First Year : Outskirts Press : 9781977244772 : 1977244777 : 27 Jul 2021 : The First Year: Coping with Widowhood relates one woman's journey through grief and out the other side to a new life. When Vennie Anderson's husband Wendell died in 1997 after a brief illness, she was stunned and nearly overcome with devastating grief. At times she feared she was losing her mind. Desperate for a way to cope with her feelings, she began writing in a blank journal book. Writing stream-of-consciousness, she poured her grief onto the pages without regard for style or punctuation. Unplanned, she filled in the last page of the journal exactly one year and a day after her husband died. Accompanied by a foreword, prologue, and epilogue, The First Year: Coping with Widowhood is that journal, exactly as she wrote the original. Not a feel-good or a how-to book, it's a book filled with raw pain, but also with hope and growth. Included is a brief list of the author's suggestions for additional resources for c