In this episode, we talk with Ru Callender, author of What Remains: Life, Death, and the Human Art of Undertaking. Ru shares his personal experience with profound childhood loss to becoming a self-proclaimed radical undertaker. We also discuss the impact of grief at different life stages, how participation in funerals can be helpful for children, and reimagining rituals to accurately reflect the life of the person who died.

Main topics:

• Parental Loss and Early Grief: Ru reflects on the loss of his father at age 7 and his mother in his 20s, sharing how these defining losses shaped his perspective on death and grief.
• Boarding School and Emotional Austerity: The impact of being sent away shortly after his father’s death.
• Becoming a Radical Undertaker: After a chance encounter with a TV program, Ru was inspired to challenge conventional funeral practices and embrace more personal, inclusive rituals.
• Children and Grief: Why including children in funerals can be helpful, offering them tangible ways to process and revisit their grief.
• Radical Funeral Planning: Ru’s vision for end-of-life ceremonies, including his own desire for a midsummer funeral pyre, and how he helps families create ceremonies that resonate deeply.
• The Role of Grief in Life: How grief manifests and resurfaces, and the creative ways Ru has processed his own grief through rituals and art.

Resources Mentioned:

• What Remains: Life, Death, and the Human Art of Undertaking by Ru Callender
• Dougy Center’s grief support resources: www.dougy.org

Join the Conversation: Have thoughts about this episode? Email Jana at [email protected] or connect with Dougy Center on social media. Don’t forget to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to share what it means to you.

Grief can be shattering - and it can also reveal unexpected strength and resilience. In this episode, we’re joined by Lauren Sisler, award-winning sports broadcaster, ESPN Sideline reporter, and author of Shatterproof: How I Overcame the Shame of Losing My Parents to Opioid Addiction (and Found my Sideline Shimmy). Lauren shares her powerful story of losing her parents, who died within hours of each other during her freshman year of college, and how grief, fear, and shame, kept her from telling her story. 

Lauren discusses: 

• The initial shock of loss. 

• How grief evolved for her over the years and the tools that helped. 

• The power of sharing her story and connecting with others who’ve experienced loss. 

• Insights from her book Shatterproof, including ways she's found to stay connected to her parents.

Follow Lauren on IG. 

Thanks for Listening! If you found this episode meaningful, consider leaving a review or sharing it with someone who might benefit from it. Let’s keep the conversation about grief going.

[This episode originally aired December, 2023]

This time of year can be grueling for anyone, but particularly for those who are grieving. So, each year we put out an episode to help you feel less alone and hopefully more equipped to traverse the next few weeks. Today's guest, Melissa Peede Thompson, M.S., is a Grief Services Coordinator at Dougy Center. While she has lots of professional knowledge in this realm, we asked her to talk about her personal experience of grieving during the holidays. Melissa was six when her sister died of gun violence. She was 13 when her father died in a motorcycle accident. And she was a young adult when her grandparents died. Each loss shaped - and continues to shape - how Melissa and her family approach this time of year.

We discuss:

• How her sister's death impacted her parents at the holidays
• What she remembers about the first Christmas after her dad died
• Grieving for her her grandparents before they died
• How the holidays can feel empty, even when the house is full
• Melissa's realization that grief has left her a little bit "Grinchy"
• What she's doing to shift how she thinks and feels about the holidays
• Learning to appreciate being able to spend time with the people who are still alive
• Why St. Patrick's Day became her favorite holiday
• Taking the pressure off trying to make the holidays feel the same after someone dies

If you missed our past Holidays & Grief episodes, be sure to listen to Ep. 27, 98, 174, 240.

And our latest one, 306. 

Tips For Getting Through the Holidays & Holiday Plan Worksheet.

It's our annual holidays and grief episode! In the past we've focused on more tangible tips and suggestions for supporting kids, teens, and adults during this time of year. This year we decided to focus on one person's lived experience with how the holidays can get really awkward when grief is involved. Ana Salazar-Walsh was just nineteen when her father died in a mountain climbing accident. A few months later, it was the first holiday season after his death, but it was actually the third Christmas in a row shadowed by grief. Two years earlier, her father left their family to start a new one with a woman he had fallen in love with. All of this, combined with moving from Spain to the United States for college, made for three very uncomfortable and awkward holiday seasons. Now that Ana is married with her own children, she's finding ways to bring her father's memory into their holiday celebrations. 

Looking for our past episodes about the holidays & grief? Check out: 

• Ep. 272 It’s Okay That It’s Not The Same – Grief At The Holidays 

• Ep. 240 The [Not] Most Wonderful Time Of The Year – Holidays & Grief Mini-Episode 

• Ep. 98 Under Pressure – Grief & December Holidays

When Reshma Kearney's husband Sean died of suicide, her immediate concern was their three young children. She needed to figure out how to talk to them about his death - and his life - all while meeting their emotional and physical needs. Pretty quickly she realized her needs also had to be met so she could keep showing up for them. Reshma and her kids had an established mindfulness practice before Sean's death and those practices became integral for tending to their grief and finding ways to keep engaging with life. 

Note: this episode discusses suicide. If you or someone you know is struggling, please reach out. You can call 988 or text HELLO to 741-741. 

Connect with Reshma on IG.

Listen to her kids on Ep. 303: Let's Hear It For The Kids - Grief In Their Own Words.

In May of 2024, Christine Passo's beloved dog, Maya Ray, took her last breath in Christine's arms. This wasn't the first time Christine experienced loss or trauma, but the grief she felt and continues to feel for Maya Ray caught her off guard with its intensity and depth. We talk about Maya Ray's last day, how Christine's other dog, Zoe, grieved, and how Christine and her partner are finding ways to continue honoring Maya Ray's life and her place in their family. 

Christine Passo is a coach who specializes in supporting women through life changes, many of which come with grief. She is also the co-author of My Fur Baby Wrote This Book and host of the Unconscious Evolution podcast. 

Be sure to check out our previous episode on grieving for a pet - Ep. 238 "These Relationships Matter."

In honor of Children's Grief Awareness month, we asked kids and teens to talk about grief in their own words. This compilation episode includes clips from children and teens reflecting on their people who died, their varied responses to loss, and what they hope grief will feel like in future. 

Thank you to all the children and teens who contributed to this episode - and to their parents and caregivers for facilitating the recording process. 

Want to learn more?

• Register now for Too Young To Grieve? Dougy Center's Children's Grief Awareness Day webinar. Thursday, November 21st, 2024 - 10 - 11:30 am PST 
• Be part of our #UnderstandGrief campaign
• Follow November's Flip The Script posts on social media

No one is perfect and no one is just one story, but how do you grieve when the person who died was so different than the person you fell in love with? When Jenn met and fell in love with Jesse, she never imagined their relationship would unravel due to his struggles with mental health and alcohol use disorder. Jesse died in 2020 and Jenn's been left to reconcile the man she loved with the one she eventually had to leave. His death also left her unsure where her grief fits in the world of bereavement and how to support their son, whose grief is complicated by the impact his father's illness had on their relationship. 

Dr. Jennifer Vriend is a Licensed Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychologist and co-host of The Coping Toolbox podcast.

Susan Lieu, is a Vietnamese-American author, playwright, and performer. When Susan was 11 years old, her mother died from a routine plastic surgery. After she died, Susan's family stopped talking about her mother, leaving Susan on her own to figure out what happened and how to feel. Susan's debut memoir, The Manicurist’s Daughter, recounts her quest to get to know her mother, avenge her death, and try with all her might to get her family to open up about it all.

Susan is a compelling and accomplished storyteller, co-hosting The Model Minority Moms podcast and speaking at TEDx, the Smithsonian, and at universities and companies across the country. Her memoir is an Apple Book of the Month, most anticipated 2024 book by Elle Magazine and Goodreads, and has been featured on The New York Times, NPR Books, and The Washington Post. Read her press here. 

Follow Susan on IG @susanlieu

It's our 300th episode and this conversation with Maegan Parker Brooks, PhD, is the perfect one to honor that milestone. Maegan is an Associate Professor at Willamette University and a volunteer at Dougy Center where she facilitates a peer grief support group for adult caregivers of teens who are grieving. Maegan is also a daughter and sister, grieving the deaths of her father, her sister Emily, and her mother. In this conversation we talk about grief and estranged relationships, relationships impacted by substance use, non-death losses, memorialization during the pandemic, and all the ways we talk to one another - and ourselves - about that grief. 

Maegan Parker Brooks, PhD is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Civic Communication & Media Department at Willamette University. At Willamette, Maegan teaches courses in Death and Grief Communication and facilitates the Diversity of Loss grief support group. Beyond Willamette, Maegan co-facilitates a group for adult caregivers of grieving teens at The Dougy Center and she recently earned a certificate in Arts-Assisted Grief Therapy at the Portland Institute for Loss & Transition.   

Related Articles: Brooks, Maegan P. "Listening to Grief." Willamette., 1 Feb. 2024, pp. 20-21.  Brooks, Maegan P. “Listening to Layers of Loss.” Journal of Autoethnography, 4, 2 (2023): 174-192.   Want to help us celebrate our 300th episode? Be sure to follow the show and give us a rating/review on whatever platform you use to listen!   Grief Out Loud®  is a production of Dougy Center, The National Grief Center for Children & Families.