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I used to tell friends and family that after my three children left home for college and work, my husband and I would savor the payoff years in our marriage. Although I wept inconsolably after dropping off my youngest child at college, it took about one hour to realize that, hey, this could be the start of something new. And it was. We often feel the same about our careers. We work, structure our lives around our jobs and families, try to balance the demanding needs of each, put money into retirement accounts, pay off our mortgages, smile gleefully when...

By Susan  “Honey” Good I was sitting at my desk making out my dinner menu for my husband’s homecoming that evening. Michael was in Utah attending a business meeting. My daughter had just arrived back from the No Ko Oi flower shop with gorgeous orchids for the house. We were all excited and were just about to leave for the market to shop for the homecoming dinner when the phone rang. It was my brother-in-law calling from Colorado. He was a doctor. This was the exact conversation: “Hi Suz.” “Hi Rog! So happy to hear your voice! How are you?”...

At first, I was terrified at the thought of being alone. It happened quickly. One day I was a wife, and then I wasn’t. My husband had died. Yes, I still had children (grown), but they were long gone. I found myself slowly sinking into a depression that was as deep as a cosmic black hole.    I was bereft. What now? And poof! One day, or week, or month, or year later, I climbed my way back to the land of the living. It hit me like an electric shock: I was living alone for the first time in...

It’s countdown time! Much like the excitement and joy we each experienced with the birth of our children (five between us), our latest delivery is conjuring up similar emotions. “Suddenly Single After  50: The Girlfriends’ Guide to Navigating Loss, Restoring Hope, and Rebuilding Your Life,” Rowman & Littlefield (July 2016), will make its appearance July 16. We hope readers will find the book to be a welcoming, life-saving, and friendly resource.  Our losses began first with Barbara on a warm Saturday afternoon when her then-husband turned to her in their remodeled kitchen and announced: “The passion is gone.” And after...

 “Look what I came up with,” Barbara said excitedly in an email to Margaret with an accompanying photo. It’s “The Henry.” Margaret sat there staring at a grilled cheese sandwich on her screen.  Huh? “What am I looking at?” After uproarious laughter, Barbara confessed that she had spotted the Grilled Cheese Academy competition online, which was designed to honor and find more ways to use, yup, cheese, and in this case from Wisconsin and in sandwiches. And the reward was tempting bait: $15,000 for the Grand Prize winner.  “See what you can come up with?” she challenged. I took her...