Grieving Garden

A Portable Support Group for Parents Who Have Lost a Child
 
“A variety of backgrounds and circumstances, along with a shared dedication to speak out on a notoriously unspeakable loss, make this brave volume cathartic and comforting; grieving parents may well find it invaluable.”—Publisher’s Weekly (Starred Review)
 
Every year, some two million parents in the US suffer the death of a son or daughter. The unnatural sequence of the child's preceding the parent in death creates a wrenching loss and overwhelming emotional and spiritual disorientation. Most of these bereaved parents find relief from their isolation only in the company of others like themselves. The Grieving Garden offers support, understanding, and, ultimately, comfort and hope from those who have sowed the same tears over the death of a child.

The Grieving Garden is a ground-breaking book that invites bereaved parents into personal conversations with a diverse group of fathers and mothers who share the same loss. The text is free of distracting and heavy-handed editorializing, "expert" opinion, or unwanted advice. Instead, readers are welcomed into a community of common understanding one they may enter at will, at their own pace, for reassurance and hope.

Suzanne Redfern is the president of Redfern Ranches, Inc., a diversified farming and cattle operation in the Central Valley of California. Her 32-year-old daughter died of lung cancer in 1999. Redfern lives on the Redfern Ranch and in Palo Alto, California.

Susan K. Gilbert was a pharmaceutical executive for many years in California's Silicon Valley. Her 18-year-old daughter was killed in an automobile accident in 1993. Susan lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.