As a result of Stephanie Ericsson's own experience with many kinds of loss, her book offers a guide for those in grief, legitimizing the complex and often taboo emotions people feel when loss transforms their lives. Grief is defined as "the constant re-awakening that things are now different". The book combines intimate diary writings with meditations, describes the language of loss, and captures the contradictory, wrenching and chaotic emotions of grief. It can be opened at any point to chapters not more than one or two pages long on such themes as abandonment, rage, exile, silences, cherishing and spiritual awakenings. By the author of "Shamefaced" and "Womansafe".