from a loved-one’s suicide requires nothing less than everything we have. We need courage and real tools to approach the wounded heart unflinchingly, with love and wisdom. Marilynne Chöphel and Robert Lesoine provide those real tools, abundantly. It is possible to start again. Reading Unfinished Conversation will prove that over and over.” —Richard Heckler Ph.D., author of Waking Up, Alive

“Thank you for the courage to look into this well of darkness and despair plaguing modernity and the world as a whole. More importantly, thank you for your courage to excavate the tragic and for making it yield the healing gems hidden within. May this gift serve as a map and a guide to numberless people trapped in this dark landscape of sorrow, and longing to come home.”—Malidoma Patrice Somé, author of Ritual and The Healing Wisdom of Africa

“Twenty-five years ago my sister took her own life. Recently I began working with the exercises for survivors that Robert Lesoine and Marilynne Chöphel offer in Unfinished Conversation. Guided by their questions, I was able to remember and release some deep unhealed grief and move on in my own life in a new way, deepened and transformed by my journey into and out of profound grief. I am now using the book with a support group I facilitate for survivors, confident that this journey will lead them to genuine healing.”—Shoshana Alexander, co-author of Awakening Joy

“Unfinished Conversation is a compelling account of one mans' personal journey depicting the human capacity to search and find meaning, love and beauty in both life and death... even in the midst of great sorrow. The authors include practical strategies that can offer healing in the wake of a suicide.”—Jean Larch, author of Dying To be Free

“Suicide strikes our hearts unlike any other loss often leaving us feeling a unique incompleteness. Unfinished Conversation shares the author's personal healing journey through the loss of a dear friend to suicide. Their writing guides the reader through a structured journaling process that may help many on the path from tragedy to transformation. Robert Lesoine and Marilynne Chöphel MFT have combined their own learning with classical grief work to provide a very accessible toolkit to support healing.”—Frank Ostaseski, co-founder, The Zen Hospice Project, author of Being a Compassionate Companion

“This book is a much-needed tool and source of hope for the family and friends of those who suicide, a valuable resource that addresses each of the challenges and each stage of grieving in a very moving, mindful way.”—Janina Fisher Ph.D., Licensed Clinical Psychologist, International Trainer, and leader in the treatment of trauma

From the Publisher