Death Benefits: How Losing a Parent Can Change an Adult's Life--For the Better (Hardcover)

~ Jeanne Safer Ph.D. (Author)
Key Phrases: death benefits, psychological inventory, Beth Grant, The Last Taboo, Going Through the Stuff Choosing (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Psychotherapist Safer appears to be targeting surviving adult children of dysfunctional parents when she claims, The death of your parents can be the best thing that ever happens to you. Safer (The Normal One: Life with a Difficult or Damaged Sibling) describes her own mother as an unhappy woman who viewed her daughter as an extension of herself; she also relates anecdotes from patients and 60 interviewees whose parents were critical or rejecting, or who significantly impeded their children's happiness and personal growth. In other cases, parents dominated their children's lives because of prolonged illness. Safer offers some perspective along with helpful exercises for adult children to begin to heal from emotional wounds inflicted by their parents. For instance, just as one sorts through a parent's physical possessions and keeps some while discarding others, one can do the same with parents' emotional legacy. Some will be shocked by the central idea of Safer's book; others seeking to free themselves from ties that have bound too tightly will welcome Safer's message: there's no need to feel guilty about a sense of freedom and finding one's true self after a parent's death. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

AARP Bulletin Today
“Equal parts anecdotal, autobiographical and self-help, Death Benefits offers readers a new way to grieve—and grow in the process.”

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books (April 28, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0465072119
• ISBN-13: 978-0465072118
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #317,960 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in this category: (What's this?)

  #74 in

  Books > Health, Mind & Body > Psychology & Counseling > By Topic > Grief

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Book, Free yourself of Guilt, May 5, 2008

By	Heritage Group Home "PhotoBuff" (Los Angeles, Ca) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book really touched my heart and after discussion with friends about it, I learned that so many shared the sentiments of the author but did not have the courage to talk about it because it would appear they don't love their parents or wish them dead. The author makes very important and courageous points regarding emotions and how a new phase in life really starts once our parents have moved on. It is valid, emotional and so very true. I felt a lightness and freedom after reading it and feel more comfortable sharing this info with my friends. I am not happy that my parents are deceased but I am truly joyous about the new life I discovered after I stopped having to structure my life around their care and well being. It is was a freeing and liberating feeling to focus on my own needs and the needs of my children, when in the past, parents needs were so demanding and time intensive, I was always living feeling guilty about not serving them enough or guilty about not being able to focus on kids. It was simply too much for an only child. I am thankful for this book ~ It is a treasure

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not much of a benefit, December 18, 2008

By	William T. Barto "An Anxious Anglican" (Fairfax, Virginia United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The author has done a great service by sharing her advice on how to endure and possibly benefit from the death of a parent. She recommends that someone seeking to benefit from the passing of a parent take three main actions: construct a narrative history of your parent's life, conduct a psychological inventory of your parent's character, assessing which parts of the legacy you wish to keep or discard; and actively seek new experiences and relationships based upon one's experience and decisions based upon the narrative and inventory. The four-part "psychological inventory of your parent's character" was the most useful part of the book for me. Having recently lost a parent, it was very helpful to me to realize that I have some control over which parts of a parental legacy I retain. That being noted, I cannot give this book more than three stars; it was truly only "ok" in my assessment. The majority of the book is anecdotes from individuals who experienced liberation of some sort after the death of a parent. These anecdotes were occasionally interesting but ultimately tiring to me for several reasons. First, many of the persons whose stories gave rise to the anecdotes seem anything but typical, and they seemed to be drawn heavily from families which had experienced parental abandonment or abuse of either a physical or sexual nature. As a result, it was difficult for me (who had a merely difficult relationship with a recently deceased parent) to relate to the sense of "death benefit" proclaimed by these individuals. Moreover, it is not that significant a revelation to think that one might enjoy a psychological benefit after the death of a truly abusive or derelict parent. It would have been a more useful exercise to share more stories from children of merely difficult parents and how they can move beyond a parent's death in a positive fashion. Many of the story-tellers in the book are extremely un-self-aware and somewhat unattractive people; one woman described her father as a "Grade A Narcissist," and yet that same label could have easily been applied to many of the individuals profiled in the book. Finally, I found the whole "actively seek new experiences and relationships" portion of the stories (and the larger analysis) to be less than helpful; my recollection is that most of the story-tellers in the book went on a trip, bought something, changed careers, got a new wardrobe, redecorated, etc. I guess that economically "normal" people would just take a walk around the block or something less materialistic than the apparently affluent individuals whose stories make up the bulk of the book. Again, not fatal to the premise of the book, but neither the choice of stories and length of the book aided the persuasiveness or appeal of the author's thesis. I cannot help concluding that this would have been a better article than a book.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Recommended for everyone, September 19, 2008

By	Dr Cathy Goodwin (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Usually I don't recommend books about life and family because I don't consider myself an expert. But family issues come up for almost all my clients. They put off career change and even take a leave from their own businesses. And they're frozen with grief.

I loved this book. I can relate to it (my parents died quite a while ago). I have watched my friends and clients go through loss. Nearly all seem to have a mixture of relief and guilt at feeling this relief.

It's a little awkward to recommend this book to friends. "Here's a book that...um...helps you realize how much you're freed up when your parents die." But the book is so good it's worth the social risk.

Safer writes well and she keeps the book focused, with a clear theme. She doesn't sugarcoat the message or urge people to look for kindness and goodness inept parents. Her exercises are few and simple. They're more like coaching than what I think of as therapy, but I suspect they're very powerful.

It's hard to pick out the highlights because (rare for me!) I really liked every chapter. I would call a reader's attention to the chapter on "the last taboo," noting that many people are embarrassed to admit their feelings about the loss. The chapter on religion is particularly sensitive to two diverse responses -- turning away from a parent's religion or returning to a faith that was once abandoned.

In the section on disposing of "stuff," we could note that you don't have to do this yourself. You can hire people who will go through furniture and clothing, sorting out what can be sold, what is valuable ad what should be given away. Look under "estate sales" or advertise for help on craigslist.

Safer is a psychologist, so she doesn't explore the broader implications o our new understanding of parent-child relationships. Our society is still set up to demand contributions -- financial and psychological -- from children, even when parents have been indifferent, incompetent, or even abusive. Company policies and legal systems support and even demand parent-child relationships. We need to recognize that families are not what they used to be, and probably they never were.