A Child Dies, What to Expect and How Long Does it Take: Patricia Loder, The Compassionate Friends

HEALING THE GRIEVING HEART
A Child Dies, What to Expect and How Long Does it Take
Host: Dr. Gloria Horsley
With guest: Patricia Loder, Executive Director
of The Compassionate Friends
June 9, 2005

G: There are no simple or quick solutions to dealing with death. Each of us is unique and special as are our relationships and our responses to loss. We have all heard at the time of death, I don’t know what to do. Well, there’s nothing to do. In fact, most of us need to stop doing. The heart will heal. It’s a matter of letting it happen. Healing the Grieving Heart is about nourishing the heart and removing the blocks that slow the miracle of renewal. I know you hurt. I’ve been there. Have faith. The heart always heals. You may think you will never be able to function again, but my guests and I will be here every week to tell you, you will survive this and can even thrive. The sun will shine. Even after a devastating death, all is possible. You can love, open your heart, and be happy again. Please join us on the show by calling our toll free number 1-866-369-3742 with questions or comments regarding the losses in your life. Today I am honored to have my special guest and friend, Pat Loder, Executive Director of the Compassionate Friends, a self-help organization composed of families who have lost children. Good morning, Pat. Welcome to Healing the Grieving Heart.
P: Good morning, Gloria. Thank you so much for allowing me the privilege to share this time with you.
G: Well, it’s wonderful to have you on the show. I know you’re a very busy lady and I really appreciate it. Pat, I know it’s been a long journey for you as it has been for many of us. Our son, Scott, died in an automobile accident almost 22 years ago, and I know you lost two dear children, Stephanie and Stephen, in an automobile accident. Could you share your story with us?
P: Certainly. It was the first day of spring. It was a glorious spring day in 1991 which is 14 years ago. Stephanie, Stephen and I were on our way home from visiting my parents who at the time were dealing with the death of my brother, and we wanted to spend some time with them and nurture them through their loss. As I was preparing to make a left-hand turn onto my street, a racing design motorcycle slammed into the side of my car at approximately 115 miles per hour. He hit the side of my car that Steph and Steve were seated. Stephen, who was 5 years old at the time, was never able to be resuscitated. Stephanie, who was 8 years old at the time, and I were taken to the local hospital where she was stabilized and lifted to Children’s Hospital where she died later that night. Stephanie and Stephen were our only two children at the time, and they were two very special kids, as all of our children are, filled with beauty and silliness and love all the time.
G: I so appreciate your courage and generosity for sharing that story with us. You know, no matter how long it’s been, these stories are so fresh in our hearts and will always have a special place for those little ones that have left. Pat, for all those who are grieving out there, I wondered, would you tell us what helped you get through those dark days and how was it for you? I know it’s tough to get back there but I know it’s there.
P: Oh, absolutely. It’s a question that we’re often asked in our organization. I guess at the time I learned that I needed to deal with things one day at a time, and sometimes it was one minute at a time. When I sat and thought about the future or what it held for me, it was much too much to deal with. Getting out of bed and getting dressed, having shoes that matched on my feet, that was an accomplishment for me.
G: Those 45-minute showers.
P: Forty-five minute showers, absolutely, in which you cry your heart out and try to figure out exactly what’s going to happen in life, but when I learned to deal with just the moment, just that time, I found that it was much easier for me to go on. When I tried to think of the future, it became very, very difficult.
G: How were those very, very early days? Were there things that happened at the hospital that were disturbing for you? Of course, everything was disturbing. But were there things that made it more difficult?
P: I think that everything’s difficult at that time. You’re dealing with– in my case, I was dealing with a terrible, terrible auto accident in which two small children were killed and the media was very interested. Stephanie was in school. Stephen had not started school yet. There was all of the trauma of the children, and I worried so much about her classmates and everything that was going on around us. It was a horrendous time.
G: Yeah. I remember the media coming to our home. My son was a pitcher on the baseball team, quarterback on the football team. And people wanted to come in and record things for radio shows and put spots on. It’s kind of interesting because in some ways, you welcome them in because early on you do need to tell your story.
P: Absolutely.
G: But you sometimes just don’t know what’s going on.
P: And you’re in such a fog at the beginning that it’s very difficult to even process the fact that your children have died. And it’s such a fog that yet everybody, they’re trying very desperately to help you and not hurt you, but it’s a fine line because it is such a tender, tender time in the family’s life.
G: Now how did you find the doctors and nurses and the professional people?
P: I was hospitalized after the accident, and I had a nurse who just stayed with me, cared for me, went and even bought a teddy bear just so that I could sit and hold it and cry. I just thought it was one of the sweetest, most tender things that any person could do. She didn’t have to talk. You see. She was just there for me. And I thought what a very, very special, special person.
G: That’s a wonderful story. I remember a friend of ours just came to our house and sat and watched us have our first meal together and that, for some reason, was kind of an amazing thing. Didn’t say a word. Just sat there while we ate.
P: Absolutely, it is an amazing thing. Because people oftentimes are uncomfortable with silence and they think they need to fill the air with words. Really and truly, there are no words at a time like that. So just being there, touching you, hugging you, loving you, and caring for you is so special.
G: And I also think that running the little errands and bringing the food. One person just answered the telephone.
P: Yes, absolutely.
G: Stayed around and answered the phone. It’s the small things. Maybe putting some gas in your car, you know.
P: Absolutely. My brother and his wife, they were such a wonderful family support system. They made sure we were fed. They helped with the funeral arrangements. They did things, tried to anticipate what we needed. As you said, answered the telephone and were just there for us all the time. We were very blessed to have them.
G: One thing I found very interesting in retrospect as the years go on is we develop some new friendships of people that we never would have connected with. There are some people who I call them good grievers. They’re just really good at helping. Then we had other close friends who we didn’t see.
P: Isn’t that the case? I hear that so much. It certainly happened with my husband, Wayne and I. It’s almost as if our friends, the whole family of friends that we had changed at that time because they were very uncomfortable with our grief and our pain and our sadness. However, those people who sometimes were just mere acquaintances before the death of Stephanie and Stephen, they stepped up and came and were very, very helpful and became very close. It’s like there was a turning point in which all of our friends kind of made a shift.
G: But then I found that maybe a year later, some of my old friends started being friends again. And also I found years later people who had never been able to talk about it were talking about it again. It’s very interesting.
P: Well, don’t you think it’s also such a shock to them? This wonderful child, or in my case, children that they knew, they’re suddenly dead, and they’re out of your life.
G: I think some people just hold them in their heart rather than being able to verbalize it. There are so many people out there that hurt for you when you lose a child, and it’s just enormous if people could be in touch with how much the universe really does care.
P: They do. They do.
G: So, I wanted to ask you, do you remember the first time you laughed?
P: Oh, my goodness, yes, I do. It was a sound that was almost foreign to me. I was almost embarrassed because I felt I was being disrespectful to my children. They were dead and I had no right to laugh or feel happiness again. And so it was almost as if, I shouldn’t do this. This isn’t right. But as time goes on, you learn that that’s the way you honor your children.
G: I remember, I think it was about three months after Scott died, and I opened the New York Times and my husband’s picture was in there. I had no idea he was going to be in there. He didn’t say anything about it. And I just burst out laughing. It was so funny. As you said, it was such a foreign sound. It was kind of like the tinkling of a bell.
P: Absolutely. Absolutely.
G: Pat, could you tell me what advice you would have for those who have lost a child?
P: I think the best advice that I could give somebody who has lost a child is just to take one day at a time. It is just so difficult. What you’re going through is so difficult that it’s a time in which you need to nurture yourself and sometimes that’s very difficult because in our society in which we are so very, very busy every day, it’s really a time in your life where you need to sit back, reflect, be sure that you are taking care of yourself and all of the needs that you have and your family has at that particular moment in time.
G: Well, one of the things when you talk about needs or taking care of yourself, one of the things that I found was that there’s a real need for sleep.
I have had several questions emailed to me and I thought maybe we could talk about those for a moment. One lady, Brenda, asks: How did you get the courage to go on after the death of two children and now have any other children?
P: Well, it was difficult. It was very difficult. Early on, Wayne and I made this decision that we had so much love to give and that we really, really wanted to have more children. So we made a concerted effort. This was a very difficult decision for us, but we decided to try to have more children and against quite stringent medical odds, we were able.
G: How long was that after the children died?
P: It was about a year and a half after their death. We knew that I was getting up in age and if I was going to have any more children that I was going to have to do so rather quickly and so we went ahead and we were able to have two additional children. Christopher came along first and Katie was our second, actually our fourth child, I should say.
G: Oh, that’s always an issue, isn’t it, when people ask us how many children do you have?
P: It is. And as far as I’m concerned, I have four children, and you know that’s one thing that we are often asked in our organization also is how do you answer that question? I guess I’ve gotten to the point where I answer it based on the circumstance. A lot of people really don’t want to know your life’s history but somehow you feel like you’re dishonoring your child who has died if you don’t mention them. But sometimes they are simply just asking for whatever reason and there are times in my life I do say two because I think that’s what the situation dictates. Most of the time I do say, I have four children. If it requires a further explanation, I give it to them, but you have to go with your heart.
G: So sometimes you do, sometimes you don’t. I have three daughters and humor, especially as time goes on, is something you use within your family, and my daughters have a little joke. They call it the Scott paper, and they say when they were in high school and college, they could always plan on an A if they wrote the Scott paper about their brother. What was your daughter’s name?
P: Katie.
G: And how old are they?
P: Christopher is 12 and Katie is 11.
G: I wondered how you keep the memory of Stephanie and Stephen alive for them since they’ve never known them. How do you integrate them into the family?
P: Steph and Steve are integrated into our family every day of our lives. We freely talk about – you talked about the Scott paper – but we freely talk about Steph and Steve stories all the time, and Chris and Katie really do enjoy hearing stories about their brother and sister. We have pictures of their brother and sister up all over the house. We talk about them in relation to what Chris and Katie are now going through. What might have happened with Steph and Steve way back when. We do integrate them into our everyday life. If it’s Steph and Steve’s birthday, we have a birthday celebration for them because our lives were blessed by having them in our family, and we do celebrate their birthdays.
G: Do you have a cake?
P: We do. We have cake and we will sing them happy birthday in heaven and we don’t care what other people think. That’s part of our celebration of their lives and we’re happy to say we were blessed by them.
G: Oh, yes. I think it’s a wonderful thing. And families sometimes think it becomes taboo to talk about these children.
P: Oh, my goodness. It’s music to our ears, isn’t it? Just to hear their name.
G: And we love to hear their name. Even after all these years, I love to hear our friends say, oh, I was thinking about Scott the other day. I saw somebody. It’s just a fun thing.
P: It is. Very much so. And even a few years after Steph and Steve died, I wrote a letter to our family and friends to thank them for all of their support that they had given us through the years and told them that it was a difficult journey for all of us, including them. And I asked them at the time if they would be so kind to share a Steph or Steve story with us and we’ve got such wonderful, wonderful stories. That they wrote their stories down. They took time to share these wonderful moments that they have shared with Stephanie and Steven and they are such treasures to us today to have those gifts that our friends gave us.
G: That’s really fantastic. They say that there is a high divorce rate. That’s the word out there. I was talking to somebody the other day whose niece committed suicide and she said there is such a high divorce rate. Do you think that’s true, and how did you and your husband make it through?
P: Well, first off, the high divorce rate is not true and let me get into that in a second. The fact that many people believe and articulate to bereaved parents that there is a high divorce rate among the group actually hurts me quite a bit.
G: As a professional, it’s interesting, too, as I’ve been a therapist for 22 years and I’ve never believed that. I haven’t done any research but I hear other therapists tell people that. That they’re at risk.
P: As I said, Stephanie was airlifted to another hospital. I was admitted to one hospital, and Wayne accompanied her, obviously to the other hospital where she died. And after her death, the hospital gave me a book that was written as a helpful guideline for families after the unthinkable happened. And in the book it gave suggestions for funeral arrangements and who should be notified of the death and other helpful information about the death. And one section of the book talked about the high divorce rate among bereaved parents. And when I read that section, I thought first my son dies, then my daughter, and now I’m going to lose my marriage. My whole world was falling apart. And I just want to jump in here and say those statistics are absolutely wrong.
G: I don’t even think there are any.
P: Right. Several years ago, in fact, the Compassionate Friends organization commissioned a survey to gain insight on the true scope of the organization’s mission. Included in the survey was a series of questions regarding marital status. And the survey determined at the time that 72% of people who are married at the time of their child’s death were still married to the same person. The remaining 28% of marriage included 16% of which one spouse had died. So only 12% of marriages ended in divorce, which is far, far below the national average for a non-bereaved “normal” couple.
G: Well, my husband and I have been married for 45 years and there certainly are some stressors when you have a child die because one of the things that happens or that happened to me and my husband is that when you’re up, they may be down, and you work so hard to get yourself together for the day and your partner is not on that day. And so that’s very stressful. Is that what you found?
P: Oh, absolutely. In the early days of my grief, I looked toward my husband to fix what happened to me. I wasn’t sure how he was supposed to do that. I wanted him to fix it.
G: We were talking about the ups and down of marriage and I was saying that when my son was killed, I found that there were days when I really had to work to get myself up and then maybe Phil would have a down day and I resented it. It made me angry that here I am trying to get it together and this guy was not getting it together. And it would be the same with him. He would be happy. Let’s go out, and I am like, I can’t make it. And you were saying that you were wanting Wayne to fix it for you. Can you tell us more about that?
P: I did. I wanted Wayne to fix it. I wasn’t sure how he was supposed to do that but I wanted him to fix the situation. He had his job. He was the husband, the protector, the great problem solver. He did a wonderful job handling everything right after the accident, and I wondered why he was falling down on his job. What I didn’t realize at the time was that he was feeling the same way. He was asking himself the same sort of questions. How could he right this terrible wrong that had happened to us? And as we worked our way toward the realization, we realized that we were living in a situation that could not be fixed. And we needed to deal with the reality of the situation in order to deal, to get to an understanding of who we were then after their death. Individual and as a couple. So I do remember one day looking at Wayne, pleading with him for some answers. And he said to me, it’s hard to throw you a lifeline when I’m drowning myself.
G: What an incredible comment.
P: And those words became a turning point for me. Grief is really a selfish emotion. You think about yourself and your own grief and you forget about your partner sometimes.
G: It’s such a survival situation. The lifesaver thing is so apropos.
P: And suddenly I realized he was hurting, too, and that he needed time and space and understanding just as I did. So as we went on, we realized we needed time together and we also needed time apart. We needed time to grieve and to grow as a couple and as we traveled through our journey, the most important lesson that we learned can be summed up by the wonderful seven-letter word which is respect for the differences in our grief, the pain we were each going through, and that’s the love we still have for one another.
G: And realizing that people grieve differently.
P: Absolutely. No question.
G: Some people are more open about it. Some are more quiet, more private.
P: I needed chatter. I needed to talk, talk, talk about it. And Wayne was very quiet. He needed to think things through.
G: Right. And it’s so difficult sometimes for men, too, because women tend to have a support system where they do talk more and it’s a wonderful thing when a man calls another man and says I’ve lost a child, too.
P: Absolutely, and they can talk as men to men.
G: Let’s take a call from Phil of Pleasanton and then I would like as we go on to talk about the Compassionate Friends and how you and Wayne got involved in that because it’s such a wonderful organization, I believe for men and women, but for men particularly because it’s an opportunity to be with other men who are grieving a lot.
Phil: Dr. Horsley, Ms. Loder, thanks for taking my call.
G: Hi Phil, it’s good to talk to you. Thank you for calling.
Phil: I have not lost a child. But over the years I have had three co-workers who have lost children and I guess my question is, how do I proceed? I would find that I would see my fellow worker in the workplace and want to ask how he’s doing and I would do that. However, what would happen is the co-worker would be pretty much inundated with 30 or 40 people to start every day with everybody asking him how he’s doing. And at some point, that transitions from concern into an intrusion. Do you have any guidelines or any perspective for us or for me, when I’m working with someone, and these are people I was not friendly with outside of the workplace, but in the workplace how do you recommend I handle it?
G: It’s very interesting. When my son was killed, I was a psychiatric nursing consultant at the University of Rochester and I taught on the faculty. And I was co-workers with many psychiatrists and mental health workers, and they wanted to pull me in my office and do a mental health assessment and interview me, and I finally had to say, you know what, I grieve on my own time. But, I hear what you’re saying because when people come up to you and say, how are you doing, you want to say I’m doing like crap. I’m doing awful. But, of course, you’re not going to say that. So in my mind, the question, how are you doing, would for me be better put, I hope you’re having a good day, or something like that, rather than how are you doing because what if you’re doing lousy? But you do appreciate any comment. What’s your thought on it, Pat?
P: I think that it’s really important to tell a grieving person that you understand their pain. You understand where they’re at and to let them know, I’m here for you. You can even say to that person, I understand that you’re being inundated with a lot of questions, a lot of comments, and I want you to know that I understand this and I understand you’re hurting and if you need to talk, I’m here for you. Just allowing that to make sure that they know that you’re just not ignoring them. So often we hear from people in a work environment that they’re just ignored. The pain that they are experiencing is just ignored by their co-workers and let’s face it when newly bereaved especially, it is very difficult for us to concentrate and it is difficult in the work environment and we need to be very, very understanding with people in the work environment and let them know that we understand they’re going to make some mistakes and they’re going to cry sometimes, and it’s okay because they are sad and I think you’re doing the right thing, Phil, just being there for people.
G: And even that you’re bringing up the point that you understand and the things that you’re thinking are maybe some of the things that you might want to say to them. That it’s hard to know what to do. I haven’t lost a child. But all the things you’re saying are wonderful. But I think one of the things also people need in the work environment and if you happen to be supervising them is they need to be told that it’s okay if they get up and leave a meeting. They really need to be able – kids need to be able to leave classrooms. People need to be able to leave because nobody wants to break down in a meeting.
P: I commend you for being so concerned about your fellow workers that you would want to call and ask that question.
Phil: These are three different co-workers over a period of time. These are wonderful people, really difficult situations, and the kinds of people that did a great job and wanted to continue doing a great job and that was only going to happen if everybody got behind them. But I really like the idea of wishing them well as opposed to making an inquiry that requires energy back.
G: Because all of a sudden they’re in their mind, how do I feel? It’s so horrible.
P: Gloria was absolutely right. They feel like crap and that’s just the way it is. They’re dealing with it on a day-to-day basis and they’re doing the very best they can. They’ve showed up for work and they’re trying their best. We need to acknowledge that.
G: Also, Phil, one of the things that people need to know is don’t be afraid to ask people about their story. One of the ways that we bring it into consciousness and we work with it is to tell their story. Having people ask, how did your child die? and slowing the story down. Having coffee with them and letting them tell their story is a good thing because they need to be able to do that in the proper place and wonderful if they feel like workers allowed them to do that. They also need the slack to be late for work and whatever.
Phil: Well, thank you for answering my question. There’s a real need for this show and I appreciate the effort you’re making.
G: Thank you for calling in. I appreciate that. Pat, I wanted to get in a little bit with you about the Compassionate Friends because we were talking about the fact that this is a place where people can come together with other bereaved parents. Could you talk a little bit about the Compassionate Friends organization?
P: Sure, I’d be happy to. The Compassionate Friends organization –
G: Oh we have to go to break. We were going into talking about the Compassionate Friends and I want to thank you for being on the show and have you help me introduce next week’s guest, Harriet Schiff, because I think this leads us into the Compassionate Friends. Harriet is the author of The Bereaved Parent and Living through Mourning and your husband Wayne was very instrumental in helping me get Mrs. Schiff on the show, and it’s my understanding that Mrs. Schiff was not only your neighbor but also part of the growth of the Compassionate Friends in the United States. Could you tell us something about how the organization started and then we’ll take a call from Verabel of Utah.
P: Our organization actually started in England when a young hospital chaplain saw that two grieving parents could really help each other on their grief journey more than he could possibly help them. A story was written in Time magazine and that story was read by someone in the United States so the organization spread to the United States around 1969, 1970. In 1977 Harriet Schiff was a guest on the Phil Donahue Show. And at that time, she was the first author that had written a book about bereaved parents.
G: The Bereaved Parent. It was a book that I was given which was very instrumental and very helpful for us.
P: Absolutely and it’s still very helpful.
G: I think she told me it’s in its seventh printing. I said how many have you sold? And she said, I don’t know but I think it’s in its seventh printing, which is pretty amazing.
P: Well, she became a guest on the Phil Donahue Show and the show was such a powerful show, they took a break and asked the studio audience if they would film another show. They filmed back-to-back shows with Harriet on the show both days and talking about bereavement issues of bereaved parents. And it was really a springboard for the organization to take off at that time. The calls started coming in from all over the country. How do we start a chapter? What do we do, etc., etc.
G: And you’re now 600 chapters.
P: We have nearly 600 chapters in the United States alone and TCF has a presence in 29 countries around the world. We are the largest self-help bereavement organization in the world.
G: Amazing. Well, let’s take our call from Verabel and then maybe we’ll be able to get back to talking a little about how it would be to go to a group.
V: I was noticing two things that you commented about. I’ve enjoyed your show very much. Thank you very much for sharing this. The humor and what I had the biggest problem with was anger and it was my husband’s anger. My son was driving the car where he and his cousin were both killed and his anger was so raging at my son that I could hardly be in the same room with him and the anger at the carelessness and the inability of youth and me to deal with that through the anger of everyone was phenomenal. And 20 years later, I still see my face going hot when I realize that level of anger.
P: Does your husband still have that type of anger?
V: You know, we were divorced. I’m afraid we were part of the 12%. I can say I could blame it on that, however. But the anger issue is a very big one, and I wondered if you had any help for people dealing with the anger of people of the kids who died.
G: I think the Compassionate Friends organization and going to group if you can get someone like that to go to a group with other bereaved parents where they can express it openly and not have it going on in a one-to-one situation. With a husband and wife, it sounds like you took a lot of the brunt of dealing with his anger. Do you have a comment on that, Pat, or thought?
P: Well, obviously, anger is a big part of the grieving process for anybody. I used to say I felt sorry for telemarketers who called me because they happened to be a handy group for me to take off on. But one thing we did in a chapter meeting that was very powerful and very very healing was to write a letter. Now this might be something that your ex-husband may not want to try. But to write a letter to your son in which he expresses all of that anger. He pours it out on a piece of paper and then wait a few minutes and then write a letter back as if you were the son answering the concerns in that letter, and you will find that the son will say things like, dad, I never meant for this to happen. Yes, I was driving but it was not something I meant for it to happen. We did this at a TCF meeting. It was one of the most powerful meetings that we had ever had because people had these little bottled up emotions, whether it was anger or you didn’t get to say good bye or whatever the case may be. There may have been some unresolved issues between them and their child and they sat down and wrote these letters and then I told them, I didn’t tell them ahead of time that I wanted them to answer the letter as if they were their child answering the letter. It was a very very powerful learning experience.
V: I appreciate that. I think it would probably help a lot of people. Next time I see him, I’ll give him that piece of advice. Also, I have to comment on the humor part. My brother came to the funeral from far away and after the funeral he was telling all these teenage kids dirty jokes which upset everybody except me because it was the first time I’d stopped crying for weeks so I thought, don’t forget humor. What you said about humor, the first time you get to laugh, it was a great gift.
G: Verabel, I was thinking, it sounds like you might still have a little bit of angst about maybe anger with him or maybe with your son or I don’t know what all the anger is. But I love the idea of the letter and was thinking maybe you would want to write a letter to your ex-husband or even to your son and then have them respond to it. You wouldn’t even have to talk to them and look at your own feelings about it. I love the letter idea. It’s a lovely, lovely thought.
V: Oh, that is a great idea. I appreciate that and I’ll do it. I’ll check back with you next show.
G: Good. Thanks so much for calling in. We really appreciate and good luck with all your issues, and we’re very sorry to hear about the death of your son.
V: Well, thank you for your profound thoughts.
G: Pat, maybe we could go on for a minute and talk a little more about TCF. What would a meeting be like for me if I wanted to go? Do I have to talk? What would it be?
P: No. You don’t have to talk. What we like to say. No one has to say but we’re all obliged to listen because in listening, you learn so much. I remember, and people laugh at me now since I’m now the Executive Director of this organization, but at first I did not want to go to a TCF meeting and pour my heart out among total strangers so I would sit there and say nothing. When I listened and I heard people talk about the videotape that never went off in their head, I realized that I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t the only person who had a videotape that never stopped playing. And reaching an understanding with another person on that same level that I was walking, they were walking alongside of me, helped me so much in my grief that I can’t even express it. I truly think going to meetings, being able to share, saved my life. And I hear that a lot from bereaved parents who attend TCF meetings. It saves their lives because they’re able to share their grief and their innermost feelings when a lot of other people were going, oh, you’re dwelling on that.
G: Pat, again, I want to thank you so much for being on the show. You’re such a wonderful person and I look forward to seeing you soon at the national conference.
P: All right. Thank you so much for having me.
G: It’s time for our show to close and again I want to thank Pat Loder, Executive Director of the Compassionate Friends. Pat is certainly an inspiration to all those who are suffering the pain of bereavement. Please tune in again next week to hear bereaved parent and renowned author Harriet Schiff talk about the losses in her life and help you with the losses in yours. This is Dr. Gloria Horsley. Please tune in again next week Thursday at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time for more of Healing the Grieving Heart, a show of hope and renewal and support. Remember, you need not walk alone. I’m your host. Dr. Gloria Horsley. This show is archived on www.thecompassionatefriends.org website as well as www.Health.VoiceAmerica.com. Thank you.