This book was a balm I didn't even know I needed, and it validated and explored so many aspects of loss and grief that it truly is a gift of a book that could help anyone and everyone, as we all suffer different forms of loss as we live. JS particularly focuses on categories that hardly get air time in addition to loss of life: loss of the future for one, loss of mental health, loss of autonomy, loss of worth (due to trauma and abuse), connection (loneliness), and of humanity - touching powerfully on race and rage.
It's part memoir and part anecdotes of different patients' stories woven do delicately together.
I love how he gives so much empathy and voice to situations and tough emotions that we may feel shame for- some examples: feeling like you weren't able to be there enough for a loved one who died by suicide, feeling both confliction and presence when seeing a parent die, holding both "I hate you" and "I'm here" in final moments. For someone who died from loneliness and wasn't able to find "their people." The nuance and validation is so tender. And I oh so love his prose. Because I could go on and on, here are a few long quotes that just got me:
"My theology didn't need an upgrade. It needed disassembly. What I carried would not carry. In an air conditioned church, maybe. In crisis, in pain? Much harder.
The defense I kept hearing was 'The theology is good, but the timing is bad. The theology is true, but you just can't say it to a hurting person right now. Save it for later when they're ready.'
When they're ready. When would that be?
If good theology wouldn't work in your worst moment, why should it work for any moment at all? It it doesn't carry you in suffering, how can it carry anything else? If it doesn't work in the end, I didn't want it now either."
"We do not, in the end, always find next-of-kin. But maybe we can be “caught and welcomed by a tenderness in kinship.” If not the next-of-kin, then next-to-kin. …Kinship, not a fix, but a balm.”
If we are made for each other, then our separation is a wound, and when we meet, it is grace that enters there and mends us together.
I am a witness, momentarily. My patient’s loneliness is seen. It does not fix it. It cannot. No one’s loneliness can be fixed. But there is something valuable, holy, sacred about being seen. I have held hands with patients who did not want to die alone—and it did not entirely matter then that I was a stranger. It mattered that someone was there. Each of us will die alone, behind the opaque walls of our own minds. Yet there is value in being lonely hand in hand."
"The irony is that by idolizing a robust autonomy, we shun those deemed to have lost autonomy. Seeking to lean on one another, then, has been shamed, abhorred, anathema. What I mean to say is that ideally, a lack of autonomy would only be a perceived loss; no one would ever have to fear it because we have always shared in our care, we have always been the shoulder for one another. I have dreamed of an interdependent care, braided mutuality, generations giving water and wisdom down the mountain, elders gently relieved of their post, the young shouldering their elders into rest, no soul here expendable, no body discarded at first wear. These places exist but they are as rare as they sound. Still the human heart continues to look for this: the sharing of our grief as time pulls the thread, until our burden is no longer burden, but we find it bearable in each other.”
Thank you JS for this gift of a book that gives us permission to grieve things we didn't even know we needed permission for. Unbury, lament, hold, breathe. Moving with. Letting in. <3
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From the Publisher
About the Author
As a hospital chaplain, J.S. Park has seen all manner of sickness and pain—terminal patients, estranged families, and victims of devastating accidents. For years he has sat at bedside with the dying, ill, and injured, listening to their stories and providing a gentle presence during the very worst moments of people’s lives.
Using stories from his own life experience and his many hours in the hospital, Chaplain Park unpacks the various losses that lead to grief—loss of loved ones, loss of autonomy, loss of health, and even loss of plans and dreams. While certain faith traditions may resort to clichés or weak “theologies” to provide comfort to the grieving, Chaplain Park faces the depths of suffering with a bold, honest eye, offering the brokenhearted the grace needed to walk the shattered roads before them.
About the author
Essential reading for anyone looking to humanize our lived experiences of loss and heartache.
As Long As You Need provides an assurance that we’re allowed to be here, in all our complexities; through and beyond them too. “Every patient I see, they’re bursting with the life they’ll never get to live.” J.S. Park walks alongside readers with an un-rushed collection of stories, reflections, and vulnerable confessions to hold a tender and honest mirror to our shared (mis)understandings of grief. As a family member, friend, spouse, father, and hospital chaplain, Park invites us to move closer, slower perhaps, to let experiences in that we’ve often been taught to ignore or “let go.” “Speeding through grief always has a cost.” We’ve all heard some version of overly simplistic “Pocket Theology” in response to tragedy. “It was God’s plan. It was meant to be. Look on the bright side. Heaven just got another angel. At least…” As an adult adoptee and mental health professional, this book profoundly resonates with interpersonal and existential concerns that I encounter and navigate daily. Through a candid, unfiltered, and intimate disclosure about his personal and professional relationship to grief, Park meets us with open, road-worn hands to invite our own stories into the room next to the ones we witness in the text. I leave each page feeling more human; further “unburied” in ways that bring life despite cultural stigma surrounding such multi-dimensional subject matter. Park shows us what that can look like from a constellation of perspectives, and none of them are sugar coated. It’s canon to the kind of “aftermath theology” that so many in this generation are desperate to learn and practice. This is an essential read for clinicians, pastors, administrators, medical personnel, friends, family, neighbors; regardless of background or vocation though, it's for anyone who’s ever wished for a way to bring what feels unspeakable into the light. If you’re looking for an in-the-trenches, walk-through exploration of grief and pain, dying and life, remembrance and connection, please don’t go without this book.
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on May 6, 2024
- Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2024
As Long As You Need provides an assurance that we’re allowed to be here, in all our complexities; through and beyond them too.
Essential reading for anyone looking to humanize our lived experiences of loss and heartache.
Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2024
“Every patient I see, they’re bursting with the life they’ll never get to live.”
J.S. Park walks alongside readers with an un-rushed collection of stories, reflections, and vulnerable confessions to hold a tender and honest mirror to our shared (mis)understandings of grief. As a family member, friend, spouse, father, and hospital chaplain, Park invites us to move closer, slower perhaps, to let experiences in that we’ve often been taught to ignore or “let go.”
“Speeding through grief always has a cost.”
We’ve all heard some version of overly simplistic “Pocket Theology” in response to tragedy. “It was God’s plan. It was meant to be. Look on the bright side. Heaven just got another angel. At least…”
As an adult adoptee and mental health professional, this book profoundly resonates with interpersonal and existential concerns that I encounter and navigate daily.
Through a candid, unfiltered, and intimate disclosure about his personal and professional relationship to grief, Park meets us with open, road-worn hands to invite our own stories into the room next to the ones we witness in the text.
I leave each page feeling more human; further “unburied” in ways that bring life despite cultural stigma surrounding such multi-dimensional subject matter.
Park shows us what that can look like from a constellation of perspectives, and none of them are sugar coated. It’s canon to the kind of “aftermath theology” that so many in this generation are desperate to learn and practice.
This is an essential read for clinicians, pastors, administrators, medical personnel, friends, family, neighbors; regardless of background or vocation though, it's for anyone who’s ever wished for a way to bring what feels unspeakable into the light.
If you’re looking for an in-the-trenches, walk-through exploration of grief and pain, dying and life, remembrance and connection, please don’t go without this book.
Images in this review
- Reviewed in the United States on May 21, 2024
As a therapist who just lost my own 21 year old son to a motorcycle accident, I’ve read and consumed a number of resources on grief myself - as much as able.
Profoundly impacted me - will recommend to clients
Reviewed in the United States on May 21, 2024
This book is the best I’ve read - and profoundly impacted me. It’s so well written - from the style, to the imagery, to the feelings, vulnerability, authenticity, and the array of stories and messages shared. Joon pulls you in with a writing style that captivates and isn’t removed (as many of the books I’ve read on grief can be). He shares his stories of trauma, loss, heartache, and many stories of others he’s encountered as a chaplain (and one trained in psychology) in a profoundly beautiful and impactful way.
So many parts of the book left an imprint on me. It will remain as my top resource on grief for future clients. Can’t speak highly enough of it.
(I don’t know Joon, but first heard of him and the book on the Adam Young podcast - which I really enjoyed. I also don’t know Adam Young, nor am associated with either of them in any way.)
Images in this review
Top reviews from other countries
- MatteReviewed in Canada on May 3, 2024
Invites us into compassionate and honest responses to grief and loss
- JesseIdelsonReviewed in the United Kingdom on July 4, 2024
The most healing book about grief and identity I have ever read.
- Amazon Customer Ontario, CanadaReviewed in Canada on September 30, 2024
Exceptional, Compelling
