After your parent dies, you have an opportunity to think about your parent and yourself in a different light and resolve your relationship with them—an opportunity to come into your own, to grow into full adulthood and take responsibility for your own character and mature choices. You are nobody’s child…and your parent can no longer […]

A physician by the first name of Cynthia (same name as my deceased sister), wrote, “When my father died, although he was beloved, we all experienced a lifting of the burden through which we all had been living. [He had multiple medical illnesses, a fractured hip, and dementia. We were very involved in his extensive […]

Don’t walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don’t walk behind me, I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend. ~Albert Camus Melanie Hack Author of Who Killed My Sister, My friend Read an excerpt now TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

One way to find out what is on the mind of your dying beloved is to have the person list what they would do if they had ten years to live; five years; one year; three months; or less. “Are there any unfilled obligations to family members or friends you want to deal with?” “Are […]

While engaged in activities together—looking through catalogues and travel magazines or scrapbooks and photo albums and talking about memories with your terminally ill loved one, or while listening to music together or working on a simple puzzle together or enjoying a coin collection, or painting with watercolors, or baking, (or other activities)—you can feel out […]

As he faced the finality of death, it was natural for him to want to review the life he had lived—to look back and catalog his accomplishments and failures in life…financial, occupational, societal, and interpersonal—to understand the past—a final opportunity for him to resolve and come to understand the conflicts of earlier life. For him […]

Many dying loved ones who come to fully accept they have an untreatable illness, which will cause their death, still find ways to maintain hope. This can take the form of: Hoping to live to see a particular event (like the upcoming birth of a family member), Hoping to be released from the hospital or […]

In my last Blog post I shared some of Henry’s story of existential suffering and the feelings he expressed to his daughter in the time leading up to his death, and said I’d share some ideas for relieving mental suffering. Hearing the following reassurance from a physician or health care team, “My job is to […]

Henry is facing the reality that his existence in this world is about to end—he is terminally ill. As the weeks pass, he feels himself becoming weaker and realizes his time is short and his accomplishments are almost over. He can no longer control his own existence. It is an unavoidable loss. For several months […]

Good friends are like stars…you don’t always see them, but you know they are always there. Melanie Hack Author of Who Killed My Sister, My friend Read an excerpt now TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James