Remembering For Good - Grief Support Community

04/02/2025

I got news last week that the online shopping cart I’ve been using for selling my grief support books is going to be more than doubling their fees.

I don’t want to raise the prices of my books so I’m going to have to quit that service and find another more affordable way to keep these books available. This means there’s going to be a period where the books won’t be available while I sort it all out. So if you’ve been thinking of picking up one of my grief support books, I suggest you do it before the end of this week.

And to those of you who know about services for selling digital downloads, your recommendations for a simple and affordable service for selling digital downloads are welcome!

(Sigh. I loathe how complex and expensive online business tools have become. I just want to set it and forget it and go make art!)

Here’s where you can get my books until the end of the week.

Since 2002, I’ve practiced as a therapist (MSW). I’ve worked with hundreds of people who are finding their ways through loss. I’ve also had to navigate my own personal journey of learning to live wholeheartedly after loss. In 2010, I Co-Founderd the Creative Grief Studio, offering a program fo...

10/30/2024

09/27/2024

What a lovely idea

“My oldest daughter made me the sweetest and kindest gift. She took one of the saved voicemails from my Dad off my phone and put the sound waves along with his message on the board. Now all I have to do is scan the QR code when I walk by it and I can hear my sweet Dad’s voice 😭❤️” spotted on the Tedooo app (thanks for your tip i learned about it and made my shop there as well)
By Burdine Designs, LLC

07/11/2024

02/20/2024

What a delightful little film about creativity and community and healing.

My fav quote: “I’ve unraveled a lot over the years… knitting and myself…”

Emotional repair through wool.Are you an aspiring filmmaker looking for help navigating your short film journey and accelerating your career? First of its ki...

01/11/2024

"A magnificent killer whale named Tahlequah
gave birth and caught the world’s attention.

Her calf died only thirty minutes after being born, each of those blessed minutes a sacrament to the progeny of love.

But the real reason journalists and photographers and millions of viewers followed this mother’s story, was her willingness to grieve unbidden, to become a thing utterly governed by kinship.

After a year and a half of growing this enormous life inside of her belly, and the immense feat of labor, and a half an hour of looking into one another’s eyes, Tahlequah proceeded to carry her dead baby on the tip of her nose for seventeen days, traveling more than a thousand miles all throughout the Salish Sea.

And some people think that grief is not
inexplicably beautiful. But perhaps it’s because those people (who are us people) no longer see grieving enacted publicly as a plea for sanity, as a way of feeding that which grants us life.

There was no real grieving at my mother’s funeral––

sniffling and shoving tears back up into our eyes, yes, but no keening. No collapsing into the bottomless cavern of one another’s trembling arms, no crying out into the insufferable heat of that late-summer day, and certainly no carrying my mom’s dead body as a holy procession all throughout the places she ever knew and loved.

So I continued to carry her mostly on my own.

I wailed in the privacy of my own home long after the funeral was over, with only the hurting eyes of my husband to behold me––a kind of holding that was never meant to be done alone.

I imagine that if killer whales were not endangered, Tahlequah would have swam those seventeen days with a grand procession of many other glistening, black and white giants all across the ocean.

Or perhaps she swam for one thousand miles
to personify the loneliness of her grief in a world spiraling toward oblivion.

And our savagery for not swimming alongside her; for taking pictures, for watching her exquisite ceremony on our little screens as if it were pure entertainment, as if that couldn’t be any one of us, carrying our dead children out into the dark and emptied streets."

From ‘The Progeny of Love' by April Tierney, Artwork by Lori Christopher 🐋

12/24/2023

If you celebrate Christmas and are taking some time off now, I hope you can slow down and use the time to connect more deeply with others and with the sensations and experiences that bring you meaning and pleasure.

This little practice that I call a “delight practice” which I share in my Untangle Your Grief workbook can help you to do that… Notice what people, experiences, conversations, colours, textures, tastes, sounds, smells, and physical sensations bring you delight. Snap a quick photo of it, jot down a “note to self”, or take 10mins to make a quick little sketch of it, like I’ve done in this pic.

However you do it, noticing and capturing what delights you has lots of wonderful benefits. It helps you to be more present to the delight and joy in the moment so you can soak more of it up, it’ll amp up your gratitude (which also feels great), and I bet you’ll find that it’s really the little things that matter most - a great antidote to the over-consumerism that gets marketed to us and can so easily leave you feeling “not enough” at this time of the year. You’ll also have collected a bunch of sign-posts and reminders of what lights you up which you can use to align your life a little more as you step into the new year.

Here’s wishing you a restful, connected, present, and joyful holiday season, and a new year filled with all the people and experiences you love most.

12/20/2023

I know that this time of the year can be an extra tough time of the year when you’re grieving, so I’ve reduced the prices of my grief support books for the rest of the year, in the hopes that they could be a source of comfort and support for more people during this time.

Email me at cath@cathduncan.com if you'd like to gift either of these books. I can definitely arrange that.

And if you'd really like a copy for yourself and these prices are still inaccessible for you, email me and I’ll send you a free copy.

UNTANGLE YOUR GRIEF - QUESTIONS + ART AFTER LOSS
https://cathduncan.wpengine.com/untangle-your-grief/

REMEMBERING FOR GOOD
https://rememberingforgood.com/the-book/

12/20/2023

Holiday host etiquette: If you’re inviting someone to your home and they’re grieving, be sure you’re inviting their grief to attend, too. It will be there, anyway.

Don’t invite someone with the goal of cheering them up for the holidays. Don’t expect them to put on a happy face in your home. Don’t demand they fake it til they make it or do something they don’t want to do, either.

Invite them with the loving intention of offering cheer and companionship and unconditional care during the holidays. To do this, you will need to honor and be responsive to their needs and emotions.

You can do this by privately acknowledging their grief when you make the invitation:

“I know this season is extra hard and your heart is hurting. You and your grief are welcome in our home. Come as you are, we’d be honored to have you with us.”

It’s also incredibly loving to honor the reality that it’s often hard for grieving folks to know what they will want, need, be up for, or able to tolerate at the holidays.

Giving them an invite without the need for commitment and permission to change their mind is extra loving:

“You don’t have to decide right now. If it feels good to be with us, we will have plenty of food and love for you-just show up! I’ll check in again the day before to see if you’re feeling up to coming over and if there’s anything you’d like me to know about how we can support you.”

Your grieving friends and fam need attentive care and responsiveness at the holidays, not plans to keep them busy, distracted, and happy.

If they’re laughing, laugh with them.

If they’re weeping, ask if they’d like your company or your help finding a quiet place to snuggle up alone for awhile.

If they’re laughing while weeping, and this is more common than you’d think, stay with them - this is a precious moment of the human experience that is truly sacred.

We don’t need to protect ourselves or each other from grief at the holidays. In fact, the more we embrace grief as an honored holiday guest, the more healthy, happy, and whole our holidays will be. 🙏

Sarah Nannen