Perhaps, instead, our penalty for outliving our children is the task of seeking happiness in the midst of an imperfect world, reinventing ourselves in the midst of our child's ghost, rebirthing in the midst of suffering, or finding a way to love despite the pain. Love, Livingstone says, is the ultimate risk. When we cannot change the parts we wish were different, the unfairness and cruelty of life, we've only one choice. To live or die. Yet, to surrender our existence would be to abandon all that is beautiful about our children who died. Indeed, he says, living after a child's death is both an act of will and an act of surrender. He speaks from very personal experience.

Livingstone is a bereaved parent twice. His eldest son succeeded at suicide, and his youngest, only 13, died of leukemia. How does one exist in a world where children die? I think, perhaps, through that for which we are willing to risk everything- love.

Dr. Joanne Cacciatore