密歇根新闻广播 散文珍藏了关于她逝去女儿和生活的记忆

That writing major you took in college could become the lifeline that helps you cope with loss and pain years later.

That's what Gabriella Burman of Huntington Woods is finding.

She turned the pain and anguish¹ over the death of her young daughter into a collection of seven essays titled "Michaela." The essays were published as a chapbook by the Michigan Writers Cooperative Press.

Michaela was born with special needs. Her diagnosis² was cerebral³ palsy.

"My husband and I threw ourselves into her care and our lives became so full of purpose and meaning and I always called it an elevated existence, that writing almost seemed kind of trivial," Burman says.

Michaela's first year was full of difficulties and Burman says she rejected writing. She didn't want to document the pain and suffering they were experiencing. But after Michaela died, Burman says writing was "kind of like a buoy⁴, like a lifeline."

She wanted to capture Michaela's beauty and resilience for her two other daughters, who were only two weeks old and just over two years old when Michaela died.

Burman describes her daughters as her only source of comfort through the experience and she shifted her focus to caring for them.

Burman wanted to perpetuate⁵ Michaela's existence through the writing, saying, "I have a difficult time with mortality, myself, and I wanted to keep her alive as best I can and she lives in the writing."

But she also didn't want to reduce her to words on a page.

"People need to remember that it's ok to continue to speak about the dead and to evoke⁶ her name because it's the avoidance that causes more sorrow," Burman says, advising people to speak to those grieving about who they've lost.

"You just want your loved ones to be remembered."

1 anguish   

n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼

参考例句：

• She cried out for anguish at parting.分手时，她由于痛苦而失声大哭。
• The unspeakable anguish wrung his heart.难言的痛苦折磨着他的心。

2 diagnosis   

n.诊断，诊断结果，调查分析，判断

参考例句：

• His symptoms gave no obvious pointer to a possible diagnosis.他的症状无法作出明确的诊断。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做一次彻底的调查分析。

3 cerebral   

adj.脑的，大脑的；有智力的，理智型的

参考例句：

• Your left cerebral hemisphere controls the right-hand side of your body.你的左半脑控制身体的右半身。
• He is a precise,methodical,cerebral man who carefully chooses his words.他是一个一丝不苟、有条理和理智的人，措辞谨慎。

4 buoy   

n.浮标；救生圈；v.支持，鼓励

参考例句：

• The party did little to buoy up her spirits.这次聚会并没有让她振作多少。
• The buoy floated back and forth in the shallow water.这个浮标在浅水里漂来漂去。

5 perpetuate   

v.使永存，使永记不忘

参考例句：

• This monument was built to perpetuate the memory of the national hero.这个纪念碑建造的意义在于纪念民族英雄永垂不朽。
• We must perpetuate the system.我们必须将此制度永久保持。

6 evoke   

vt.唤起，引起，使人想起

参考例句：

• These images are likely to evoke a strong response in the viewer.这些图像可能会在观众中产生强烈反响。
• Her only resource was the sympathy she could evoke.她以凭借的唯一力量就是她能从人们心底里激起的同情。