Losing and Finding My Father is an adult daughter’s journey of discovery sparked by the illness, coma, and subsequent death of her father. Having struggled for years to come to terms with a childhood marked by his invalidation and abuse, she attends to her ailing father, converses with him even during his coma, and uncovers the love hidden deep within their painful relationship. It is a story of loss — loss of childhood trust, loss of self-esteem and desire for intimacy, loss of the father. Ultimately, it is a story of revelation — about finding one’s voice, softening emotional armor, opening to grief, forgiving the past, creating pathways to intimacy, and revising one’s life story.

Losing and Finding My Father corrects the misconception that surviving the death of a parent requires steeling oneself against the pain. The grieving process can be an epiphanous healing journey that eases the loss and, as well, provides a doorway into peacemaking. The purpose of Losing and Finding My Father is to inspire readers to believe that healing is possible — from both grief and the pain of a tormented childhood — and even more, to set forth with consciousness, intention, and heart into the turbulent emotions that are the seeds of this healing.

This is more than a guidebook to loss and grief; it is a moving reminder that facing the death of a loved one fully cognizant of all the emotions it arouses gifts us with wisdom and the courage to be authentic. Whereas other titles about death and dying discuss what to do or what can be, this one reveals what actually was . . . and the rippling effects that continue to this day.

*  *  *