when your sibling dies, you lose your past, your present and your future.
Surviving the Loss of a Sibling One of the most misunderstood and neglected areas of bereavement is sibling grief. Society tends to overlook sibling grief and concentrate more on the grief of a parent or child. Personnel policies at work may offer more funeral leave for a parent than a sibling. Many books, brochures or articles are available about grief but most of the literature fails to touch on the unique grief adults feel when one of their siblings dies. Indeed, most of the literature dealing with sibling death is designed for children. As with any grief, sibling grief is unique – it is influenced by the emotional bond and attachment level you had with your sibling. For younger siblings, there was never a time in their life when their older sibling did not exist. Older siblings may not remember the time before their younger sibling became a part of their life. For many, siblings are the first people with whom we socialize on an equal basis. We grow around each other...