Dear Readers--I have an apology for you. This blog space was silent last Friday with no explanation. Sorry about that. I overestimated by time management abilities. It turns out that I can't actually see all my patients, participate in a family wedding and get all my writing done in one week. That was a good exercise in remembering my … [Read more...]
When Asking “Why” Isn’t Helping–A Follow-Up Post
September 14, 2012 by 8 Comments
Last week, I looked at the tendency I see after people experience loss, trauma, or illness to try to understand why the painful event happened. In the first post, I explored the reasons that we do this. I also asked readers to evaluate a list of questions. Here are those questions: How much of your waking time and energy go into trying to … [Read more...]
Maybe Understanding “Why” Isn’t the Goal: Coping with Loss
September 7, 2012 by 6 Comments
Maybe some of these sentences will sound familiar to you: "Why is this happening?" "What did I do?" "How did I get here?" "If I could only understand how it happened, then . . ." These are sentences that I often hear when I am in session with someone. They are about our tendency to want to understand, to try to get our questions … [Read more...]
Pushing Back Survivor’s Guilt: Reach Out
August 3, 2012 by 15 Comments
A few weeks ago, I wrote a post on survivor's guilt--how it can be the monster under the bed when you receive positive news or pass a milestone in your healing process. A few days after that, I had the privilege of discussing survivor's guilt with the #bcsm (breast cancer and social media) community. That conversation was lively (you can read … [Read more...]
