Open to Hope Articles

Articles Home

Rituals

Posted on September 16, 2009 - by Sandy Fox

by Sandy Fox Rituals are part of life. When your child dies, they become even more important. For myself, I have a few rituals I follow to honor and remember my daughter. Today will be one of them. Each time I leave town for more than just a weekend, as I will very soon, I go to the cemetery to see Marcy and clean off her grave. It makes me feel good. No one else cleans it like I do, and I always want it to shine and look good in case others come by to visit and pay their […]

The Antique Iron Bed, a Source of Comfort

Posted on September 16, 2009 - by Harriet Hodgson

When my husband and I were first married, we didn’t own any furniture. We lived in furnished apartments for a few years and purchased a home when my husband was a resident at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Residents don’t make much money and our house was furnished with hand-me-downs. My mother and father-in-law gave us an antique, wrought-iron bed to help out. The bed was white and had small, fleur-de-lis decorations. These were nice, but the most unusual part of the bed was the mattress, which had a picture of a bed bug in the middle and the words […]

When Behaviors Don’t Make Sense

Posted on September 15, 2009 - by Stan Goldberg

More than 10 years ago, I saw a black and white photograph by Richard Avedon that I still vividly remember. It was taken of a young boy in 1947 in Sicily. He was in the foreground smiling broadly and wearing a suit that was too short in the arms and too tight in the waist. In the background—softly out of focus—was a tree with a symmetrical oval canopy and a fence that defined the boundary between sky and water. A seemingly bucolic scene unless you looked carefully at the boy. After starring at it for a while, I realized that […]

Dreamwork as a Healing Path Through Grief

Posted on September 15, 2009 - by Julie Lange

The only way to fully understand what your dreams are telling you is to observe them over time and slowly discover the landscape, the common themes and the inhabitants that populate your dream world.

‘I’ve Never Been a Crier,” But Now….

Posted on September 15, 2009 - by Nina Bennett

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief…and unspeakable love.” Washington Irving Here they come again. I have no idea what triggered this waterfall. One moment I was driving to work, thinking of my schedule for the day ahead, and the next thing I knew, the tears were rolling down my cheeks. This is part of the new normal that is me since my precious granddaughter was born still more than five years ago. I’ve never been a […]

Grief and Degrief: When Theory Meets Reality

Posted on September 14, 2009 - by Lyn Prashant

On the eleventh day of September 2001, I awoke to a crisp northern New York state morning, the best of blue skies and an audible fall crunch in the air. I am New York City-born, so I remember those fall days well. I was in Rochester, N.Y., to present my work on the “somatic aspects of grief”. It was 9:01 a.m. as I stood in front of my class. It was my first presentation representing the University of Arizona and I was in front of 75 health care professionals. I began to introduce myself and the contents of my Degriefing […]

A Moment of Perspective…

Posted on September 14, 2009 - by Eric Tomei

Sometimes, it’s hard to put things into perspective becuase we are always so consumed about what we are feeling and how it affects us in our lives, that we don’t take the time to think that maybe somebody has it just a little bit harder than you. I was in a charity golf outing this weekend honoring one of our beloved family members, who I have written about earlier, who passed away from a 2 year battle with leukemia in March. Ironically, the golf outing was on 9-11 and it couldn’t have been more fitting since he was a police […]

Time Moves Differently When Dealing With Grief

Posted on September 14, 2009 - by Harriet Hodgson

Four months ago my daughter was killed in a car crash. Her sudden death on a snowy night stunned her 15-year-old twins and sent shock waves through the entire family. Many of us are still in shock. I know I am. One moment, I know my daughter is gone. The next moment, I can’t believe it. Nobody can grieve for me and I am working hard on recovery. But my grief flares when well-meaning friends say, “Last year was a hard one for you.” Last year? It has only been four months since my daughter died. When friends say this […]

When and How to Use Medicine for Grief

Posted on September 14, 2009 - by Richard Dew

It was a typical meeting of Compassionate Friends, the organization for parents who have lost a child. We were discussing what helped us cope with the death of our child. Joanna, a quiet lady who seldom spoke, suddenly blurted out, “I take Prozac. I couldn’t have made it without it, and I don’t care what anyone thinks.” After a few seconds of stunned silence, several others confessed to “using drugs.” As a physician, I have been uneasy with what seems to be an almost blanket disapproval of medication by support groups, psychologists and counselors. We are encouraged to cry, scream, […]

When an Employee is Grieving the Death of a Child

Posted on September 14, 2009 - by Patrick T. Malone

The Situation Businesses are accustomed to putting a price tag on lost productivity and increased insurance costs associated with conditions from diabetes to those from life problems including substance abuse and depression. For the first time, there is data available on the impact of grief in the workplace. The annual cost of grief from the death of a loved one is more than $37.5 billion. The grief following the death of a child is intense, long-lasting and complex. It is perhaps the most devastating loss a parent may experience and poses unique challenges for you, the employer, who is concerned […]