75 Habits for a Happy Marriage Quotes

“Synthesis is the gateway to Transcendence, because once you accept that you are forever changed and that life is forever different, you have to ask, "What are you going to do about that fact? Will the change be for the better or for worse?" It's the loss itself that becomes the catalyst for meaning. (pg 273)”
― Ashley Davis (Prend) Bush, Transcending Loss: Understanding the Lifelong Impact of Grief and How to Make It Meaningful

“One griever told me that three years after her twenty-eight-year-old daughter died unexpectedly, she was having a bad day and found herself quite depressed and sad. She called a friend hoping to find a sympathetic ear but instead was assaulted by the friend’s exclamation, ‟You mean you’re still grieving over her, after three three years?” The friend’s question was not meant to be malicious. She honestly didn’t understand that to a grieving mother three years is nothing. She was sadly ignorant that major loss lasts a lifetime. This woman is not alone in her ignorance. I’ve heard educated people tell me that they thought the average length of the grieving process was two to four weeks. Maybe that was just their wishful thinking. We’re an immediate-gratification society that values quick fixes, a generation raised on microwaves and fast foods. We prefer our solutions and emotions conveniently packaged for the swiftest consumption. So we expect grief to be a quick and easy process with no bitter aftertaste. But how can we expect to love someone, lose someone—and not be changed irrevocably? How can we realistically expect this to be a speedy process? Yet time and again grievers tell me they are being asked, “When will you be your old self again?” or “It’s been three months already, shouldn’t you be over this by now?” Perhaps you’ve heard comments like this too, and chances are that as a result, you feel quite confused and isolated in your grief. Maybe you’ve been asking yourself the same questions.”
― Ashley Davis Bush, Transcending Loss

“point is that in the beginning, in the stage of Disorganization, things are not okay. Life is not fine. You are not doing all right. Someone you loved dearly, someone precious to you, has been wrested from you, and your life is left in shreds. If someone describes a griever to me by saying, “Oh, she’s so strong and together; she’s handling her grief really well,” that’s when I worry. I think someone is handling her grief well if I hear that “she’s terribly upset, she’s crying constantly, she’s falling apart.” Emotion isn’t the problem to be fixed; it’s the natural response and the ultimate solution.”
― Ashley Davis Bush, Transcending Loss