When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss - 3rd edition

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

Just published the 3rd edition of this volume on Amazon.com  Completely revamped, re-edited and includes new chapters with references to specific losses such as Murder Grief, Suicide Grief, Relationship Grief and Loss of a Child Grief.

Dr. Maurice Turmel reaches out a helping hand to those who are grieving the loss of a loved one in this collection of reflections, stories, parables and poems coupled with sound advice garnered from 25 years of professional practice. 

This is both a practical and spiritual approach to what is for many the most difficult task we must face as humans on this earth. With simple guidance, illustrative stories and reflective pauses, the reader is taken through the ups and downs that constitute this universal experience and given tools to help navigate this most difficult of tasks. 

Utilizing both psychology and spirituality as guides, the reader is encouraged to look within, seek help when necessary and reflect on this unique experience that holds the potential for growth regardless of the facts and circumstances surrounding one's lost loved one. "We are the ones experiencing grief and loss, not the Dearly Departed. And we are the ones who need healing during this trying time and must, by necessity, open our hearts to receive the comforting gestures pouring our way. Only in this manner can genuine healing proceed." 

A Treasure Trove of Wonderful Material! 

“Thank you so much for this Dr. Turmel. I love how you write; so down to earth. Not all that mumbo jumbo we mere mortals have trouble digesting. I’ll be sharing these stories and insights with readers of my Grieving Behind the Badge Newsletter - Many HUGS” 

Peggy Sweeney - The Sweeney Alliance - Kerrville, TX 

Different Kinds of Loss 

We must go through the stages of grieving to heal our hearts.  In this book on Coping with Grief and Loss, Dr. Turmel opens the door to the heart with his amazing way of delivering stories that put us on the path to healing. His way of explaining and guiding us on the path of grief is a blessing that must have come from Angels and God. When Angels Call is a true gift for anyone who's heart is grieving and looking to heal." 

Carol Guy, Angelic Counselor and Author 

Appeals to Persons of Many Faiths 

Even though references to God are Christian in tone ‘When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss’ will appeal to persons of many faiths suffering the experience of loss. The stories are simple and hold interest, offering much comfort, insight and motivation to share one’s Grief, that being essential to the healing process.  

Father Gilbert Gariepy, Chaplain Services - Health Sciences Centre, Wpg., MB. 

An Exceptionally Inspiring Book 

"Dr. Maurice Turmel has written an exceptionally inspiring book for those experiencing the grieving process, and for the general reader as well.  Filled with inspirational stories, poetry, and reflections, “When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss" is more than just a book: it is an interactive experience that will raise your spirits. Dr. Turmel has the knack of hitting just the right note at just the right time.  I have to say that I truly enjoyed this work.  It's a gem that you can refer back to again and again when you're feeling low, or when you just need a spiritual lift.” 

Kenneth MacLean, Author of "The Vibrational Universe"

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

Grief Counseling

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

When I was in private practice I saw a lot of individuals who were grieving the loss of a loved one, whether that was a child, a spouse, a parent or a close friend. On a few occasions I saw couples where one of them had been diagnosed with a terminal condition and had less than 6 months to live. These situations were particularly traumatic for the persons involved, especially for the spouse who was not ill.

With these couples, we would discuss what was happening and how each of them was dealing with their feelings. The diagnosed partner seemed to have the easier time, having accepted their illness and the eventual fatal consequence. I saw this in my own family with my now departed brother-in-law and my sister. It was always the surviving partner who had the most difficulty.

With counselling of any sort, the goal is to LISTEN! Not just the hear the words an individual was speaking, but to identify the Feelings behind them. When I would reflecte back to the individual I always began with “sounds like you’re feeling – sad, angry, scared, anxious, depressed – whatever it was they were conveying. I would then ask them to check “in” to see if what I said was accurate. It usually was.

Then I would instruct them to pay attention to that particular feeling and tell me more about it. They would then describe their feelings in detail along with whatever physical reactions might be attached to it. Tears would begin to flow as they related the physical and emotional reactions they were experiencing.

This was the essence of my counselling approach for persons in grief, no matter what the precipitating circumstances. Sometimes they would want to know about “Stages” and other catch phrases associated with grief and loss, and I would just steer them back to their feelings. Once they realized that this was more important, it became easier for them to go there themselves and accept that crying and sharing were in their best interest.

For some individuals it would take a few sessions to get them acquainted with this feeling approach, but eventually they got it. And working with their feelings through their period of grief became OK. Many of these individuals would later report that keeping in touch with their feelings had many advantages and helped them with other aspects of their life. Lesson learned! Being in touch with your feelings is essential to a healthy life.

Our society is geared toward Externals, like stages, graphs, charts, outlines and theories. Good counselling focuses on Internals – feelings, emotions and physical reactions. In other words, counselling focuses on “The Heart” where we feel our life and where emotional healing takes place. Once an individual is properly focused they can take it from there. A few tools like Journaling, Writing Letters to your lost loved one, listening to favourite music and poetry will put you in touch with Your Heart. You can now heal because you are listening to YOUR HEART!

"When Angels Call" is a counselling companion designed to put you in touch with your feelings. Since the experience of grief and bereavement is so intense, you’re almost already there. Just a little push and the right resource book and you’re on your way. For most of us, all we need is Permission to Feel. Our heart and soul will take it from there because we have engaged the body and heart’s own innate healing process.

Trying to apply Externals to an internal problem is futile. It only serves to distract us from the real issue which our feelings will gladly tell us about. Thankfully, counselling and audio ebooks like How to Cope with Grief and Loss will re-acquaint you with your feeling nature and guide you through the process of grief recovery.

You now have what you need to heal your grief. You will recover from this tragedy and great loss. You will become intimately acquainted with your Heart and Feeling Centre. You will come to a point where you can think about your loved one and smile. Because when the hurt is finally healed, what remains with you forever is the love you carry in your heart. To quote Martha Stewart “And that’s a good thing.”

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

If Tomorrow Starts Without Me

If Tomorrow Starts Without Me
A few years ago a woman was killed in an auto accident. She was very well liked, so the office shut down for her funeral.On the day the workers came back to work, they found this poem in their e-mail that the deceased woman had sent on Friday before she left work to go home. Happy to share this piece here.

If Tomorrow Starts Without Me
"If tomorrow starts without me And I'm not there to see, If the sun should rise and find your eyes all filled with tears for me.
I wish so much you wouldn't cry the way you did today, While thinking of the many things We didn't get to say.
I know how much you love me As much as I love you, And each time that you think of me I know you'll miss me too.
But when tomorrow starts without me Please try to understand, that an angel came and called my name And took me by the hand.
And said my place was ready In heaven far above, And that I'd have to leave behind all those I dearly love.
But as I turned to walk away A tear fell from my eye, For all my life, I'd always thought I didn't want to die.
I had so much to live for So much left yet to do, it seemed almost impossible that I was leaving you.
I thought of all the yesterdays The good ones and the bad, I thought of all that we shared And all the fun we had.
If I could relive yesterday Just even for a while, I'd say good-bye and kiss you and maybe see you smile.
But then I fully realized That this could never be, For emptiness and memories would take the place of me.
And when I thought of worldly things I might miss some tomorrow, I thought of you, and when I did My heart was filled with sorrow.
But when I walked through heaven's gates I felt so much at home, When God looked down and smiled at me From His great golden throne.
He said, "This is eternity, And all I've promised you." Today your life on earth is past, but here life starts anew.
I promise no tomorrow But today will always last, and since each day is the same way There's no longing for the past.
So when tomorrow starts without me don't think we're far apart, For every time you think of me I'm right here, in your heart."


Send this to all those you care about because you never know what's going to happen tomorrow Show them how you care, before it's too late.
May God watch over you and your family now and always. There is no right time to do the wrong thing, there is no wrong time to tell someone you care.

THANKS TO SHIRLEY WHO LOST HER DAUGHTER IN 2006

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

Bereavement Help I

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

Bereavement Help I

The experience of bereavement is where you come to after the loss of a loved one has begun to work its way through your emotional landscape. Bereavement Help is about choosing resources to help you heal and recover from this emotional trauma.

You will feel lost for a time. This person who has passed on and left your world represented something important to you. You not only lost them, but a part of yourself as well. Bereavement Help is what you need now to assist you in facing these difficulties, this being essential to your healing.

Bereavement Help in the form of counseling focuses on this aspect of loss where your emotions are in a heightened state and your mental acuity is low. Depression emerges here, because it is the main consequence associated with loss. But so can anxiety and other uncomfortable feelings. The initial stages often include trauma and confusion which are completely normal given the circumstances. Depression, anxiety and feelings of loss come along later and they will be the focus of your grief recovery.

If you need medication, see your family doctor and she or he will help you with that. There is no shame in utilizing this type of help. The loss of a loved one is such a shock that initially at least, medication for sleeping and calming you becomes quite necessary. Bereavement Help includes medications as part of an overall strategy to help you recover. All of these emotional and feeling reactions are part of the grieving process and you need to be kind to yourself right now. Give yourself whatever Bereavement Help you require.

The Bereavement Process is like an illness. It has an onset, middle period and end. When you're first thrust into it, you can't fight back, much as you'd like to try. Your mind reels with possibilities but cannot control your emotional reactions. Bereavement Help is required to calm you down and help you heal the hurt that accompanies a major loss.

In bereavement, circumstances beyond your control surround you with their dark eerie glow and keep you stuck in that traumatized emotional state. No amount of willpower or mental acuity will undo that. And you'll only beat yourself up every time you try and repeatedly fail.

After the Bereavement Process starts to wind down, you'll come back to yourself in better form. All of the Bereavement Help Resources that you have utilized will bring you there. Trying to tough this experience out will only keep you stuck and that can last for years. Use books like "How to Cope with Grief and Loss" as a guide and see to it that you get all the bereavement help that you need.

Bereavement Help and Counseling, in whatever forms you choose, will assist you throughout this process. Think of Bereavement Help as Medication for your Soul. Just add Love and you'll be on your way again. Here are some links to help you focus on specific types of grief and loss.

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

Grief, The Holidays, And You

The following press release was put out to several hundred media sources across North America. Here we are facing another holiday season with thousands, if not millions of you, dealing with the experience of Grief and Loss.

This is the time of year when I think about my mother, my friend Bruce and my favorite brother-in-law Frank. I miss them all dearly. Now I get to add my dad to this list, and several more friends who passed away since 2015. I will likely shed a few tears. But I will also be celebrating their lives and what they each meant to me. There will be laughter and tears of joy. That's how I remember these loved ones and keep them in my heart forever. Because my grief for each of them is healed, I can easily call them to mind, speak to my family about them, and appreciate what a great benefit they were to me and my life while they were here.

How are you going to deal with this Holiday Season? Are you going to recall your lost loved ones, or are you going to try and avoid any reference to them? That would be sad. Your hurt and pain are testimony to how much they meant to you. Isn't it better to have loved and lost than to not have loved at all? What are you waiting for? You don't have to do this alone. Help is readily available.

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

PRESS RELEASE:Veteran Therapist Creates New Grief Recovery Book Teaching Individuals How to Cope with Grief and Loss and Start Feeling Better in 3 Months or Less. St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. Maurice Turmel PhD points out that our feelings lie at the heart of the grief and grieving process, and addressing these with the right tools offers the quickest path to recovery. By dealing with this core component, we temper the shock and trauma associated with grieving process while placing ourselves on a path of genuine healing.

The grief and grieving process is a subjective emotional experience. It cuts to the core of our being and becomes the emotional wound in our heart that we must now address. This is where the damage lies and where grief healing needs be applied. Understood in this context, we can see why platitudes like “It’s God’s Will” or “Time Heals All” continuously fail and leave sufferers feeling confused, guilty and inadequate.

Emotions and feelings need to be expressed openly with kind receptive supporters, and privately through the process of journaling for the grief and grieving process to have healing take place. The answer to “How to Cope with the Grief and Grieving Process” lies with modern psychology and the lessons of psychotherapy.

When people are encouraged to talk about their feelings, they heal more quickly than through all other methods combined. Honest self-relating is required here. Defenses, emotional blockages, addictions and other strategies of denial block the flow of feeling energy and cripple our attempts to engage the grief and grieving process. These common forms of escape prevail until we learn that connecting with feelings and expressing our emotions does in fact promote healing.

Wars have taught us that repression of feelings and emotions becomes manifested in a condition called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Once the experts identified it, they found a way treat it. They engaged PTSD sufferers in group therapy, one on one counseling and journaling, all part of a newly emerging grief and grieving process approach to recovery. These strategies stand out as the best ways for accepting and releasing feelings associated with any trauma, including the loss of a loved one through death, suicide or broken relationship.

We have also learned through study of the grief and grieving process that addiction distracts us from feelings we want to avoid. Recovery from addiction, oddly enough, is not much different than dealing with grief and grieving. Expressing feelings in a safe and receptive environment is the key to breaking the back of any addiction and denial process.


This approach deals effectively with the grief and grieving process at its feeling core. There are many losses to be dealt with in a lifetime. Whether it’s the loss of a job, a broken relationship or the death of a loved one, this feeling-based approach to grief and grieving leads to a healthy recovery in the shortest possible time.


Let this approach to the grief and grieving process be your short cut to a full and complete recovery where your departed loved one remains in your heart as a loving and positive reminder of who you were together.

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

More on Holidays - Always Difficult for Grieving a Loss

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

The holidays are upon us again. The US also celebrates Thanksgiving at this time of year, after which the big focus will be Christmas and New Years. Holidays are always difficult for persons in Grief.

The loss of someone important to us comes boldly to the fore at this time.  We feel their absence more intensely than at any other time of the year.  The tendency is to want to withdraw from all the merry making and  celebrating when we are feeling so low about our loved one.

It is necessary to push at times like these. And be prepared to cry more than usual. This would be a good time to write a letter to your loved one, letting them know how much you miss them and whatever else you're feeling at the moment. This is for you, to help reduce the stress, to acknowledge how much you miss them and how it hurts to be without them. This is not a permanent condition. It too will pass.

For those of you engaged in the How to Cope with Grief and Loss strategies, you will be turning to your journal more often at this time. It's been working for you so far so just ramp it up as much as you need.  Listen to the relaxation program. Read and listen to your favorite passages in the book. And let yourself feel. Although this may be intense, when you come out the other side, you will be greatly relieved and your recovery process will have taken a giant leap forward.

For those of you struggling without guidance, we wish you well. Your tendency as already mentioned will be to distance yourself from activity in order to try and avoid what you're feeling. That'll just make it worse. Be with friends and family at this time, especially if you are sharing this

loss with others. There should be some comfort there for you.

Feeling Connected

Sometimes when we are feeling lost and alone we don’t know which way to
turn to possibly renew a friendship.

That pal we had so long ago is lost to us now. They have faded away like
so many things from our earlier life.

Are we to believe that we can no longer sustain such relationships? Are we
to let go of all those sources of comfort that once enjoined us and caused
us great pride.

Our affections for others are what keep us alive. That is, our connection
to each other invites us to live again, to breathe, and to satisfy those
cravings for friendship we once carried around and dismissed.

It’s not true that we have to let go of all this as time marches on. It
is true however, that we have a greater need for each other as the years
speed on by.

When we’re alone, we’re alone, but not in the factual sense. We are
alone because we feel alone. And we are together because we feel connected.

Connected means enjoined. It means we are happy to be in the service of
the Lord. He/She is our Creator and Guide. She/He is our Source of constant
comfort. Without the Creator we wouldn’t have each other, given that we all
sprang from the same “Source.”

Now we are ready to move on, to join with each other once again and to
share what we know and cherish. The twilight of life is a better place if
our lessons to this point have taught us about the value of having good
companions while marching on this pilgrimage toward home.

Home is where the heart is, and that is where we are all joined together,
isn’t it?

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

4 Reasons for You to deal with Grief and Loss Now!

1

When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss

   1) You will feel better

knowing you are not alone with this experience of grief as a result of losing a loved one. Many individuals have traveled this path successfully and, those of us who study these processes, have been hard at work creating the tools and strategies necessary to help you safely negotiate the recovery experience.

2) You will feel better 

as you become aware of how manageable the healing experience can be while you grow accustomed to using tools that will help you get in touch with your feelings. Once aware of what you are feeling, you will be encouraged you to express those feelings and see for yourself how your stress level will begin to recede. Strategies of denial, anger, withdrawal and repression will be abandoned as they should because you are now aware of what’s necessary to safely manage your recovery experience.

3) You will feel better 

realizing that you no longer have to tough this out, or engage in practices that would deny you the genuineness of your loss. Your heart knows where it’s going and it knows what it needs to help you safely negotiate this path. Open yourself to the possibility that you can have what you want in terms of help and self-awareness, and about the process that will set the stage for your emotional recovery.

4) You will feel better knowing that no one travels this path alone and nor should you. Helpful resources are readily available. The old ways of denial, repression and toughing it out are done. They belong to another era. Today, we are allowed to feel what we feel and express those feelings in a safe and genuine manner. What we do today when facing tragedy is our choice. If we choose the path of recovery, then that’s what we will have. Do not deny yourself the opportunity to heal. Never choose suffering over healing. The spirit of recovery is in the air. Alcoholics recover. Drug addicts recover. Abused children recover. Persons with broken hearts, for whatever reason, can do so as well.

     So start your recovery now and learn how you can not only cope with this experience, but actually heal your broken heart.

    

    When Angels Call - Coping with Grief and Loss