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Summary: Intelligent and Compassionate look at death and our parents
Review: "Losing Your Parents, Finding Yourself" is a journey that affirms a rite of passage. It deals with the aftermath of losing our parents and our expectations as adults dealing with a life event that is not only significant but life changing. Secunda fearlessly dissects the point of no return when our innocence is snatched away for good. We become not only the legacy of the past but the trailblazers of the present and future. Secunda brilliantly addresses the issue of losing our parents with compassion and unparalleled insight. Much of what has been written deals with the emotions of grief and loss, but Secunda does much more for us. She has given us a road map that both enlightens and assists in the integration and healing of our hearts and souls to become fully human adults. Secunda resists limiting her scope to only one aspect of parental loss. She addresses how it affects every aspect of our lives beginning with our relationship to our parents, our siblings, our spouse, our children, and our friends. She shows us how we must be accountable for our actions and decisions but we must also forgive ourselves and others for our own frailties and humane-ness. She accomplishes this without being judgmental and preachy. Having both parents still alive, I feel I have been given the benefit of great wisdom. I am grateful I was able to read this book when I can effect meaningful changes in my life now. I will be more compassionate and more present in the future to my friends and family who experience loss. The most important lesson I gleaned from Secunda is the age old saying, " Carpe Diem!" Seize the day, but do it with forethought, love, understanding and compassion.
Rating: 
Summary: Victoria Secunda: Losing Your Parents, Finding Yourself
Review: A very insightful work, as far as it goes. The author states that she has "never believed in an afterlife", and the book completely ignores the role that faith in God might have in coming to terms with the loss of your parent. For some then, as for me, the book may seem incomplete.
Rating:
Summary: Victoria Secunda: Losing Your Parents, Finding Yourself
Review: A very insightful work, as far as it goes. The author states that she has "never believed in an afterlife", and the book completely ignores the role that faith in God might have in coming to terms with the loss of your parent. For some then, as for me, the book may seem incomplete.
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Summary: Stunning ripple effects of parental loss on adult children
Review: After my mother died in 1993, several of my acquaintances sympathetically offered their condolences. But since I was in middle age, I think they assumed that I'd take the death in stride, that my life would go on as before, and that I would be relatively unchanged by the experience. It turned out to be quite the reverse. I found myself undergoing seismic changes that had everything to do with the fact that I was now nobody's "child." My relationships to my siblings totally shifted--my brother suddenly broke off our relationship. But my younger sister, Nancy, and I became closer than we had ever been. Before, we had always seen each other through the prism of our mother--what Mom said about us, or who was going to visit, that kind of thing. Now Nancy and I could see each other eye to eye, with no distractions. I can honestly say that we didn't really know each other until our parents were gone. My marriage got stronger, too. My husband and I realized that simply because our parents had died, we now really counted on each other in ways we hadn't before. I also began treating my own grown daughter differently--I wanted to make sure that there would be no loose ends between us after my own death (not soon, I hope). All these changes astonished me. I hadn't read anything in the psychological literature about the ripple effects of parental death on the lives and choices of adult children. A lot of books talked about grief and mourning, and stopped there. None of them went into the details of how your relationships inside and outside the family are never the same, and of how you are forced to develop compensatory strengths. For instance, it was stunning to realize that there was no living parent to blame or to hope would change, that I was now the nominal "head of the family" and that my own days were undeniably numbered. Since my life is several open books--readers of my previous work are acquainted with my complicated relationships to my parents--I thought to myself, "There's a book in this." So I decided to write about the defining turning point of adulthood--being without parents--in order to understand the changes in my life by talking to others who had been through it. I conducted a study of over 100 men and women whose parents had died in the respondents' adulthoods--that is, after age 21. To my amazement and journalistic delight, most said that they, too, looked at the world in an entirely new way. They had been rocked by the fact that they no longer had their parents to count upon, or whose approval they wanted to win. Such questions as, "Who in your family do you call first with good or bad news?" or "Where are you going for Christmas" or "How do you define the words 'home' and 'family'?" took on new meaning. There were a lot of surprises in my research. For example, people who had been close to their parents were likelier than those who had not been close to make major decisions, such as changing careers, or marrying out of the family religion, or getting a divorce. These people, when their parents were alive, had been concerned about hurting their parents. Now they could follow their own dreams without guilt. Another surprise was that 62 percent of the respondents said that their parents' deaths had had positive effects, such as becoming more self-reliant, or holding themselves accountable for their own behavior, or being able to concentrate more on themselves, or rearranging their priorities. My hope is that readers of this book will include not just people whose parents are aging or have died, but also parents who are getting on in years who can still make changes in their relationships to their own children. The death of parents is not the end of the story. It's the beginning of our adult identities without them. Writing this book was the hardest project I've ever taken on because it made me think about my own mortality. But it was also the most gratifying because it helped me to realize that now, more than ever, I'm on my own--I must finish the job of growing up. And that has made all the diffference.
Rating: 
Summary: Psychologically comprehensive study, but...
Review: For such a thick book, I would have preferred more case studies/examples, to which more readers can relate. Isn't that the point of a book like this, to bring the reader in and then feed us with something that resonates? But the author provides only one example for each "theory." For example: when a parent dies, the adult child's relationship with the surviving parent either 1)remains unchanged, 2)improves, or 3)deteriorates. While absolutely true and an affirming statement no matter what the reader's situation (there are only those 3 possibilities, after all), we only get one example of each possibility. And what this book needs is more case studies to be outlined, more examples getting the message across. In doing so, more readers will respond to the book, because they will feel REPRESENTED therein. I respect the work done here, but the author must concern herself with affecting readers, NOT writing a book to be respected as pscyhological study by her peers.
Rating:
Summary: Psychologically comprehensive study, but...
Review: For such a thick book, I would have preferred more case studies/examples, to which more readers can relate. Isn't that the point of a book like this, to bring the reader in and then feed us with something that resonates? But the author provides only one example for each "theory." For example: when a parent dies, the adult child's relationship with the surviving parent either 1)remains unchanged, 2)improves, or 3)deteriorates. While absolutely true and an affirming statement no matter what the reader's situation (there are only those 3 possibilities, after all), we only get one example of each possibility. And what this book needs is more case studies to be outlined, more examples getting the message across. In doing so, more readers will respond to the book, because they will feel REPRESENTED therein. I respect the work done here, but the author must concern herself with affecting readers, NOT writing a book to be respected as pscyhological study by her peers.
Rating:
Summary: Nice Primer but Didn't Say Much That Was New
Review: I enjoyed this book and there were a couple of moments where the author presented new information, but for the most part it was stuff I had heard before. If you are just delving into this subject I highly recommend it.
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Summary: ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL BOOK PUTS MY FEARS TO REST
Review: I lost my father when I was 23, but as my mother approaches her 80s I realize that I'll be dealing with totally different issues when this painful time comes 'round again. Before I read Victoria Secunda's eloquent and enormously hopeful book, I could only paint dark and sad scenarios. Now, after reading her insightful account of this truly "defining turning point of adult life," I am opening myself to the possibility of better relationships with my sisters, a deeper and more satisfying relationship with my spouse and children, and a truer me. The grief will be there, but so may there be a greater me. I am grateful beyond words to this superbly talented author whose book is truly a gift.
Rating:
Summary: Great book
Review: I lost my parents 18 months ago. This book was a great help in figuring things out. It was interesting to hear the experiences of others. Highly recommended.
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Summary: Gentle Insight
Review: I loved this book. What I liked most was how the author expressed such important insights in so clear and gentle a fashion. I found helpful ideas on nearly every page, and could identify with many of the stories. I hope I can find more books like this one. It really helped.
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