Sandy Fox

Sandy Fox has won four finalist awards for her recent book "Creating a New Normal...After the Death of a Child" with over 80 coping articles and a huge resource section. One award is from USA Book News in the Health/Death and Dying Category for 2010. The second award is from ForeWord Reviews in the Health Category for 2010. The third is from Royal Dragonfly Book Awards. The most recent finalist award is for the self-help category of the 2011 Indie Book Awards. She is also the author of another grief book, "I Have No Intention of Saying Good-bye." “I Have No Intention of Saying Good-bye” tells the stories of 25 sets of parents and how they moved on with their lives after the death of their child, offering hope and survival techniques. Sandy has headed two national bereavement conferences for childless parents and spoken for many years at Compassionate Friends National conferences, POMC and across the U.S. to a variety of bereavement groups. She also writes articles for the Open to Hope site, EZ articles, and Journey through grief newsletter in addition to her own weekly blog: www.survivinggrief.blogspot.com. Sandy can be contacted at sfoxaz@hotmail.com to set up any speaking engagements or to ask any questions related to surviving the death of a child. Sandy was a guest on the radio show “Healing the Grieving Heart“ discussing: “I have no intention of Saying Good-Bye: Coping Techniques for the Now Childless.” To hear Sandy being interviewed on this show by Dr. Gloria & Dr. Heidi Horsley, click on the following link: www.voiceamericapd.com/health/010157/horsley010407.mp3

Articles:

Open to  hope

Death of Dog Compared to Child’s Death

Not long ago I was listening to the Today Show and Jill Rappaport was interviewing a woman who had lost her dog. This woman compared the loss of her dog as equal to the loss of a family member. As much as I loved the two dogs I owned in my lifetime for 15 years each, there was no comparison for me when my daughter died. We may get attached to our pets, we mourn when we lose them, but to make that comparison for me is unthinkable. Granted, there are similarities that while this woman who was interviewed may say she […]

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Open to  hope

Finding Support in Grief

by Sandy Fox Bereaved parents find support from many sources during their grief journey. The results of one survey conducted by Compassionate Friends showed that parents said the most helpful and providing the most information for bereaved parents are: Friends (82.3%) Family (80.3%) Physicians (58%) Coworkers (44.8%) Clergy and hospitals (39.5% each) Websites (20.5%) Therapists/counselors (19%) Online chats/message boards/forums (13.3%) Support groups (12%) Supporting someone whose child has just died is difficult. From this survey, friends and family seem to do the best job, but this loss is so enormous that we have few words of comfort to offer. Though […]

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Open to  hope

Poem: Dedication

YOU ARE IN EVERY SUNRISE My child You are gone from me physically But I see your face. You are in every sunrise In every new bloom In every new season. I can hear your voice I can hear your laughter I remember it all so well. It warms my heart To think of you always With wonderful memories. My journey has been long and uncharted I am amazed at where I am in this journey… A new life, a new joy, a new love But what I wouldn’t give to have you back with me. I know in my […]

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Open to  hope

Divorce Rate Among Bereaved

by Sandy Fox There is much controversy about the divorce rate following the death of a child. Some say that a great majority of couples divorce as their marriage falls apart after the death of their child. Others say it makes their relationship stronger. Still others say it was completely different problems that caused the divorce. What is the answer? Like many myths, the high divorce rate one has snowballed way out of proportion. Harriet Schiff in 1977 (The Bereaved Parent) said that as high as 90 percent of all bereaved couples are in serious marital difficulty within months after the death of their child. […]

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Open to  hope

The Grieving Father

by Sandy Fox Fathers grieve differently with different emotions in the loss of a child. I believe this to be true. Here is some of the information that has been gathered on men losing a child. According to research, bereaved fathers put their grief into a compartment separate from the rest of their lives. Because they feel they need to protect their families, they submerge their own grief. And they dislike being overcome by intense emotion and feel that talking about the emotion only makes it worse. They deal with grief by thinking about something else, by doing something else […]

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Open to  hope

Grief Support on the Web

by Sandy Fox There is a wealth of information on the web dealing with bereavement support. I will list for you some of the sites and leave it up to you to check them out. Perhaps there is something here that will help you on the road to recovery. CHAT ROOMS www.groww.org/chat/gr.shtml GROWW offers a grief recovery chat room that is open 24/7. They also host many types of moderated grief support chats. It is a place where peer groups teach that you have permission to grieve. It is a place of belonging and one that helps you to get […]

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Open to  hope

Signs from our children

by Sandy Fox, author of I Have No Intention of Saying Good-bye Mothers have an uncanny way of knowing exactly about their child’s health, and in Susan’s case, it was gratifying to have the head of pediatrics realize it when he said to her “You knew all the time, didn’t you?” Susan did. He had no clue how she could have known that her daughter was dying because the doctors kept reiterating until the day the baby died that she would be fine. Susan’s baby was born with multiple physical birth defects and was in and out of the hospital […]

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Open to  hope

A Message of Hope

by Sandy Fox One mother who I know quite well lost her only child, a daughter, twenty-one years ago. In a recent writing for a bereavement newsletter, she offers hope to those who are just beginning their grief journey. I find that it can be very comforting to those newly bereaved and even those a few years down the road to hear from others on how they have survived and moved forward with their lives. (That is how my book came about.) I am pleased to offer my friend’s honest appraisal of what she felt and did with her life and how we can […]

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Open to  hope

Learning from Others

by Sandy Fox My daughter died 15 years ago. Her dreams, hopes for the future…everything gone. My hopes for her: a family, a bright career, a wonderful marriage…all gone. Each year I think what her life would have been like now. She would have had children to love and share with her husband; she probably would have had a career in the advertising or public relations field. Or perhaps she would have preferred staying home and just be a mother. They would have traveled eventually, seen the world, learned from the experiences and been better people for it. Perhaps my […]

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Open to  hope

Old Friends Never Forget

by Sandy Fox, A few months back I wrote about an email I received from my daughter Marcy’s first boyfriend, telling me how much he cared for Marcy. This week I received another email, from a good friend of my daughter from 25 years ago, who has been trying to find me for many years (she had only my former married last name and didn’t know I had remarried). She was finally able to get my email. She had heard about Marcy’s car accident years before and through her tears was writing to me. “Some friendships,” she said, “cannot be […]

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