Family relationships are always hard but even more so after the loss of your hero. Whether that hero was your son, your daughter, a sibling, or a spouse, that death will deeply affect your relationships with the rest of the family.

The first year of grief generally separates the wheat from the chaff. Relationships may change dramatically. Some family members, so at a loss for words, will slowly drift away, unable to understand, unable to initiate a conversation, and fearful of what your response will be.

The passage of time reveals the deeper cracks in once comfortable relationships. Family members, once supportive, cannot understand decisions you now make in your life. They wonder why you choose to take a path that may diverge from one previously planned.

Here is the deal. Unless you have experienced that deep, gut wrenching grief, you will never understand the way it affects the lives of the survivors.

I had a path. It was one I chose; one of those decisions we make day in and day out throughout our lives. It involved a considerable sacrifice of time and of money. Friends and family encouraged me along the way. Then came that moment; the call in the middle of a freeway commute delivering the worst news of my life. Everything changed in that instant. (more…)