Toni Lepeska
When a Parent Dies
Grief is such a common experience, and yet so individual and personal, that we’re bound to step on each other’s toes from time to time when trying to define it, express it and get through it. I thought about this after the Twitter chatter on the deaths of actress Carrie Fisher and, one day later, …
The tragic news of performer Debbie Reynold’s death the day after Carrie Fisher’s, her famous daughter, illustrates the tremendous stress grief puts on loved ones left behind. People can indeed die of a broken heart. According to a USA Today article, Reynold’s son said the stress of his sister’s death “was too much” for …
The tragic news of performer Debbie Reynold’s death the day after Carrie Fisher’s, her famous daughter, illustrates the tremendous stress grief puts on loved ones left behind. People can indeed die of a broken heart. According to a USA Today article, Reynold’s son said the stress of his sister’s death “was too much” for …
The late afternoon sun beamed down on us through the clouds of the incoming front as my husband bent down on his knee and asked me to marry him. I giggled. “Of course,” I said. That happened eight years ago today on the roof of the historic Memphis Peabody Hotel. What’s a happy …
I once wrote that each Christmas gets better and better after losing someone you love to the grave. I meant well, but I was wrong. Stay tuned. There’s hope in this story. Last year, a great pall fell upon me for reasons I cannot pinpoint. I was unhappy with Christmas. Go away. …
I’m trying to figure out how to put my new life together. It’s been eight Christmases since I lost my mother and 11 since I lost my dad, and I still am trying to figure out this “new normal.” Especially this time of year. Maybe it’s like following a recipe. I don’t mean that …
Fidel Castro died, and I wanted to tell my mother. You know, she’s dead, too, and whether the Castro news is important to her now, I don’t know. But it would have been important if she’d been alive because she saw his tanks roll into Cuba and destroy her island fantasy. Single, childless and 30-years-old, …
Welcome to my blog. I got an uneasy feeling as I prepared to write this first post. I’m not a terribly private person, but as the moment to bare my soul approached, I discovered I wanted to hold back, not put myself out there. Expressing grief is an exercise in vulnerability. Perhaps you’ve felt vulnerable …
