Griefland: An Intimate Portrait of Love, Loss, and Unlikely Friendship Book

Griefland. It's a place no one wants to visit--a place without borders where language is inadequate and pain is constant. It's a place where every morning, one awakens to the stark reality that a loved one will never be seen, heard--or embraced--again. This is a place that Armen Bacon and Nancy Miller know all too well, for both of them, when they met, had lost a child to drug addiction. Both of them had also enjoyed a comfortable, middle-class life—until it was rocked by the sudden death of a son Alex, and a daughter, Rachel.

Griefland provides an intimate portrait of what tragedy does to the human soul, how it changes one's life, and most important, how it can be survived. With achingly beautiful language, this book explores the acute moment-to-moment experience of grief. But it also transcends that and speaks to the redemptive power of friendship, trust, intimacy, and love. Together they discover a will and desire to move forward, recognizing that Life is the ultimate prize for those who survive this excruciating journey.

[excerpt]

Grief blisters like third degree burns, trying to form scabs, struggling to heal, ripped off without warning by the sight of his favorite things: scuffed Adidas, an autographed Tony Hawk skateboard, Rice Krispies treats, macaroni and cheese from a box. I see him in all of these things now, but he quickly evaporates, setting off a silent alarm that plays full volume inside my head. (Armen)

This is the month I've been wondering about for nearly a year. That marker that reminds me I'm still alive, but frozen—a still life—that I've survived the step out of time into the realm of no-time. Where the frost that sweeps the lawns with glistening white has infiltrated my body and soul like a virus, moving through each vein and artery, to the ends of my toes. I am frozen from the inside out. (Nancy)