Customer Reviews
This book helps one with losing a parent through death or abuse 
2008-08-05
I purchased this book in the fall of 2004 for someone I loved who lost his dad at age 7. He would NOT read it. However, I bought a 2nd copy, and I read it, and reread it, and found that the book was for ME as well. Our parental losses were our connecting points. He lost his dad through death. I lost my dad through alcoholism. While I struggled with this loss, and its affiliative repercussions in my first marriage and in all of my life, until I surrendered to a lifelong process of healing and interpersonal growth, I had not grown beyond the loss. This book did indeed prepare me for my father's real death 6 months later. It was like a cushion and I knew that I had already lost someone I could not fully regain even though he was alive when I read the book. Fortunately, my work in therapy helped me to love, forgive, appreciate,and to let go while my father was living. Having someone die to you who is living and breathing is also a loss that goes on forever. The book needs to be read in small bites....and sessions, and will definitely help you heal. Whether one can remember or not, not having a parent be fully present either/or/and emotionally OR physically is a huge loss to anyone in life, and particularly before we mature and marry and become parents ourselves. There is a huge hole is in our lives that affects ALL of our relationships and requires gentleness and loving support to heal. This book helped me to understand my friend, and his fears of intimacy and closeness and how differently each person responds to the losses, and what decisions one makes about being close in adult relationships. Maxine Harris has done an excellent job of grasping the extent of this loss and put it into print in words everyone can understand. It is NOT a technical therapy book. The only hard parts are reading, understanding, realizing the loss, and processing through. Good material for use with a therapist or on your own. If you have NOT done a great deal of therapy, you might join a grief support group while reading this book. Many times individuals think that a loss has to be immediate to join. This is NOT so. You will find the support and group dynamics nurturing. This book nurtured me, and I hope it nurtures you. Be gentle with yourself and the book. It took me a couple of weeks to go through it each time. A powerful help book! Judy Laughton Lilley, M.A. Counseling and Professional Psychology
A story that parallels my own life 2007-01-17
I was one of the people initially interviewed for the book when it was being written. After the book was published I was so deeply affected by the overall effect of all the lives that Ms. Harris had so beautifully interwoven. For the first time in my life I no longer felt so alone having been a child who lost a parent at an early age. I think this is must reading for anyone of any age who has gone through this experience or knows others who have had this experience.
Must Read 2007-01-10
This book is a must read for anyone who has lost a parent in their childhood. I was talking about it today at my book club meeting where four out of seven us lost a parent at a young age. We all agreed with a lot of what was written in this book. Three of us had tears in our eyes as we described our experiences. We all had tears rolling down our cheeks when one of us told about going to elementary school and the other kids could have their mothers be the room mother and how she didn't have a mother to do this. This woman is in her 40s. Realistic look at those of us who were so unforunate to lose a parent and how it defined our lives.
Gives you hope at a dark time 2005-10-16
My 45 year old husband died suddenly of a heart attack. He was a very thin, active person who never smoked and had NO family history of heart disease. Besides dealing with my loss I was distraught at this staggering blow to our three children, 18, 15, and 10. This book gave me hope that our children could go on to live whole and happy lives in spite of this loss. Eight years later, our children have, for the most part, thrived. I recommend this to anyone dealing with this tragedy in their lives.
As bad as it is for surviving spouse, it's worse for the children 2005-07-16
This book was a life-saver for me some 10 years ago when my husband, at age 40, died from cancer. We had two children - ages 5-1/2 and 20 months at the time - and this book helped me empathize with their plight and grief at their daddy's death.
As hard as his death was for me personally, I understood after reading this book that the experience was at the time -- and would be in the future -- far harder for them. It let me shift focus away from myself and to something far more important -- helping guide their little hearts and minds into stable, secure and productive adulthoods.
Unspeakable Grief 2004-06-02
My father died suddenly 44 years ago, shattering the illusion of security that nearly every other child takes for granted : the ongoing presence of a loved and caring parent.I was almost seven years old, but it has been the single most determining experience of my entire life. No other book I have ever read on the subject (and there are regrettably few) has offered as much illuminating information or insight into this under-researched,too-often- unacknowledged life changing loss.This author leaves no stone unturned, no question unanswered.She deftly gets out of the way of the 66 individuals
telling their poignant stories of early parental death and allows the details to emerge, vividly evoking both the internal and external realities of the event as well as its aftermath.Her interpretive narration provides more insightful observations and accurate conclusions than I have received from decades of psychotherapeutic intervention, all conveyed with a tone of deferential respect.
This book is a must-read not only for anyone who has endured the overwhelming trauma of losing a parent through death
in childhood, but also for those therapists who accompany them on their lifelong journeys of emotional healing. We need more informed professionals, who can recognize the particular
lifelong shockwaves that this kind of loss entails. Maxine Harris
has provided the most definitive and comprehensive resource available for adults who cannot imagine what it would be like for your parents to die and have no-one send you a sympathy card-
or even act as if anything significant had happened at all!A friend in her 40's called me to relate the recent death of her father and the funeral gathering, during which she was surrounded
by friends and family, consoling her as she scattered his ashes over a canyon near her childhood home. Then she sighed and remarked,"Öh, you know how it is...we're the age when our parents die..." I replied, "No, actually, I don't know how that is...but there is this book that will tell you what MY experience was like.It's called THE LOSS THAT IS FOREVER."
This book changed my life. 2003-08-14
Everyone knows that loosing a parent will cause life-long grief, this book enlightens the reader to the life long habits and thinking patterns that occur. It's a blueprint to understanding yourself if you've lost a parent as a child. I can't recommend it enough.
I thought I had self actualized and knew myself very well until I read this book. I lost my father when I was six.
Everything I have become and all of the choices I've made have had something to do with that. I had no idea.
Then I read this book that described me so well. I don't usually buy books, but I keep this one on the shelf, well dusted and frequently referred to.
I understand 2001-11-16
I lost my Dad too early. I miss him so much and it has impacted my life. Loss is hard. Thank you for writing this book.
I find it helpful also to write in a journal. I found Write from Your Heart, A Healing Grief Journal is a way to get my feeling onto paper. I also create a memory journal at the same time.
Helpful and informative 2001-09-19
Touching, sentimental, yet full of scientific and psychological support. Maxine Harris captures the tremendous impact of early parent loss through both anecdotal and scientific support. This book is a tremendous asset to anyone who has experienced early parent loss. For women dealing specifically with mother loss, Harris' book works well in conjunction with Hope Edelman's "Motherless Daughters." I would say this is a must have for anyone who has lost a parent before they were 21 and are still trying to come to terms.
An excellent book 2001-01-29
Both my parents died when I was very young (4 and 5 1/2). This book is great because it tells many stories similar to my own. In fact, it has inspired me to try to get some kind of discussion group together on the topic in the Washington DC/Fairfax VA area. If you have any ideas on how to best start such a group, or know how to contact this book's author, please let me know (john.craig@aya.yale.edu).
There are many moving stories in this volume. JC
