Narrative Non-fiction / Self Help · Hardback

Elias & Benjamin

Norwegian title: Elias og Benjamin

Lars Petter Kjær

How do you process grief after a suicide? And how do you deal with the feelings of guilt, powerlessness, shame? The feeling of not having done enough? Lars Petter Kjær lost both of his sons to suicide in the space of six months. In this book, he reveals how painful suicide is for the those left behind, and he shares his grieving process with the reader by writing about his children’s upbringing, his role as a father, the feeling of losing control, and the destructive desperation he suddenly found himself having to deal with. The twins where very close. They were both resourceful, but where also suffering from high functioning autism (Asperger). It could be hard for them to understand both their own feeling as well as the feelings and reactions from others. Kjær is a psychologist and a father who has been an active part of his children’s lives. He is an optimist and used to getting things done. He has a wish to understand his children and does his best so that they can take part in life, in activities and vacations, everyday joys and the possibility of things getting better. In this book the worst you can imagine has happened. But faced with such a total crisis Kjær chooses that life must go on. He writes his way through the grief and unwraps layer upon layer of the children’s lives, his role as a father, the process of grief, the powerlessness, and the destructive desperation he is himself thrown into.

Suicide is one the most common cause of death for young men, and in this book the author also points to how destructive suicide is for relatives losing their family members to suicide. But this book is a book that is meant to help, a book about working one’s way through grief and choosing life.