In some ways connecting with the tragedy of strangers is a cathartic act. A selfish house-cleaning of sorts. The webster dictionary definition of catharsis is a purging of the bowels. Therefore, if you will permit me the slang, double entendre, one of the reasons we mourn the losses of strangers is to get our own shit out.

But there’s more to our tears than trash disposal. Communal sharing of emotions, whether it be through television sets, on Facebook, or in person at vigils, is one way that humans heal. We reach out to others, connect, bond, feel empathy, and ultimately become stronger. Connection with others is the best way to feel emotionally better. When I feel turbulence on a plane, I find that I immediately strike up a conversation with my seat mate and notice my anxiety immediately decrease. Last year, I survived an emotionally tortuous stint in a closed MRI tube by the glorious finger tips of a caring friend whose touch helped me overcome my fears.

Emotional connections with other people is a lifeline. Yesterday I appeared on CNN International to offer my thoughts on what the trapped Chilean miners need to preserve their mental health. My advice was clear: Consistent contact with others. Be that letters from family, emails from the public, or, best of all, some form of reliable electronic communication. Studies of Facebook users show that stints on the online social network can raise oxytocin levels, the human bonding hormone. I suggested that hard-wired iPod Touches with Facebook capability be lowered into the mine. Already there are numerous Facebook pages designed to share information and send encouraging messages to the miners. This kind of connection to the real world is a life-line as valuable as food and air.

But even without direct contact, humans can mourn and empathize with the pain of others we have never met, and this can be an act of connection. So, when we take time to reflect on 9/11 and mourn for the victims and families we become part of an emotional community. And that feels good.

When her daughter finally brought her sadness to her attention and a friend severed their relationship saying she was “no fun anymore.” Stephanie found  Dr. M. Katherine Shear, a professor of psychiatry at Columbia, who administers a 16-week experimental kind of therapy specifically designed for something she calls. “complicated grief” — acute sadness that lasts for more than six months.

Shackled with survivors guilt and fear of letting go of her precious son, Stephanie’s grief had become a preoccupation that hung out on the background of her day, yet it was also something she had avoided head on.

Dr. Shear’s treatment, a technique borrowed from treatment for PTSD, involves a revisiting exercise that focus on pleasurable experiences with Eric to help reactivate pleasurable memories, memory work sheets, and eventually tape recorded stories about the trauma of his death. She was instructed to play the tapes every day at home as a way to teach her brain how to compartemenalize. It taught her she could turn off sadness.

“My grief became more comfortable. less shocking. It’s like you get used to it. I had been afraid that if I let go of the grief, I would be letting go of Eric. But the opposite happened. I remembered him more and was able to hold onto him as a positive memory rather than a chronic grief.”

The therapy also showed her she could turn on pleasant memories of Eric without feeling guilty. Another part of the exercise involved letting go of survivor’s guilt. Dr. Shear asked her to imagine a conversation with her son and ask him questions she needed answers to. Then she was told to construct his answers. For Stephanie, the questions were simple: “I wanted to know if I had been a good mom. And I wanted to know what he wanted to be in his life. His future.”

Today, Stephanie feels she has her life back. She can experience joy without guilt and have pleasurable memories of Eric without debilitating sadness.

Each year, two-and-a-half million people die and at least four other people are severely affected by each death. For some of these people the pain does not go away and becomes complicated grief, something that Dr. Shear says, it now treatable.