How to Get to Grips with Grief: 40 Ways to Manage the Unmanageable

Description

This book is for anyone who has lost someone. It may have been recently, or it may have been years ago, but still it stings like it was yesterday. James Withey has known the grief beast since he was five, when his dad died, and it has followed him ever since. In his twenty years supporting people with their own grief, as a counsellor and social care worker, he has helped others work through their despair and reconcile the injustice of grief. With his trademark humour and warmth, he provides forty ways to help you live with and manage your grief no matter what stage you're at. It provides comfort for when it all gets too much, ideas for when you feel at a loss for what to do and more than a laugh or two to balance out the sadness.

James Withey is the author of the bestselling book How to Tell Depression to Piss Off: 40 Ways to get Your Life back, and is the co-editor of The Recovery Letters: Addressed to People Experiencing Depression and What I Do to Get Through: How to Run, Swim, Cycle, Sew, or Sing Your Way Through Depression. He is the founder of The Recovery Letters project which publishes online letters from people recovering from depression. James trained as a person-centred counsellor and worked in addiction, homelessness and mental health services. He lives with depression & anxiety and writes and speaks about mental health. He lives in Hove in the UK with his husband and emotionally damaged cat.

I loved this book so much. It was just so accessible, refreshing and practical. James has an irreverent ability to capture the often absurd realities of grief. I would happily gift this book to my closest friend if they were struggling with grief. James' writing is just so full of humour, compassion and depth. So engaging and real. He really wants to share the stuff that has helped him over the years. I found this book to be a generous gift for those folks looking to get to grips with and grow around their grief. A practical, productive and positive resource that will have you smiling through the tears and wishing you could meet James for a cup of coffee as you know you would both like and respect him -- Julie Stokes, OBE, author and founder of Winston's Wish Beautiful, relatable, funny and true. This is a book that won't try to 'fix' you but attempts to fix the societal expectations we have around grief. James validates how it feels to exist in the world in the aftermath of loss and offers practical advice while avoiding all the usual platitudes and cliches. A book to be picked up and revisited time and time again. A true comfort for anyone experiencing grief -- Natasha Sholl, author of Founding, Wanting I cried as I read it. But as James says, crying is a good thing. As is moving, shouting, screaming and holding on to hope - and laughing too in those moments of dark humour. The sentence I will treasure is: "Each life makes a splash, the ripples spread outwards." This is the best book about the everyday experience of coming to terms with grief that I've read. I understand what grieving means, and so does James. Abso-bloody-lutely -- Linda Gask, writer and psychiatrist In James' upbeat voice, he gives us forty great ways to manage grief -- Julia Samuel, psychotherapist and bestselling author of Grief Works James Withey has written the most comprehensive, thoughtful guide for anyone seeking to understand the complexities of grief. As an expertin thefield of mental health, his insights and suggestions are brilliant, supportiveand helpful. I also loved his personal stories and senseof humour, making this book relatableand appropriately funny. Yup, laugh-out-loud funny. Griever, to cry is expected;to laugh is divine. I wish I had this book years ago when I lost my son. I havebeen reading and writing aboutgrief for over twenty years, and his guideon grief is by far thebest I havehad theprivilegeto read -- Jane Edberg, artist and author of The Fine Art of Grieving: An Illustrated Memoir