About Brook Madsen

Posts by Brook Madsen:

The day I lost my rudder

/ grieving, loss, loss of child, survivor /

I was thinking about how I could possibly explain to someone how it feels to have lost your only child. Imagine a sailboat without a rudder. For a really long time. While I was successful in my career, motherhood was really my thing. Work was what I did to make money so I could raise […]

The ultimate writers block?

/ DoNM, narcissism, relationships / , /

I have spent the last year writing a book about what it was like being an average little girl growing up with a mother who was the walking definition of Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Repeatedly I would get curious about the competition I would be up against and research for similar books. I couldn’t find any. […]

Messages from lost loved ones

/ grieving, loss, relationships / /

You might think I’m crazy, but I think my dad came to visit me after he died. It was a couple years after his death in the early morning hours of my birthday. We talked for a couple hours and he left because I needed to get some sleep. I woke up in the morning […]

A sadness regarding holidays

/ family, grieving, loss, relationships / /

I don’t have a lot of sad thoughts about my son anymore. Somewhere along the way I chose to celebrate the 22 years I got to have him in my life rather than dwell on the sadness and sorrow of him not being here anymore. I was driving yesterday and for some reason I thought […]

Doing bad things in the name of love

/ narcissism, relationships / /

Isn’t that an oxymoron? One definition of love is “unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another” so how can that be twisted into doing terrible things because  your beloved wants it. The concept completely eludes me despite the fact I have suffered on the wrong end of that situation with two members […]

Happy birthday daddy

/ family, loss, relationships /

Today is my dad’s birthday. If he hadn’t died 28 years ago he would be 91 today. Wow. Twenty-eight years later and I still miss him and think of him often with incredible love and fondness. I still wish he was here, but since he’s not I hope he’s with my son. It may seem […]

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