Chrishell Stause, one of the stars of Netflix original reality show, “Selling Sunset,” shared with her fans that her mother had passed away after a long battle with stage 4 lung cancer a little over a year since her father passed away from the same disease.
In honor of her late mother, Stause, 38, shared a handful of photos of them together and penned a touching caption detailing her mother’s brave spirit and kind personality. While she’s clearly mourning, Stause wrote that she’s relieved her mother is no longer suffering and that she and her father will be reunited once again.
Read MoreCoping With Losing A Parent To Cancer
Losing a loved one to cancer, especially a parent, is an especially difficult challenge for children to cope with. In many cases, families who have lost a loved one to the disease have told SurvivorNet that resources such as therapy, support groups, and journaling have helped them work through their emotions after experiencing a devastating loss.
Camila Legaspi was only in high school when her mother, Gabriela, passed away from breast cancer. While speaking to SurvivorNet, Legaspi shared that she started seeing a therapist in order to talk through all the emotions that she was feeling after her mother passed away and have someone to talk to. Now, Legaspi encourages anyone to consider therapy if they are going through a difficult time or trying to cope with a devastating loss.
“Therapy saved my life," she said. "I was dealing with some really intense anxiety and depression at that point. It just changed my life because I was so drained by all the negativity that was going on. Going to a therapist helped me realize that there was still so much out there for me … that I still had my family, that I still had my siblings. The reality is when you lose someone, it's really, really, really hard, and it's totally OK to talk to someone, and I'm so happy that I talked to my therapist.”
Camille Legaspi, who lost her mother to breast cancer, said therapy helped her cope with the loss
After her mother’s passing, Legaspi would regularly account moments of her mother’s life particularly her creativity. In order to cope with her emotions, and continue her mother’s creative legacy, Legaspi started getting involved with creative writing which continued into her entering college at Princeton University by joining the school’s magazine. By writing, Legaspi has been able to not dwell on the loss of her mother as something terrible that happened to her family, but instead let it serve as inspiration for poetry, fiction, or whatever else she may be inspired to write.
“My outlet became writing and writing for my school magazine and publishing creative works about what had happened to me,” Legaspi explained. “I’ve learned to have it impact me in a positive way, and not for it to have just been a sad story of, but instead, share this really tragic thing happened to her, and [focus on] how she grew from it, the awesome things she did because of it, and these are the poetry pieces and the fiction pieces she wrote as a result of it.”
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