Only bad things happen quickly

<>

 “Only bad things happen quickly, . . . Virtually all the happiness-producing processes in our lives take time, usually a long time: learning new things, changing old behaviors, building satisfying relationships, raising children. This is why patience and determination are among life’s primary virtues. ”
― Gordon Livingston

In 1991 Livingston’s 22-year-old son Andrew committed suicide after a long struggle with bipolar disorder. Lucas, his youngest son, was diagnosed with leukemia six months later. That child died at age 6 after an unsuccessful bone-marrow transplant from his father.
How does one deal with such losses? Not with the aim of reaching closure about the experience, said Livingston.

In fact, he wrote, “Like all who mourn, I learned an abiding hatred for the word `closure’ with its comforting implications that grief is a time-limited process from which we all recover.”