Tear Soup: A Recipe For Healing After Loss

A few weeks ago, I got the call that no one want to get. My father had died. As you know, everyone has nice words, advice, food, hugs, flowers all that good stuff, but plainly people do all that stuff because they really don't know what else to do. I am thankful for the hugs, friends, prayers and kind words, but basically now I just need time to chill out, hang with my cats, and just be.

I have always looked to books to be my friends when I was alone or afraid. We find our friends and ourselves in books, particularly those that we love enough to read over an over again.

The day before my Dad died, I drove with my sister to visit him. The Hospice nurse had told my step-mother Linda that he was slipping away. He was in a coma and would not wake up or talk again. We were encouraged to talk with him, tell stories, and let him hear us laugh. I sat be him and told story after story. Occasionally, one of my siblings would come in to add their two cents. We laughed as we shared a story about an argument between my sisters resulting in a hole in a wall and a well-placed Donny Osmond poster. One story after another...a first step to healing.

When my step-sister arrived, she brought with her a book. A children's story book. I think is was called, Grandpa, I Love You. She read it to my dad, showed him the pictures and told him that her sons wanted her to read it to him. I was glad to see the healing role of books in others lives.

Several years ago, when a teacher friend of mine, lost her Dad suddenly, I took Pat Schwiebert's Tear Soup: A Recipe for Healing After Loss to her. This book, although designed for children, contains a powerful plan to help those of any age dealing with a loss. In the story Grandy makes a pot of tear soup which contains ingredients like a dash of bitters, a heart that is willing to be broken open, a bunch of good friends, a lot of patience, plenty of exercise, and a variety of helpful reading material.

I would suggest purchase of this book for your library collection. You can recommend it to any reader. Check out the "see inside" on the Amazon.com page to read Grandy's recipe for Tear Soup.




Tear Soup: A Recipe for Healing After Loss
Pat Schwiebert & Chuck DeKlyen, authors
Taylor Bills, Ill.
Reading level: Ages 8 and up
Hardcover: 56 pages
Publisher: Grief Watch; 5th edition (June 1, 2005)
ISBN-13: 978-0961519766

                                                      Patty and Dad - January 20, 2013