#11 How to Be There for a Grieving Friend with Medical Student Kira Sklar
12/03/20 • 49 min
For most of us, death is a topic that was typically avoided in our households growing up. So, when a friend loses a loved one, it's difficult to know how to respond, especially if we've never experienced deep loss ourselves.
You don't know what to say, and don't want to say the wrong thing, so you say nothing. For those grieving, it can then feel like they are all alone.
With the help of her therapist, Kira learned how to be very vocal with her friends about what she needed from them when her father passed away by suicide. It helped as well that her father was also very vocal about his depression, in an effort to take away the shame and stigma, hoping others find it easier to open up about their own struggles.
In this episode, Kira shares the story of her father's death, and we discuss the importance of normalizing grief and the different ways we've felt supported by friends through our grief. We also talk about the different ways we've personally approached sharing the information that our fathers have passed with new people we meet.
Resources Mentioned:
The Inflamed Mind: A Radical New Approach to Depression
by Edward Bullmore
Healing from Within: Psychological Techniques You Can Use to Help the Mind Heal the Body by Dennis T Jaffe, PhD.
Get in touch with Kira Sklar:
[email protected]
Donate to 'Sick Not Weak' Organization (organization that Kira's dad was very much involved with):
https://www.sicknotweak.com/
Get in touch with Maayan and Michal:
Website: https://www.sistersinpsychology.com
Instagram: @sistersinpsychology
Email: [email protected]
For most of us, death is a topic that was typically avoided in our households growing up. So, when a friend loses a loved one, it's difficult to know how to respond, especially if we've never experienced deep loss ourselves.
You don't know what to say, and don't want to say the wrong thing, so you say nothing. For those grieving, it can then feel like they are all alone.
With the help of her therapist, Kira learned how to be very vocal with her friends about what she needed from them when her father passed away by suicide. It helped as well that her father was also very vocal about his depression, in an effort to take away the shame and stigma, hoping others find it easier to open up about their own struggles.
In this episode, Kira shares the story of her father's death, and we discuss the importance of normalizing grief and the different ways we've felt supported by friends through our grief. We also talk about the different ways we've personally approached sharing the information that our fathers have passed with new people we meet.
Resources Mentioned:
The Inflamed Mind: A Radical New Approach to Depression
by Edward Bullmore
Healing from Within: Psychological Techniques You Can Use to Help the Mind Heal the Body by Dennis T Jaffe, PhD.
Get in touch with Kira Sklar:
[email protected]
Donate to 'Sick Not Weak' Organization (organization that Kira's dad was very much involved with):
https://www.sicknotweak.com/
Get in touch with Maayan and Michal:
Website: https://www.sistersinpsychology.com
Instagram: @sistersinpsychology
Email: [email protected]
Previous Episode
#10 The Simplest Meaning of Life with Dr. Rafael Reisfeld, MD, and Dr. Gabriel V. Rubanenko, MD
More often than not, it's best to just keep things simple. Dr. Rafael Reisfeld, MD and Dr. Gabriel V. Rubanenko, MD, have known our dad for over 35 years, working together in the medical field and sharing a bond of being Israeli Americans.
Throughout those 35 years, our dad would continue to ask them the question, "What is the meaning of life?" Our guests each give their perspectives on the question, taking into account years of working with often terminally ill patients, and emphasizing the beauty in keeping things simple.
They also both share their own personal experiences coping with losing a loved one and coping with the existential dread that death may bring.
Dr. Rafael Reisfeld, MD is a General Surgery Specialist in Beverly Hills, CA and Dr. Gabriel Rubanenko, MD is a Orthopedic Surgery Specialist in Los Angeles, CA. Both have over 40+ years of experience in the medical field.
Resources Mentioned:
Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
Get in touch with Michal and Maayan:
Website: https://www.sistersinpsychology.com
Instagram: @sistersinpsychology
Email: [email protected]
Next Episode
#12 Change Your Perspective, Learn, and Share with Sydney Estrada, AMFT and Lauren Thomas, AMFT
Sydney Estrada and Lauren Thomas, both Associate Marriage and Family Therapists, share how their experiences with racism, colorism, and racial trauma led to pursuing careers in therapy.
The discrepancies amongst the Black community within the education system, due to colorism, empowered Lauren to prioritize her practice for uplifting Black women of various backgrounds as well as unpacking racial trauma.
Sydney currently works at the Child Development Institute, where she and Maayan met. She supports young children and their families understand and develop social/emotional skills. After experiencing, first hand, the disparities in the education system, Sydney aims to provide the mental health resources necessary for children and families to thrive in all environments.
In this episode, Lauren and Sydney unpack the term "code switching", racism in the school system, the importance of having faith in something (even if it's just in yourself), and of course, how they define their meanings of life.
Get in touch with Lauren:
Instagram: @therapywithlt
Website: therapywithlt.com
Get in touch with Sydney:
Instagram: @showandtellyourstory
Get in touch with Maayan and Michal:
Website: https://www.sistersinpsychology.com
Instagram: @sistersinpsychology
Email: [email protected]
Books and Resources Mentioned:
Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief by David Kessler, MD.
Journey of Souls by Michael Newton, PhD.
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