Unmet expectations and conflicts arise, when a person is hurting and doesn't know what they need, and their loved ones don't know what to say or how to help.
By the time author Erica McNeal was thirty-two years old, she was already a three-time cancer survivor, and had experienced the loss of five children, two of which she held in her arms. Those close to her were not sure of how to console her, and some well-intended comments only served to hurt Erica and her family in their healing process.
For example, imagine being diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, at twenty-two years old, and having your best friend tell you that she wished she had cancer too, so that people would like her. Or imagine being pressured to hold a friend's baby-a child that was born the same day you buried your daughter, in order to "prove your love" for the couple.
These statements represent only a fraction, and not even the worst, of the painful words spoken to her family while they struggled through cancer treatments and grieved the loss of their children.
Good Grief is a book filled with tangible solutions for determining what to say, what not to say, and what to do, in order to love others well, through difficult times
