Losing My Reflection

Losing My Reflection
Author: Nicholas Smosna
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Total Pages: 126
Release: 2017-05-07
Genre:
ISBN: 9781544205922

Deep in the night of June 4th, 2007, on the desert sands of California, Nick Smosna's identical twin brother, Jason, took his own life. Looking back first on the unique experience of finding themselves growing up both as individuals but simultaneously as two halves of a whole, Nick weaves a picture of the complicated but powerful connection of identical twins. The subtle decisions and twists of fate that lead to Jason's death have life altering consequences for his entire family. Taking you through the utter devastation following the suicide, Nick eloquently and profoundly details both his grief as well as his eventual redemption. The night of June 4th marked the beginning of Nick's journey through the deepest valleys of depression to eventually the most transforming moments of love. A perfect book for those affected by suicide, loss of a loved one, or struggling with grief/depression, Nick gives a poignant case for the beauty of life that can follow even the most traumatic loss.

The Running Dream

The Running Dream
Author: Wendelin Van Draanen
Publisher: Ember
Total Pages: 354
Release: 2012-01-10
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 0375866280

When Jessica is told she’ll never run again, she puts herself back together—and learns to dream bigger than ever before. The acclaimed author of Flipped delivers a powerful and healing story. Jessica thinks her life is over when she loses a leg in a car accident. She’s not comforted by the news that she’ll be able to walk with the help of a prosthetic leg. Who cares about walking when you live to run? As she struggles to cope, Jessica feels that she’s both in the spotlight and invisible. People who don’t know what to say act like she’s not there. Jessica’s embarrassed to realize that she’s done the same to a girl with CP named Rosa. A girl who is going to tutor her through all the math she’s missed. A girl who sees right into the heart of her. With the support of family, friends, a coach, and her track teammates, Jessica may actually be able to run again. But that’s not enough for her now. She doesn’t just want to cross finish lines herself—she wants to take Rosa with her. “Inspirational. The pace of Van Draanen’s prose matches Jessica’s at her swiftest. Readers will zoom through the book just as Jessica blazes around the track. A lively and lovely story.” —Kirkus Reviews

When Breath Becomes Air

When Breath Becomes Air
Author: Paul Kalanithi
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2016-01-12
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0812988418

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • This inspiring, exquisitely observed memoir finds hope and beauty in the face of insurmountable odds as an idealistic young neurosurgeon attempts to answer the question What makes a life worth living? NAMED ONE OF PASTE’S BEST MEMOIRS OF THE DECADE • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • People • NPR • The Washington Post • Slate • Harper’s Bazaar • Time Out New York • Publishers Weekly • BookPage Finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award in Creative Nonfiction and the Books for a Better Life Award in Inspirational Memoir At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,” as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life” into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality. What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir. Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.

Healing After Loss

Healing After Loss
Author: Martha W. Hickman
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 381
Release: 2009-06-09
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0061925772

The classic guide for dealing with grief and loss. Daily reflections to find solace in our own lives, and comfort in the connection of sharing these meditations with countless others. After the focus on planning and outpouring of love from family and friends in the immediate aftermath following the loss of a loved one, we are left to enter a new version of our lives where someone important is missing. For days, months, years, the pain of the loss can crash in all at once. It is tempting to push that wave of grief back and soldier on with our new lives, but the loss will never lose its controlling power if we don’t find the courage and love to face it. Meditating on the loss, along with the rush of love that comes with it, gives us a chance to rejoice in the life that was shared, and to look forward in which memories of our loved ones continue to bless us. The short, poignant meditations given here follow the course of the year, but it is not a necessity to follow them chronologically. They will strengthen, inspire, and give comfort for as long as they are needed.

Reflections of a Grieving Spouse

Reflections of a Grieving Spouse
Author: H. Norman Wright
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2009-07-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0736933999

When author and counselor H. Norman Wright’s beloved wife, Joyce, passed away, he grieved the loss of his partner and the life they shared. Even in his state of sorrow, he knew he had to find a way to live without Joyce, to forge a hopeful path, and to move forward in God’s grace and strength. With vulnerability and emotional insight, Norm shares from his deeply personal journey and illuminates the way back to living when someone you love is gone. Readers who have lost their spouse will discover support and guidance as they work through anger, including anger at God, to ease toward God’s peace move away from denial and “what ifs” to move forward allow memories to provide comfort without getting stuck in the past create a healthy new, daily routine to care for themselves turn their new identity and life over to God’s leading and mercy This tender and inspirational book will help any reader who is grieving or who is walking alongside a grieving friend.

Am I There Yet?

Am I There Yet?
Author: Mari Andrew
Publisher: Clarkson Potter
Total Pages: 194
Release: 2018-03-27
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1524761443

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • This on-point guide to growing up by Instagram sensation Mari Andrew features “achingly vulnerable and completely relatable watercolor illustrations about relationships, heartbreak and the struggles of urban life” (The Washington Post). In the journey toward adulthood, it is easy to find yourself treading the path of those who came before you; the path often appears straight and narrow, with a few bumps in the road and a little scenery to keep you inspired. But what if you don’t want to walk a worn path? What if you want to wander? What if there is no map to guide you through the detours life throws your way? From creating a home in a new city to understanding the link between a good hair dryer and good self-esteem to dealing with the depths of heartache and loss, these tales of the twentysomething document a road less traveled—a road that sometimes is just the way you’re meant to go. Praise for Am I There Yet? “Equal parts memoir and illustrated guidebook, it chronicles Andrew’s journey through adulthood as she navigates love and heartbreak, professional indecision and success, and personal struggles.”—Refinery29 “Using her artistic skills to illustrate thought-provoking essays, Andrew inspires readers to take the path less traveled in life.”—CNN “The illustrations . . . are often packed with truths about dating, self-care, careers, and all the secret thoughts you never say out loud.”—Elle “This uplifting book is filled with essays and illustrations that will fill you with so much hope as you move forward with any big life change.”—Bustle “Her illustrations will resonate with anyone who has ever had a crush, went on a date, or felt the sting of heartbreak.”—The Independent

Reflection

Reflection
Author: Diane Chamberlain
Publisher: Diane Chamberlain
Total Pages: 467
Release: 2010-11-01
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 0988205726

Rachel Huber returns to her hometown of Reflection to care for her ailing grandmother. Twenty years ago, a tragedy occurred in Reflection and people hold Rachel responsible. Now she finds herself the object of anger and hostility. She's not without her allies, however. Lily Jackson, a young woman who was personally touched by the tragedy, perplexes everyone by treating Rachel with compassion. And Michael Stoltz, the minister of the Mennonite church, is elated by Rachel's return. He and Rachel were close friends as children, and that childhood bond quickly evolves into a loving relationship that must be hidden from the town. It is Rachel's grandmother, Helen, however, who becomes her strongest advocate, surprising Rachel with her wise counsel and rare strength--and with a wealth of secrets she has long been concealing. "Diane Chamberlain's finest work to date. . . The reader is swept into the town's emotion and suspense." --Richmond Times Dispatch.

The Long Goodbye

The Long Goodbye
Author: Meghan O'Rourke
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 205
Release: 2011-04-14
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1101486554

"Anguished, beautifully written... The Long Goodbye is an elegiac depiction of drama as old as life." -- The New York Times Book Review From one of America's foremost young literary voices, a transcendent portrait of the unbearable anguish of grief and the enduring power of familial love. What does it mean to mourn today, in a culture that has largely set aside rituals that acknowledge grief? After her mother died of cancer at the age of fifty-five, Meghan O'Rourke found that nothing had prepared her for the intensity of her sorrow. In the first anguished days, she began to create a record of her interior life as a mourner, trying to capture the paradox of grief-its monumental agony and microscopic intimacies-an endeavor that ultimately bloomed into a profound look at how caring for her mother during her illness changed and strengthened their bond. O'Rourke's story is one of a life gone off the rails, of how watching her mother's illness-and separating from her husband-left her fundamentally altered. But it is also one of resilience, as she observes her family persevere even in the face of immeasurable loss. With lyricism and unswerving candor, The Long Goodbye conveys the fleeting moments of joy that make up a life, and the way memory can lead us out of the jagged darkness of loss. Effortlessly blending research and reflection, the personal and the universal, it is not only an exceptional memoir, but a necessary one.

When It Gets Dark

When It Gets Dark
Author: Thomas DeBaggio
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2007-11-01
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0743261186

Adeptly navigating between elegy and celebration, fear and determination, confusion and clarity, DeBaggio delivers an exquisitely moving and inspiring book that will resonate with all those who have grappled with their own or their loved ones' memory loss and with death. With his first memoir, Losing My Mind, Thomas DeBaggio stunned readers by laying bare his faltering mind in a haunting and beautiful meditation on the centrality of memory to human life, and on his loss of it to early-onset Alzheimer's disease. In this second extraordinary narrative, he confronts the ultimate loss: that of life. And as only DeBaggio could, he treats death as something to honor, to marvel at, to learn from. Charting the progression of his disease with breathtaking honesty, DeBaggio deftly describes the frustration, grief, and terror of grappling with his deteriorating intellectual faculties. Even more affecting, the prose itself masterfully represents the mental vicissitudes of his disease—DeBaggio's fragments of memory, observation, and rumination surface and subside in the reader's experience much as they might in his own mind. His frank, lilting voice and abundant sense of wonder bind these fragments into a fluid and poetic portrait of life and loss. Over the course of the book, DeBaggio revisits many of the people, places, and events of his life, both in his memory and in fact. In a sense, he is saying goodbye, paying his respects to the world as it recedes from him—and it is a poignant irony that even as this happens, he is at the height of his remarkable descriptive powers. In his moments of clarity, his love for life's details only grows deeper and richer: the limestone creek where he has fished for years; his satisfying and lonely herb farming days; the goldfish pond his son designed and built in his backyard in honor of DeBaggio's passion for "any hole in the ground with some liquid in it"; the thirty years in his beloved home in Arlington, Virginia; his early career as a muckraker; the innumerable precious moments spent with his wife and son; his belated grief over his parents' deaths.

The Object of My Affection Is in My Reflection

The Object of My Affection Is in My Reflection
Author: Rokelle Lerner
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 295
Release: 2010-01-01
Genre: Family & Relationships
ISBN: 075739776X

In her latest book, relationship expert Rokelle Lerner, tackles the innerworkings of narcissism and offers compassionate and realistic advice for surviving a relationship with those afflicted with this personality disorder. A Narcissist can make life exhilaratingly exciting one minute, and shear hell the next. A narcissist has no qualms about taking another's money, love, admiration, body or soul to satisfy their unquenchable hunger. They are not inherently evil, but unfortunately their wounds compel them to act in ways that are sometimes unconscionable, damaging, and ultimately tragic. Whether a mother-in-law, friend, coworker or boss, sometimes it's impossible to avoid narcissists, so instead of being miserable or taken advantage of, Rokelle Lerner shares her insights on the dynamics behind this personality disorder to give readers the tools to cope with narcissists, including: Learning to see narcissists as they see themselves Creating defense factors to ward them off Maintaining a balanced relationship based on mutual love, not one-sided narcissism