Book Reviews on Time, Aging, Death, Grieving & Heaven

I’ll be reviewing a series of books on time, aging, death, grieving and heaven. This is part one. There’s much to learn here.

Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders 

by Mary Pipher, Ph.D.

Another Country is an outstanding, valuable book for anyone concerned about parents or grandparents who are aging and need help. The book is beautifully written – it’s a New York Times best seller. Pipher, a clinical psychologist, is knowledgeable about seniors and researched this subject extensively. She comments on the fact that our culture has changed dramatically – people are living longer yet our culture worships youth; families live at great distances from each other leaving grandparents isolated and alone.

Pipher offers many vignettes of adult children and their aging parents. Some of these stories demonstrate the helpfulness of a counselor in thinking through tough family decisions and in solving contentious family relationships.

Pipher invites us to overcome our aversion to thinking and talking about death and helps us understand elders. She says adult children live in “different time zones” from their parents and this causes difficulty understanding each other. Throughout the book she emphasizes the need for intergenerational community and offers ways to implement this. There is a wealth of information here for all generations to learn from and put to use in their relationships with each other. It is also a delightful book to read.

When Your Family’s Lost A Loved One: Finding Hope Together

By David and Nancy Guthrie

When Your Family's Lost A Loved One is a very insightful book about the difficult topic of grieving and loss. The Guthries share their experiences in losing two babies. In addition to telling their story of loss, they interview several others who have faced a difficult loss and they include information from experts. There are chapters on Her Grief, His Grief, Helping Kids Cope and ideas about handling birthdays, holidays and death days – and on remembering. This is a valuable resource for Christian families.

Beyond the Scars: Daring to Live Forward 

By F. Elaine Olsen

Beyond the Scars describes one woman’s journey of faith through the shock of a diagnosis of breast cancer, painful surgery, and difficult treatments. Olsen gives an honest, vulnerable account of her emotions and describes how she held onto her faith. She discoveed valuable faith lessons in her suffering – lessons that will help many others with any type of suffering. This beautifully written book contains forty devotional chapters with scripture, prayer and questions to ponder. Buy this for friends in similar circumstances.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff they comfort me.” Psalm 23:4

Blessings, Dottie

The Healing Power of Our Thoughts

Last week I talked about people who recently received very bad news and some keys to help in tough times. Today I’ll explore the healing power of our thoughts. We need to guard our thoughts. They can either heal us or make us sicker. Our thoughts have a profound effect on our moods and on our pain.

Notice what you say to yourself about your trauma. Thoughts such as “I can’t stand this” or “I’m never going to feel any better” can cause you to tense up, causing more pain or even more illness. Distract yourself from the pain or difficulty. Focus on something other than your symptoms. Focus on what you can still do, rather than on what you’re unable to do. Our attitude and our thoughts have a powerful effect on our health.


Herbert Benson, M.D. in his book Timeless Healing cites the placebo effect as evidence of the power of our thoughts. Patients believe sugar pills will alleviate their symptom and their belief makes this happen. A 1988 research study at Brown University showed that patients with chronic pain were more likely to be impaired, no matter the severity of their pain, if they believed pain indicated impairment. In other words, those who believed pain and disability were always linked became more impaired. When patients focused their minds on thoughts of being active and well, even though in pain, their health improved.

Focusing on positive thoughts in the midst of pain, fatigue and invasive or immune lowering treatments is not easy. The key is to monitor your thoughts and don’t dwell on how bad you feel. Acknowledge your illness or pain but think about other things most of the time. We can’t control what happens to us but we can learn to control our thoughts.

You’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious – the best, not the worst. The beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Philippians 4: 8 The Message

Blessings, Dottie

Shocking News

Several of my friends or relatives have recently experienced traumatic events in their lives. One friend lost two family members suddenly. A friend’s daughter was in a serious accident in another country. And two people I know received the diagnosis of breast cancer. All of these events are distressing, painful, and shocking to those involved. These are not minor events, but major and life changing events. They affect every member of the family.

Emotional reactions to crisis events are common but often misunderstood or even overlooked. Initially there is a period of shock and disbelief. Those affected may appear to be coping with the crisis while actually they are numb, acting strong or “putting on a smiley face.” Underneath they may be suppressing many feelings.

Later, when the reality of what has happened hits home, feelings spill out. The cancer patient and the spouse, for example, can then be overwhelmed with a variety of feelings - anger, fear, anxiety, and depression. Those affected may be facing, for the first time, their own and each other’s mortality. It’s essential for couples and families in crisis to give comfort and support to each other, talk about it, share the pain, even cry together. All of this is therapeutic. Journaling and exercising are also helpful in dealing with the many emotions that can almost overwhelm us in a crisis.

David Haynie, my nephew, and Kathy Haynie, his sister, are combining exercise and writing in a unique way that will help many. They have decided to walk in the Susan G. Komen sixty mile, 3 Day Walk for the Cure in Philadelphia, in support of Liz, Dave’s wife, who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. Kathy writes about her experiences preparing for the sixty mile walk and Dave writes about the ups and downs of Liz having cancer. Their blogs are worth reading. To see Kathy’s blog click here.

http://www.the3day.org/site/TR/2010/PhiladelphiaEvent2010?px=5314915&pg=personal&fr_id=1468

Dave’s blog can be accessed from Kathy’s. I’ll write more next week about other keys that will help when in the midst of a crisis and beyond.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and staff, they comfort me.” Psalm 23:4

Blessings, Dottie