Episodes

When both of Meghan Riordan Jarvis' parents died within a short period of time she experienced what could only be called Post Traumatic Stress. As she moved through her experience she called on all her humor, wit and knowledge to go forward even when she didn't know how. What emerged was a new aspect of the work she was doing, dedicated to supporting other grievers. With her blog, podcast and soon to be released book, Chasing Dark Skies, sharing her own experience has brought comfort to a commun...

Do you remember where you were when two jets plowed into the World Trade Center buildings? If you were at ground zero, you have a particularly harrowing story to tell. But that day affected most people no matter where we were. For the people who then navigated boats on the Hudson, their peaceful everyday world became a rescue operation. In interviews afterwards they shared the compelling drive that led them to improvise, regroup and help 10s of thousands of people get off the island of Manhattan...

What makes it possible for some of us to create the lives we dream of while others are held back by our life stories? Sherry Fernandez was always geared to growth. She never saw rough times in her childhood as a reason to fail. Even when she encountered bumps in the road she always looked for a way forward. Over many decades she noticed the skills that kept her on track. She studied with masters who added to her natural abilities. And over time she became a mentor for others, encouraging them to...

Although a diagnosis of autism is not, by itself, a loss, many losses come as a result. Most autistic kids are bullied, kept out of activities they would enjoy and sometimes rejected by the people closest to them. Temple Grandin's mother decided early on to raise Temple with love but also to push her to have the best possible life. As a result, Temple has lived a life of meaning and purpose, helping to completely change the beef industry's practices and becoming a college professor. Her new book...

The impact of Peg Conway's mother's death, when she was just 7, reverberated through her life, impacting her sense of safety, her reactivity and her sense of alienation. Maybe even more than the loss, the failure of her family to keep her mother alive for her created a gaping hole in her. It also resulted in the loss of ongoing connection with her mother's family when her father remarried. It wasn't until Peg gave herself permission to deeply explore her own grief and who her mother had been tha...

As an OB-GYN, Dr. Kate White knew almost everything about the physical aspects of miscarriage and pregnancy loss. But it wasn't until she experienced it herself that she truly understood the emotional impacts of a pregnancy that does not result in bringing a baby home. She set out to combine her vast knowledge with her new realization and in the process created a complete guide for families who grieve the loss of a pregnancy. What information helps families understand what has happened? And how ...

After a loss we're so aware of the missed opportunities, the things we'll never be able to do with the person we love. For Katie Russell Newland, her mother's death made their dream of touring every baseball stadium, all in one year, an impossibility. Or did it? Could Katie fulfill the dream as a way to honor her mom and their relationship? After her own cancer diagnosis and treatment, Katie took the time and went on the trip her mother had envisioned when she was just a little girl. In the proc...

When Leslie Streeter's husband, the love of her life, died suddenly after asking for kisses, she struggled to fulfill the life they had built together. Would she be able to complete the adoption of their son, not even 3 years old? How would she raise him alone? And how would she navigate this crushing grief? She would rely on community, family and humor to clear a path, taking one step at a time and guided by what her husband, Scott, had envisioned for them. Slowly, and surely, her way forward w...

What pushes a world class economist and sociologist to become an expert in Post Traumatic Growth? What inspires him to believe that we can heal from trauma and find our way to lives beyond what we can imagine? Dr. Randall Bell, born with a congenital heart condition, was diagnosed with PTSD early in life. His own path to Mt. Kilimanjaro convinced him that as humans, we are able to go forward from traumatic experience. This led him to his passion for supporting others towards their best lives. Hi...

There is no easy path from a devastating loss to who will become. Right after the loss and for an unpredictable amount of time after it can feel like going forward is impossible. For Meg Nocero, the impact of her mother's death and her career disappointments caused her to wonder whether there was any way forward. But those experiences pushed her to explore any healing mode that might help, including practices she couldn't have imagined previously. Slowly, over time, she found her way and found a...

As a practicing medium who believed in heaven, Shauna Domalain could never have predicted how hard grief would hit after her son Jack's death. Years of pain followed and she was unable to use the tools that had served her so well before that terrible loss. But over time she began to receive signs that Jack could be found, that he was communicating with her. All she had to do was believe the messages she was receiving. As she came to rely more and more deeply on the close relationship between the...

How can a mother and daughter reconcile when they cannot agree on the most basic of truths? As the author of Courage to Heal, Laura Davis became an advocate for women (and some men) who had experienced incest. But her mother Temme could not accept that Laura's grandfather had been her molester. Through years of struggle, they formed a relationship despite the hurt caused by Temme's inability to come to terms with the truth. Laura continued to heal from her trauma, creating a life of love and con...

Diana Kupershmit had the plans for her life clearly mapped out; finish college, graduate school, marry your high school sweetheart, start a family. She was not prepared for the jolt of the unexpected that arrived with the birth of her first child, Emma, who came with severe disabilities. Feeling unable and unprepared to raise a child with such profound needs, she and her husband looked for a family who could give her what she needed and love her too. But fate led Emma back to them, changing Dian...

Trauma in our early lives, or even later into adulthood, rewires us to such a degree that life can become deeply frightening. Finding a way to foster healing involves listening to ourselves, looking for support and healing modalities that resonate for us, and finding a way to make living safe and growth-ful again. Jeanine Leblanc lost her mother young, but that was not the sum of her trauma, Feeling unsupported and ill used in that loss made it hard to recover. It took moving into her adulthood ...

Doctors have more experience than most with navigating the end of life. Yet when illness and death come close to home, their well crafted distance and objectivity no longer covers all the bases. As Martha Calihan faced the end of her husband's life, she had to learn to be both doctor and wife, retaining her powers of critical thinking in helping him making medical decisions and her powers of empathy and connection for him as wife. What changed in the process was her relationship to both death an...

Abbe Greenberg and Maggie Sarachek have literally written the book on supporting yourself through anxiety and panic attacks. And of course, they tried it ALL to deal with their own anxiety, because experience is the best teacher! Join us to talk about how they each experienced anxiety, what they did to address it, and what it is like to support others through the same struggle. So much is lost as a result of anxiety; our freedoms, our sense of well-being, relationships and time! But confronting ...

When Vaneetha Rendell Risner found a deeper faith coming to terms with her childhood disabling polio, she thought that was the end of her challenges. Now, since she was walking with her hand in her God's, life would go well. But a series of deep losses, including the death of her son when he was less than 2 months old, once again shook her to her core. Join us to talk about her life-changing experience of walking through that fire of loss. In the end, the inner resources she discovered were deep...

The worst things in Mary Potter Kenyon's life led her inexorably back to her first love; writing. Her first book dealt with her husband's cancer diagnosis and the next two with her grief after the deaths of her mother, husband and grandson. Now immersed in this new life evolving out of her deepest sorrow, her next two books encourage others to use creativity to respond to their lives, thereby bringing about the same beauty and wonder she has found. Mary believes that each person's creative drive...

Alone in a brand new city, Merissa Nathan Gerson set out to connect with her community. Her father shepherded the process, traveling with her to help her choose a house and set herself up for this new life. But very shortly after, he declined, rapidly approaching the end of his life. How does a single woman in a new city, far from her friendships and supports, get help with an unimaginable loss? Merissa identified what she needed and found ways to invite her new community into her world. As a re...

When a child is unwanted, abused and neglected it is no surprise they struggle in adulthood. It took Sabine Gedeon a long time to realize that she was replaying her early life in choosing poor relationships, overtaxing herself and repeating what she had learned in her family. Only when she reached the lowest point she had ever experienced, ready to end her life, did an experience of her own higher power, God, begin to lead her to something better. But she still had lots of work to do to fulfill ...

What helps us as we face a lifetime of challenges? Boo Paterson tried it all and found that many things helped her when times were hard. But what helped the most was creative expression. She set out to find ways that people who didn't consider themselves artists could have the feeling of flow and immersion she experienced while creating art. The result is her book, First Art Kit: 25 Creative Papercraft Remedies for What Ails You. In simple paper projects created to address common emotional chall...

Cheryl Krauter and her husband, John, assumed she would die first. After all, she had lived through an aggressive breast cancer diagnosis that challenged her resilience and health. But then it was him, suddenly, with no warning at all. His heart attack killed him in under five minutes. Taken to her knees but relying on the tools she had relied on to navigate cancer and every other challenge in her life, Cheryl acknowledged her experience, noticed what seemed to help her, and looked for the power...

When Emily Threatt's first husband died, she didn't anticipate ever marrying again. But then, as sometimes happens with life's twists and turns, she fell in love. Her experience when her second husband died was different from that first loss and she began to think we can actually get better at grief, that we learn things that help us navigate the losses in our lives. She felt drawn to help other people move forward after loss as she had. Through writing about her experiences and encouraging othe...

It was a day in the life of a talented entrepreneur and her family. The kids were headed off to games and an audition, set to showcase their talents. The adults were their chauffeurs and cheerleaders. And then, into this beautiful day came the gunman, an antisemitic assailant to stole the lives of three people. Two of them were Mindy Corporon's son and father, at the synagogue for the young man's audition. How does a person find a way forward from such tragic and hate based violence? Putting one...