Oh. I'm a Widow

<p><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Relocation by choice. Retirement by accident. Widowed by surprise. </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Oh. I'm a Widow</em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> chronicles my journey after the year in which these life-changing events occurred. At sixty-seven my husband died soon after we'd moved to the Washington D.C. area for my career-capping job. On the day he died I had no family or friends nearby and no professional engagement. The book recounts the steps I took the help I found and the emotional and practical struggles I encountered as I built a new full life. It presents essays written over years some published in </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Chicken Soup for the Soul: Grieving Loss and Healing</em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> in </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Contagious Optimism</em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> and in its sequel </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>10 Habits of Truly Optimistic People</em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> and in print and online journals.</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Unlike most books on widowhood this is more about living than grieving.Written in a conversational voice the book offers practical empathetic support to widows. After losing someone close </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Oh. I'm a Widow</em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> aims to help readers recover rebuild and realize a full new life.</span></p><h4></h4><h4><strong style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>What Other Readers Think</strong></h4><p><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Barbara Rady Kazdan's book </em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Oh. I'm a Widow</span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> pulled me in and held me rapt as I watched the confident retiree's life unravel upon losing her husband of forty-two years. Though her three grown children rally to support her she's stunned as she stares into an empty future. </em></p><p><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Sprinkled with research studies humor and quotes from literary and philosophical greats such chapters as 'Get Up Get Dressed Now What?' 'Kissing a Lot of Frogs;' and 'Paddling Upstream and Down' guide us along her rocky path. </em></p><p><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>As Barbara stumbles to move forward her honesty about what's gone right-and wrong-in her marriage and her life make her story real and relatable. [Her] attempts at finding community support groups a purpose and a new partner will resonate with divorcees empty nesters aging singles all of us who have been thrust into worlds we're not prepared to enter.</em></p><p><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Marian Mathews Clark author of </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>These Doors</em><span style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)> and </span><em style=color: rgba(15 17 17 1)>Sixty Something and Flying Solo</em></p><p></p><p></p><p></p>