45: How to Manage Grief in a Healthy Way | Veronica Slater

Veronica Slater faced the horrible tragedy of losing her husband while a young mother. She shares why grief doesn’t neatly fit into “five stages.” Veronica and Emily also offer strategies for helping you and your kids to grieve in a healthy way.

Quotes:

• “I know that we are beings that are wired to be connected to one another. So when difficult things happen such as profound loss, our instincts are to connect to others. Our instincts are also to help others carry their burdens. And right now it is extremely difficult to do that.” – Veronica Slater
• “As parents, it’s hard to know the right way to help our kids because none of us have faced this before and parents are going through grief and loss right alongside kids.” – Emily Melious
• “Grief is not a logical process for people and people don’t experience it in the same way.” – Emily Melious
• “Grief is not a linear process. To be quite frank, it’s a very messy process because we are messy, we are messy beings.” – Veronica Slater
• “The reality to me is that time does not heal. The only thing that heals, I believe, is love and how we invest our energy and how we connect to other people.” – Veronica Slater
• “I would describe grief and profound loss as a permanent void that we carry within ourselves.” – Veronica Slater
• “Be brave by being vulnerable.” – Veronica Slater
• “It’s almost like when you have to look for hope it can sometimes be hard, but if you stop and you love, there’s always, always, always something to be grateful for. And if you’ve got gratitude, then I think there’s just bound to be joy.” – Veronica Slater

Highlights:

• 1:26 – Why grief is an important topic
• 4:18 – The five stages of grief really don’t fit
• 11:27 – Grieving in front of your kids
• 14:21 – Do we ever stop grieving?
• 14:49 – Writing about grief
• 18:36 – The solution for grief
• 21:55 – How do we move on after a loss