'If anyone knows how to be happy and old, it's Hunter. Read a page before breakfast and two at night, preferably with food'- Michael Palin. 'As long as I'm alive, I'll be with her, and she'll be with me.' Hunter Davies on Margaret Forster. Happy Old Me is a moving yet uplifting account of one year in Hunter Davies' life, navigating bereavement and finding hope in the future. On 8th February 2016, Margaret Forster lost her life to cancer of the spine. The days that followed for her husband, Hunter Davies, were carried out on autopilot: arrangements to be made, family and friends to be contacted. But how do you cope after you have lost your loved one? How do you carry on? As Hunter navigates what it means to be alone again after 55 years of marriage, coping with bereavement and being elderly (he still doesn't believe he is), he shares his wisdom and lessons he has learnt living alone again. Revealing his emotional journey over the course of one year, as well as the often ignored practical implications of becoming widowed, he learns that, ultimately, bricks and mortar may change but the memories will remain. Part memoir, part self-help, Happy Old Me is a fitting, heart-felt tribute to the love of his life and a surprisingly amusing and informative book about an age, and stage in life, which we might all reach someday. The third book in Hunter Davies' much-loved memoir series, which includes The Co-Op's Got Bananas and A Life in the Day.

In 2009, New York Times bestselling author Sara Davidson was surprised by a call from Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, asking her to engage with him in what he called "The December Project." At eighty-five, Reb Zalman wanted to teach people how to navigate the December of life and to help them "not freak out about dying."

Davidson jumped at the chance. She feared that death would be a complete annihilation, while Reb Zalman felt certain that "something continues." For two years, they met every Friday to discuss this and how getting "up close with mortality" quickens our ability to relish every day.

Woven through their talks are sketches from Reb Zalman's life: escaping the Nazis; becoming an orthodox rabbi in the U.S.; landing in San Francisco during the sexual revolution; taking L.S.D. with Timothy Leary; befriending other faith leaders, including Thomas Merton and the Dalai Lama; and founding the Jewish Renewal movement.

During their time together, Davidson was nearly killed by a suicide bomb and Reb Zalman faced a steep decline in health. They created strategies to deal with pain and memory loss and found tools to cultivate fearlessness and joy--at any age. Davidson includes twelve exercises so readers can experience what she did, a sea change in facing what we all must face: mortality.

In the fall of 1998, George Cantor and his wife sent off their bright, funny, enthusiastic, 18-year-old daughter, Courtney, to the University of Michigan as a freshman. Six weeks later, the university called Cantor to claim her corpse. Courtney fell from her sixth-floor dormitory window after being served drinks illegally at a fraternity party. The events surrounding her death were featured on the CBS news magazine 48 Hours. In Cantor's grief over losing Courtney, he sank into a bitter and prolonged depression that led him to question the value of his own life and newspaper career. This ended after a year when he was diagnosed with cancer, at which point the value of life suddenly and stunningly was renewed. Emotional and reportorial, a mix of grief therapy, celebration of life, mystery, and social criticism, Courtney's Legacy addresses the reality of death, but views the issue from the other end of the life cycle. How do parents and friends deal with the loss of a young woman whose life was so full of promise? Courtney's Legacy also serves as an alarm for parents, being a tough examination of how university housing, legal, and social policies helped to create a situation that made Courtney's death a tragedy waiting to happen. Cantor eloquently unfolds his and Courtney's story, one of death, loss, and renewal, revealing that learning that acceptance of the past and celebration of the present is the only way to endure in our increasingly complex world.

How a father's struggle to understand his daughter s sudden death becomes an inspiring exploration of life.

The sudden death of a child. A personal tragedy beyond description. The permanent presence of an absence. What can come from it? Raw wisdom and defiant hope.

Leonard Fein probes life s painful injustices in this remarkable personal story. He exposes emotional truths that are revealed when we re forced to confront one of the toughest questions there is: How can we pick up the pieces of our lives and go on to laugh and to love in the aftermath of grievous loss?

Ruthlessly honest, lyrical and wise, Against the Dying of the Light takes the experience of loss beyond the confines of the personal, illuminating the universal meaning and the hope that can be found in the details of grief."

Drawing On Grief is a uniquely creative journal and mindful keepsake which draws on the soothing therapeutic power of drawing and creativity to help people navigate the pain of bereavement. In this moving book of self-help through art therapy, author Kate Sutton draws on her own experiences of losing a loved one to help others on this difficult journey, presenting guided creative prompts as well as memories of her own and quotes from others on the painful topic of loss. By guiding readers through creative exercises from drawing fond memories together to creating an ocean of tears with colouring pencils, this book helps people visualise the pain they are going through, so as to better understand and navigate their grief. The book also contains written prompts such as writing a letter to yourself and to your loved one, designed to help people express the difficult emotions which bereavement brings. Part self-help book, part memoir, Drawing On Grief emphasizes the importance of self-care in the grieving process, allowing people to explore their own feelings through creative mediums, which can often be easier than trying to express feelings directly. A modern and insightful approach to the pain of loss, Drawing On Grief is a sensitive and compassionate guide to help people look after themselves as they traverse one of life's most challenging moments. This book is part of the Drawing On... series, a collection of creative guided journals which help readers explore difficult topics including anxiety and grief. Also available is Drawing On Anxiety, a beautifully illustrated interactive journal tapping into self-help, self-care, mental health and creative mindfulness.

When your child dies, your world is changed forever. You are thrust into an abyss of grief and darkness-a place of loneliness that many people can't understand. Author Renee Hogan Blythe lost her only son, Kristopher, when he died without warning in his sleep at age thirty. Now she shares her heartfelt story of her personal journey of grief, providing insight into what happens when a parent loses a child of any age.

So often, others have a difficult time understanding the shock and devastation that parents experience when their child dies. Telling the story of how she overcame the demons associated with grief, Blythe speaks to all parents who have lost a child at any age and for any reason. Whether your child is a newborn or age sixty, he or she will "always" be your baby.

"When Your Baby Dies" seeks to help parents who have lost a child at any age in any way to understand that they are not alone. To get healthy again, we must learn how to create a new normal for ourselves and our families.

A wrenching account of one family's five-year battle with what proved to be terminal liver disease, this story explores all aspects of the difficulty in raising a family under such conditions. Written from the point of view of the primary caregiver, the story reveals much about the possible challenges facing the 17,000 families now waiting for a liver transplant in the USA. Many more face other debilitating diseases or the ravages of age. Despite his scientific training to try to understand what is happening, the author is crushed by the medical bureaucracy, and the wild ups and downs of the course of the disease. Having adopted their children, the author struggles with his fundamental values and his conflicting responsibilities to the children and to his ailing wife. This book should help friends and family better understand what a stoic experience the caregiver of one seriously ill may be going through. More importantly, it can show such a lonely individual that what they are going through is not unique, and that they need not be alone. As events proceed through hospice, funeral, and grief, the author looks back on their time together and reflects on the nature of life and love.

Partly a counselling model and partly an explanation of true empathy, this handbook explores the ways companionship eases grief. For caretakers who work with grieving people or for friends and family just hoping to stay close, 11 tenets are outlined for mourner-led care. These simple rules call for understanding another person's pain, listening with the heart rather than the head, not filling up every minute with words, respecting confusion and disorder, and relying on curiosity rather than expertise.

Becoming a widow isn't like becoming a wife. Becoming a wife requires major planning. But becoming a widow is often a surprise, and even withadvance planning some people are still stunned. It's difficult to prepare for widowhood. In "Widows 101," author Susan Barber uses her personalexperience with her husband's death to provide practical tips for surviving the death of a spouse.

Delivered with a gentle, lighthearted approach, "Widows 101" touches upon core elements widows will need to address after losing their husbands, such as

remaking yourself and redefiningwhat you want;
dealing with grief;
making adjustments in your personal and social life;
handling your spouse's personal effects;
attending to the details of your new life alone;
communicating your wishes for your own funeral.

"Widows 101" helps you prepare for the changes in your life as you confront widowhood. Learn how to make the changes work for you instead of against you as you navigate one of life's most difficult periods.

Based on the "How to Be a Perfect Stranger: A Guide to Etiquette in Other People's Religious Ceremonies."

The handbook for how to respond in an appropriate way when someone dies no matter what their faith or denomination.

Few of us are ever prepared for the loss of a relative, friend or colleague. This stressful situation can be made worse if we are unfamiliar with the practices and rituals of the deceased person s religious tradition.

This complete guide provides all the answers you need to express your condolences and show your respect in the appropriate way regardless of the religious tradition involved, addressing many common concerns, including:

Will there be a ceremony what will it be like, and how long will it last? What should I wear? What should I avoid doing, wearing, saying? Are flowers appropriate? What is the appropriate behavior if viewing the body?

These are just a few of the basic, very practical questions answered in this unique etiquette guide covering all the major (and many minor) denominations and religions found in North America from Hindu to Presbyterian, from Mennonite to Sikh helping you to do the right thing in a difficult situation.

Covers all the major (and many minor) denominations and religions found in North America: African American Methodist Churches Assemblies of God Baha i Baptist Buddhist Christian and Missionary Alliance Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) Christian Congregation Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) Church of the Brethren Church of the Nazarene Churches of Christ Episcopalian and Anglican Evangelical Free Church Greek Orthodox Hindu International Church of theFoursquare Gospel International Pentecostal Holiness Church Islam Jehovah s Witnesses Jewish Lutheran Mennonite/Amish Methodist Mormon (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) Native American/First Nations Orthodox Churches Pentecostal Church of God Presbyterian Quaker (Religious Society ofFriends) Reformed Church in America/Canada Roman Catholic Seventh-day Adventist Sikh Unitarian Universalist United Church of Canada United Church of Christ Wesleyan

Karl Marx is buried in London, John Keats in Rome and Leon Trotsky in Mexico. Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris is today known for the graves of Jim Morrison, Victor Hugo and Oscar Wilde, but when it opened in the early 19th century the owners felt that they needed some star names to make it a desired burial site - and so they had Moliere's body transferred there. Arranged thematically into 75 entries, Graves of the Great and Famous tours the world exploring the resting places of leading artists, thinkers, scientists, sportspeople, revolutionaries, politicians and pioneers. Some, such as communist leaders Ho Chi Minh and Vladimir Lenin, are interred in great mausoleums, where they are visited by millions each year; others are buried in little-known country graveyards. From lives cut short through assassinations - Martin Luther King and Abraham Lincoln - to those who suffered terrible accidents (Princess Diana), from mobsters such as Benjamin 'Bugsy' Siegel and John Gotti to Napoleon and his mistress Marie Walewska, from Nelson Mandela to Eva Peron, Graceland to Highgate Cemetery, the book provides a guide to some of the most famous and unusual graves of the great and the good. Featuring 150 photographs of graves, cemeteries, graveyards and mausoleums, Graves of the Great and Famous is a compact guide to the final resting place of the famous - and infamous.

In his exceptionally thought-provoking and moving memoir, neurosurgeon Joseph D. Stern explores how personal loss influences the way physicians relate to patients and their families. How does a doctor who deals with the death of patients on a regular basis confront his own loss when his beloved family member is living out her last days? Despite a career as a neurosurgeon, Joseph Stern learned more about the nature of illness and death after his younger sister Victoria developed leukemia than his formal medical training ever taught him. Her death broke down the self-protective barriers he had built to perform his job and led to a profound shift in his approach to medicine. During the year of her illness, Dr. Stern developed a greater awareness of the needs of patients and their families; of the burdens they carry; of the importance of connection, communication, and gratitude; and of what it means to ask the right questions. Grief Connects Us intimately explores the impact of personal loss on physicians and the ways in which they integrate it into their professional lives, providing a blueprint for change that places compassion and empathy at the centre of the practice of medicine.

In this volume the author proposes that it is the interplay of love and loss that lies at the epicentre of the human story. Support for this proposal is taken from neuroscience, art and psychoanalysis. It will also introduce the reader to important ideas and findings from Attachment Theory. An exploration of the relationship between love and loss can lead us to some understanding of the meaning of our lives. It shows how love and loss are inextricably bound at the centre of human experience, and form the essential dynamic of the human struggle.This book will appeal to sophisticated lay readers, in addition to various categories of student and professional audiences. It will be of interest to psychologists, psychiatrists, psychotherapists, philosophers, neuroscientists and sociologists. Readers with a background mainly in the arts and humanities will find it appealing because of its linkages and use of poetry, song and visual art to elucidate and illustrate the major propositions of the book.More generally, anyone with a curiosity about love and loss will find this book attractive. It provides insight and illumination to many of the human circumstances that people encounter in their day-to-day lives.

A charming, practical, and unsentimental approach to putting a home in order while reflecting on the tiny joys that make up a long life.

In Sweden there is a kind of decluttering called döstädning, dö meaning “death” and städning meaning “cleaning.” This surprising and invigorating process of clearing out unnecessary belongings can be undertaken at any age or life stage but should be done sooner than later, before others have to do it for you. In The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, artist Margareta Magnusson, with Scandinavian humor and wisdom, instructs readers to embrace minimalism. Her radical and joyous method for putting things in order helps families broach sensitive conversations, and makes the process uplifting rather than overwhelming.

Margareta suggests which possessions you can easily get rid of (unworn clothes, unwanted presents, more plates than you’d ever use) and which you might want to keep (photographs, love letters, a few of your children’s art projects). Digging into her late husband’s tool shed, and her own secret drawer of vices, Margareta introduces an element of fun to a potentially daunting task. Along the way readers get a glimpse into her life in Sweden, and also become more comfortable with the idea of letting go.