LOSS with Rebecca Soffer: Finding humor, connecting with community, and moving through grief
Julie and Casey chat with Rebecca Soffer, journalist, author, and cofounder of Modern Loss, about the complicated journey and taboo subject of grief. Along the way, they get into how Rebecca found her “dead mom” community and what it taught her, dealing with ambiguous loss, what not to say to people who are hurting, our enormous world-wide moment of collective grief, and how to move THROUGH, not “move on”.
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TOP TAKEAWAYS:
Nothing is more isolating that feeling like you have to play “normal” and hide your grief because of the taboo around discussing loss. Because grief affects every corner of your life, it becomes the backdrop for so much of what’s going on. The first step to dealing with grief may be simply TALKING about it . . . but there’s no “zero vulnerability” way to do that.
There is no “correct” thing to say to someone who is grieving, so you’re off the hook for the perfect response, if that’s keeping you from reaching out to someone. Particularly, the fear of “accidentally reminding someone” or bringing up their loss is misplaced . . . they know. They remember. That said, anything that smacks of a “fix it” mentality is probably not welcome.
Just as there is no correct thing to say to a grieving person, there’s no “correct” way — or even time — to grieve. There is room for humor and lightness too.
Mini-Lesson: Better things to do when a friend is hurting than “fix it”.
Rebecca Soffer is cofounder of Modern Loss, a global movement offering creative, meaningful, and practical content and community addressing the long arc of grief. She is also coauthor of the book Modern Loss: Candid Conversation about Grief. Beginners Welcome. (Harper Wave, 2018) and an internationally recognized speaker on loss and resilience. She writes regularly across media, including the New York Times, Glamour, NBC, and CNN. Rebecca is a Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism alumna and a Peabody Award–winning former producer for The Colbert Report.
Rebecca and her husband and sons split their time between New York City and The Berkshires. For more information visit ModernLoss.com.
Twitter: @rebeccasoffer @modernloss
Instagram: @rebeccasoffer @modernloss @runningpressbooks
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/ModernLoss