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Mary E. Plouffe Ph. D. is a clinical psychologist and writer of essays, non-fiction and memoir. This book is the story of her sister's death, her own grief, and her relationship with her niece, who was only 3 when her mother died. It weaves adult and childhood grief together in a story of love, loss and healing.
Reviewed by Christian Sia for Readers' Favorite
I Know It in My Heart: Walking Through Grief with a Child by Mary E. Plouffe Ph.D. is a powerful, heart wrenching memoir that takes a visceral, somewhat clinical look at loss, grief, and healing, the journey of a woman and a child through devastating loss. Mary had thought that her sister’s last and desperate treatment for breast cancer could offer a final solution to her condition, but she was wrong. Her sister, Martha, died unexpectedly because of the treatment, leaving behind a three-year-old daughter, Liamarie.
How can Mary explain the situation to the young child? How can she fill the void left by a loving mother in her child’s tender heart? In this captivating memoir, the reader follows the story as the loving sister navigates the path of recovery from grief with her niece and a father who seems as terrified of the loss as he is broken. The memoir starts with the phone call in which Martha informs her sister, Mary, of her decision to undergo treatment, asking her to take her daughter for a short period that would last only for about three to four weeks. Things change, and Mary soon finds herself with a loss that she never saw coming.
The pathos comes out strongly in this narrative and the reader is pulled into the hearts of the characters, feeling the contours of their grief and their pain. Mary E. Plouffe Ph.D. writes with expertise on the subject and the reader has no doubt that she is one of those authors who write from experience, from what she’s felt. I Know It in My Heart: Walking Through Grief with a Child offers great wisdom in dealing with loss and what people with children suffering from grief need to know. This story is both entertaining and inspiring.
