Joyful Mourning

I started reading JOY COMES WITH THE MOURNING by Holly Besser because I found it on the internet and, like many women who have gone through the loss of a child, I read as many books about child loss as I can.  Part of it is a shared community--knowing I'm not the only one.  A part of it is probably morbid and that I still every single with the sadness of my losses.  But another part of it is wanting to know how others who have been through child loss deal with the pain that is with us each and every day, no matter where we go, no matter what we do.

JCWM definitely met my expectations for a book about child loss.  I do find, though, that when I do read such books that my depression tends to come back in full force and no amount of medication makes it better.  The sadness can be overwhelming.  I have to be very careful when I read books like this and make sure that I don't let "it" take over.

If I have anything negative to say about this book (and I don't see it so much as negative so much as it was distracting), it would have to be the "other testimonies of God's grace, peace, and joy, after the loss of a child."  The book is mostly about Holly Besser's story and adding in the stories/testimonies of others made it confusing for me as to whose story I was reading about.  Now that I'm finished with the book, I'm not sure which parts were Holly's and which were the testimonies--they're all running together as one entity in my head.  It's a great idea to add the stories of others, but I found it to be distracting rather than encouraging.

Still worth the read if you want to read inspirational stories of other women who have suffered child loss.