I won't do this talk justice (I have bronchitis and otherwise am not in a chatty mood), but I saw Rick Lavoie give two terrific talks last week. It was interesting watching him perform in the two venues, actually: he used some similar jokes and anecdotes as openers but covered very different material based on the audiences. The one thing I've always loved about his work is his focus on how the child is perceiving things--yet another one of those parenting reminders that I really need, to stop and imagine what my child is seeing or feeling. He talked about the stages parents go through to reach acceptance, and he pointed out that acceptance isn't a final destination, that the various phases of anger and envy and fear can recur.

As I've said many times, I think part of my coping strategy has been to get angry or to problem solve and intellectualize. The grief, I have no defense against the grief so I don't let myself feel it very often.