What Can I Say Analysis

Final Book Analysis-What Can I Say?

For my book analysis I read, What Can I Say? A Guide to Visiting Friends and Family Who Are Ill by: Simon and Karen Fox. This book was broken up into five different chapters: Giving the Gift of Compassion, Making the Most of Your Visit, Communication That Shows You Care, Understanding Emotions and Dealing with Stress, and Special Circumstances. Overall, this book is a guide on how to communicate with friends and family who are ill and gives the reader insight on what to do and not do in situations when it comes to visiting with the person who is sick or ill. It also gives some tips to the reader about approaching emotional situations with confidence, and avoiding the difficult parts of hospital visits.

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The four elements of compassion are: Attention, Acknowledgement, Affection, and Acceptance. According to the book, “carefully paying attention helps people feel heard. Acknowledgment helps people feel respected and appreciated. Affection helps people feel connected. Acceptance helps people feel safe. When you are focused on meeting these needs for a sick friend or relative, you naturally discover what to do and say, making your visit a valued contribution” (Fox, 2003 pg. 2). If you carry out those four elements, actions, or words, you will be giving the gift of compassion, opening your heart, and you will also gain the creativity and skill to communicate how you feel which will help you to communicate with the person who is sick or ill and even just communicating with someone in general. It also states in the book, “the four elements of compassion are not a checklist of things to do one after another. Instead, they all come together to form a circle” (Fox, 2003 pg. 13). I believe this concept aligns best with this book because it opens with this concept and it also refers to the circle of compassion multiple times throughout the book. It also states in the book, “the four elements of compassion are not just four things you can do. They also correspond to four basic needs that every human being

According to the textbook, “grief is the reaction to loss. There is no one right or universal way to experience and respond to loss. Grief is highly variable” (DeSpelder and Strickland, 2015 pg. 343). Like the textbook definition of grief, my book states, “grief is a release of deep sadness, hurt, remorse, or regret” (Fox, 2003 pg. 48). It states in the textbook that grief comes about because of John Bowlby’s attachment theory and that, “when a person recognizes that an object (someone loved) to which he or she is attached no longer exists, grief arises” (DeSpelder and Strickland, 2015 pg. 347). I believe that grief goes hand in hand with the dying process because when a loved one or someone you know dies, you will experience in some way, shape or form the five stages of emotional healing that my book talks about in its grief section. The five stages are: denial, grief, anger, bargaining, and acceptance. Which corresponds to the seven stages of grief talked about in the textbook: shock or disbelief, denial, bargaining, guilt, anger, depression, and acceptance/hope. I choose this as one of my three concepts because I think that grief plays a big role in someone’s grieving process and that the topic of grief is talked about quite a bit throughout the entire book. The book also educates you on ways to deal with grieving, how you should respond, and how to be there for the person with the illness and their family and