Open to Hope Articles

Do you want to read stories of others who have been where you are? Are you looking for bereavement help, and advice? Look no further. We offer over 7,000 articles written by our Open to Hope authors.

Articles Home

Early Days After Child-Loss: Survival

Posted on February 28, 2020 - by Mary Jane Hurley Brant

Excerpted from When Every Day Matters: A Mother’s Memoir on Love, Loss and Life (Simple Abundance Press) on Amazon. When you really want to pray for something and you do not receive it, you tend to believe that your prayer was not answered….it is true that at times your prayer is not answered in a direct way ….Unknown to you, that prayer has secretly worked on another aspect of the situation and effected a transfiguration which may become visible only at a later stage. ~John O’Donohue~ Eternal Echoes July 14, 1999 Dear Katie, Today you have been gone four days.  […]

Read More

They Help You in Ways They Never Could Before

Posted on February 25, 2020 - by Karen Noe

This is an excerpt from Your Life After Their Death: A Medium’s Guide to Healing After a Loss, by Karen Noe available on Amazon.com. Your deceased loved ones are able to help you in ways they never could before. Because they don’t have bodies that limit where they are able to go, they can be wherever they’d like to be with a simple thought. They put the right people in your path, place thoughts in your head about how to accomplish your goals, inform you of things you didn’t know, grant you peace when you need it, help you to […]

Read More
fear of dying

The Coronavirus and Grieving the Fear of Your Own Death

Posted on February 25, 2020 - by Gloria Horsley

The Coronavirus, also known by its scientific name of COVID-19, is most likely on all of our minds. With so much coverage about how it can spread to epidemic proportions if not addressed proactively, the fear about it grows. Many may even call to mind some of those movies like “Contagion.” These types of movies dramatize the impact  a virus can have on the world. Fear Grows Already, we see how our viewers are reacting to media coverage. We’ve receive more questions and concerns about the Coronavirus. Even though we covered it previously, it’s important to revisit it, which was […]

Read More

Do It Anyway

Posted on February 22, 2020 - by Allen Klein

This is an excerpt from Embracing Life After Loss: A Gentle Guide for Growing Through Grief by Allen Klein. Available on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Embracing-Life-After-Loss-Growing/dp/1642500062/ref=sr_1_1?crid=330F5I7PHDK96&keywords=embracing+life+after+loss+klein&qid=1579904828&sprefix=Embracing+lif%2Caps%2C219&sr=8-1 Life is risky; we are all acrobats tiptoeing over one bridge or another. To a tightrope walker the rope is just like home. Those who hold their bodies lightly and their minds simply may seem in danger, but they are safe. —Chinese scroll saying Recently I received an email from a woman who lost her young husband in a car crash. She said that with his death, her “life has not been and never will be […]

Read More

‘Grief Fills Up the Room’ of an Absent Child

Posted on February 21, 2020 - by Mary Jane Hurley Brant

Excerpted from When Every Day Matters: A Mother’s Memoir on Love, Loss and Life (Simple Abundance Press), available on Amazon. In my end is my Beginning. ~Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots 1542-1587~ The life that I knew, the life that I had dearly loved, died when my daughter Katie died.  Today is the start of another.  Katie was not only my daughter; she was my hero.  This narrative is about her.  I invite you to get to know Katie; I invite you to get to know me.  Katie died of a brain tumor.  When she left my world and this […]

Read More

Healing Relationships After Death

Posted on February 21, 2020 - by Lo Anne Mayer

Excepted from Celestial Conversations: Healing Relationships After Death (Cape House Books), and may be purchased through Amazon. One year after Mother’s death, I was cleaning out a bookcase when one of my journals from the 1970’s fell on the floor.  I skimmed it, remembering how I’d combined meditation and journaling to tap into divine guidance.  The technique had helped me to unravel our six-year-old son’s academic difficulties.  Could this formula of prayer, meditation and journaling help me heal the grief I feel over the loss of my mother?  I figured it couldn’t hurt to try. The next morning I sat […]

Read More

No More ‘At Least…’

Posted on February 20, 2020 - by Greg Adams

At least he didn’t have to suffer. At least you have other children. At least you still have your health. At least she’s in a better place. At least you can have other children. At least you had so many years together. At least you had the chance to say good-bye. (Take a deep breath—there’s more) At least you know where he is. At least it was so early in the pregnancy. At least you still have your friends and family. At least you have your faith. At least you’ve been through this before and know how it goes. At […]

Read More

Bend without Breaking

Posted on February 15, 2020 - by Allen Klein

This is an excerpt from Embracing Life After Loss: A Gentle Guide for Growing Through Grief by Allen Klein, available on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/Embracing-Life-After-Loss-Growing/dp/1642500062/ref=sr_1_1?crid=330F5I7PHDK96&keywords=embracing+life+after+loss+klein&qid=1579904828&sprefix=Embracing+lif%2Caps%2C219&sr=8-1 As I started to picture the trees in the storm, the answer began to dawn on me. The trees in the storm don’t try to stand up straight and tall and erect. They allow themselves to bend and be blown with the wind. They understand the power of letting go. Those trees and those branches that try too hard to stand up strong and straight are the ones that break. —Julia Butterfly Hill, American environmentalist While […]

Read More

Ho’oponopono and Other Important Healing Phrases

Posted on February 13, 2020 - by Karen Noe

This is an excerpt from Your Life After Their Death: A Medium’s Guide to Healing After a Loss available on Amazon at:             My clients often express their regrets about the relationships they had with their deceased loved ones. Some just wish they would have told their loved ones how much they cared, but now it is too late; others feel they should have told their them how grateful they were for having them in their lives; some are sorry and feel remorse for their actions; yet others are very angry and are finding it […]

Read More

Quiet on the Grief Journey

Posted on February 12, 2020 - by Harriet Hodgson

This is an excerpt from Happy Again! Your New and Meaningful Life After Loss, available from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Again-Harriet-Hodgson-ebook/dp/B00PMDEYE8  Understanding yourself helps you recover from loss. You may call this self-awareness or “emotional intelligence,” a term coined by Dr. Daniel Goleman. In his book, Emotional Intelligence: Why it Can Matter More Than IQ, Goleman explains the basics of the term. He thinks self-awareness involves recognizing strengths and weaknesses “and seeing yourself in a positive but realistic light.” Being self-aware helps you avoid pitfalls. Similarly, a lack of self-awareness can lead you straight to them. Since I was a small child I […]

Read More