The nature of grief: Loss of love relationships in young adulthood

Abstract

Grieving following the loss of a love relationship in young adulthood was examined. College students completed the loss version of the Grief Experience Inventory (GEI), another questionnaire, and an adaptation of the Texas Revised Inventory of Grief (TRIG). The results indicated that the more intimate the relationship had been, the greater the grief experienced. In addition, the more marriage had been considered, the greater the grief. Grief was disenfranchised primarily by family members, unless marriage had been considered. Few gender differences were seen, except that women both considered marriage and initiated the breakup more often. The specific feelings attached to the grieving were noted more often on the TRIG adaptation than on the GEI. The findings point to the significance of recognizing grief reactions in counseling and psychotherapy for depression in young adults.     

Mental ghosts and the process of grief

Abstract

Grieving the death of a loved one is an experience that many people will face at least once in their lifetime, but the lack of widely accepted guidelines as to what constitutes “normal” grieving results in mourning being a common experience with little universality. Memories may keep the deceased alive in the minds of the survivor and may even interfere with the formation of new relationships. This article considers the process of grieving the loss of a spouse and some of the individual factors, such as age, sex, and personal beliefs, that may account for variability in grief experiences. While several modeh detailing the grief process are discussed, the inappropriateness of establishing expectations for the nature and duration of grief is argued for.     

Grief's Rationality,Backward and Forward

Grief is our emotional response to the deaths of intimates, and so like many other emotional conditions, it can be appraised in terms of its rationality. A philosophical account of grief's rationality should satisfy a contingency constraint, wherein grief is neither intrinsically rational nor intrinsically irrational. Here I provide an account of grief and its rationality that satisfies this constraint, while also being faithful to the phenomenology of grief experience. I begin by arguing against the best known account of grief's rationality, Gustafson's strategic or forward‐looking account, according to which the practical rationality of grief depends on the internal coherence of the component attitudes that explain the behaviors caused by grief, and more exactly, on how these attitudes enable the individual to realize states of affairs that she desires. While I do not deny that episodes of grief can be appraised in terms of their strategic rationality, I deny that strategic rationality is the essential or fundamental basis on which grief's rationality should be appraised. In contrast, the heart of grief's rationality is backward‐looking. That is, what primarily makes an episode of grief rational qua grief is the fittingness of the attitudes individuals take toward the experience of a lost relationship, attitudes which in turn generate the desires and behaviors that constitute bereavement. Grief thus derives its essential rationality from the objects it responds to, not from the attitudes causally downstream from that response, and is necessarily irrational when the behaviors that constitute an individual's grieving are inappropriate to the object of that grief. So while the strategic rationality of an episode of grief contributes to whether it is on the whole rational, no episode of grief can be rational unless the actions that constitute grieving accurately gauge the change in a person's normative situation wrought by the loss of her relationship with the deceased.     

Soup,Stitches, and Song

Abstract

This article discusses ways that clinical practitioners can utilize creative strategies in working with clients who are experiencing grief following the death of their adolescent child. It presents a brief literature review regarding this specific type of parental grief as well as practical and helpful ways to utilize books, songs, and tangible projects in the grieving process.     

Parallel Process

Summary

This article addresses parallel processes between the author (a therapist) and client when each are mourning the death of their mother. Similarities and differences in their experience and reaction are discussed. The effect of the client's unexpressed grief from her early childhood loss is explored. The author also examines her own, more recent loss and develops a new perspective on its consequences. Tools are presented to help the client work on her grief, especially when the issue is “motherloss.” The impact of the therapeutic process on the client and author is delineated, and the client's reactions to ending her therapy are analyzed.     

Bereavement Groups and Their Benefits

Abstract

This article provides a brief discussion of the various types of grief and posits that the many types, particularly disenfranchised, lend themselves to recovery through reconnection. Bereavement groups offer a particularly useful means of connection with a larger grieving community and allow validation from others along with personalization of loss. Additionally, the use of creativity creates deeper and more meaningful connections with self and others. Finally, the article ends with counseling considerations and two case examples.     

Observing a client's grieving process: bringing logical positivism into qualitative grief counselling research

This positional paper originates from our need as researcher/practitioners to establish a meaningful epistemological framework for research into bereaved people's journey through loss and grief over time. We describe how the field of grief research has a long and established biological basis, in keeping with a positivist epistemology. However, there has been a diminution of the influence of logical positivism in twenty-first-century counselling research. We argue that in grief counselling research, naturalistic observation of the grieving process within a logical positivist paradigm, remains a valid and valuable construct. We posit an observational protocol for the grief counselling process which minimises the intrusion of research method into the therapeutic process. We offer this as a means of conducting qualitative research within a bereavement counselling service. Further, we suggest that the development of an observational protocol for a client's grieving process has potential implications for developing good practice in grief work.     

Group Facilitation of the Grieving Process With Those Bereaved by Suicide

People bereaved by suicide receive less sympathy and support from society than do those bereaved by other causes. By using Yalom's curative factors, Parkes's stages of grief, and Worden's tasks of grief resolution, a structured group model can be constructed to facilitate movement through the grieving process of participants bereaved by suicide.     

Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy with Couples Facing Terminal Illness

Research on effective therapeutic interventions for couples dealing with terminal illness is scant. Changes in daily routine, added responsibilities, role changes, and the grief process are all contributors to the enormous stress and emotional strain felt by these couples. Couples where one partner is terminally ill may experience anger, depression, guilt, and anxiety. The authors propose that emotionally focused couple therapy (EFT), originally developed by Greenberg and Johnson (Emotionally focused therapy for couples, Guilford Press, New York, NY, 1988) may be effective in addressing this distress and in facilitating the grieving and support process in couples dealing with terminal illness. EFT is a systemic, experiential form of therapy that builds upon Bowlby’s (Attachment and loss: Volume I: Attachment, Basic Books, New York, NY, 1969) attachment theory. By exploring the emotional experience of both partners it may be possible to re-structure the couple’s emotional partnership and support the grief process for both partners.     

The influence of therapist experience upon evaluative perceptions of family members

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of experience in family therapy on therapists' evaluative perceptions of family members. Beginning students in family therapy, advanced students, and experienced staff rated members of 100 families according to the Semantic Differential technique. Contrary to expectations, beginning students did not evaluate identified patients more favorably than parents. Staff and advanced students, however, rated parents more favorably than identified patients. Beginning students were also found to evaluate all family members more favorably than staff and advanced students. These results were discussed in terms of experienced therapists initially taking the side of the parents and the effects this potential source of bias may have on the course of family therapy.     

The Use of Rituals in Grieving for a Miscarriage or Stillbirth

Abstract

Preparation for their changing roles in family and society, as well as readying their intimate space for the arrival of an infant, totally engage expectant parents. Miscarriage or stillbirth may bring on a grief storm that strips away many tender roots and branches of new life in the community that the parents have been nurturing. Creation and participation in a grief ritual can bring the grieving parents to a healing resolution. This article describes the healing efficacy of ritual, its elements, and how a compassionate therapist can create one in collaboration with grieving clients.     

Ongoing: On grief’s open-ended rehearsal

Peter Goldie’s account of grief as a narrative process that unfolds over time allow us to address the structure of self-understanding in the experience of loss. Taking up the Goldie’s idea that narrativity plays a crucial role in grief, I will argue that the experience of desynchronization and an altered relation to language disrupt even of our ability to compose narratives and to think narratively. Further, I will argue that Goldie’s account of grief as a narratively structured process focus on the process having come to an end. By contrast, I will propose the idea that grief can be understood as an open-ended rehearsal of our capacity to be alone in the company of an absent other. This makes grief a relational activity that differs from composing narratives about one’s past and about one’s process of grieving. Thus, grief is not primarily a process of recollecting our past narratively; rather, it can be seen as a dedicational activity which involves a future-oriented and open-ended rehearsal of relatedness despite irrevocable absence.     

The Myth of Closure

Therapies for grief and loss have traditionally focused on the work of grieving. The goal was to reach an endpoint, now popularly called closure. There are, however, many people who, through no fault of their own, find a loss so unclear that there can be no end to grief. They have not failed in the work of grieving, but rather have suffered ambiguous loss, a type of loss that is inherently open ended. Instead of closure, the therapeutic goal is to help people find meaning despite the lack of definitive information and finality. Hope lies in increasing a family's tolerance for ambiguity, but first, professionals must increase their own comfort with unanswered questions. In this article, the authors, one a poet, the other a family therapist and theorist, offer a unique blending of theory, reflection, and poetry to experientially deepen the process of self‐reflection about a kind of loss that defies closure.     

Beyond Hopelessness

Abstract

The researchers conducted a needs assessment survey of practicing school-based occupational therapists to determine the incidence of grief within existing caseloads, current awareness of the issue, related concerns, and willingness or resistance to address grief in the intervention environment. The survey was administered to a representative sample of 150 school-based therapists throughout the state of Ohio. Fifty-six therapists responded with usable data.

The results suggest that the students who are currently on occupational therapy (OT) caseloads face a large number of grief issues. Although a majority of therapists reported addressing grief issues, only a small percentage typically do so for a variety of reasons. The school therapists offered a number of explanations for the limited follow-through on this issue. These findings support the profession's recent efforts to further establish occupational therapy as a well-recognized and respected provider of interventions to address the mental health and psychosocial needs of children in school settings.     

The sound link: Psychodynamic group music therapy in a therapeutic community setting

SUMMARY

This paper explores the efficacy of on-going weekly psychodynamic group music therapy with those with chronic mental illness in a therapeutic-community setting. Co-improvised music-making was the primary medium of communication and connection in the group, combined with a period for verbal reflection. Central to the therapist's thesis is that the shared music medium primarily acts as a way of expressing, organising and containing the experience of individual members and of the group. It allows for contact between members at a pre-verbal, preconscious level. For this particular patient group, contacts made at this level can be critical to their further ability to tolerate and integrate feelings in a more verbal and conscious way. The music-therapy setting is seen as aiding the process of linking together these two areas of experience, thus providing patients with a potentially freer, less restricted, way of relating to themselves and each other.     

Pastoral Theological Reflection on Grief: Contemporary Theory and the Practice of Ministry by Melissa Kelley

This article highlights four of Melissa Kelley’s contributions in her book Grief: Contemporary Theory and Practice. The author identifies these as: 1) Kelley’s capacity to distill and synthesize the most important areas of contemporary grief theory; 2) her work on attachment theory and its relationship to people’s ways of coping with grief; 3) the focus on the research of Bonanno et al. (Journal of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences 60:67–73, 2005) and showing us who is most vulnerable and in need of pastoral care during grief; 4) her emphasis on meaning making as the core of the grieving process. The article also lifts up questions concerning communal practices for grieving loss born of injustice and the need for prevention and fostering coping mechanisms so that the worst effects of grief might be mitigated.     

Brief consultation with headache sufferers

Abstract

This paper describes the author's efforts at involving chronic headache sufferers in brief consultations with individual, family, and group therapy programs in an inpatient medical treatment facility. A variety of difficult issues facing chronic headache sufferers are presented, including the rationale for utilizing each therapeutic modality and the role and strategies that the therapist undertakes in each program. The author provides some case vignettes and discusses the importance of communication between the therapist, the primary physician, and the medical staff members.     

Fracturing drive or fracturing connections—relational considerations commentary on paper by Paul Williams

We tend to conceive of mourning primarily in intrapsychic terms. In this commentary I highlight how Harvey Peskin’s paper (this issue) helps us to appreciate that grief is not only the product of the individual mind but is also constituted relationally. Both what we experience in our grieving and how we express it is shaped by and through those around us whose grief we bear witness to, as we ourselves grieve and are witnessed by them.

I elaborate further on Peskin’s view of the role of witnessing during grieving and mine another profound implication in his discourse by pointing to the bidirectional influence between mourning and relationality. Not only is mourning fostered through relational engagement, but our grieving together can provide the mortar for the building and sustaining of community.     

Behind Our I’s: Grief and Loss in the Poetry of Li-Young Lee

This article uses Kenneth R. Mitchell and Herbert Anderson’s (1983) six modalities of grieving as presented in Donald Capps’ (1993) The Poet’s Gift to bring a pastoral theological perspective to bear on Li-Young Lee’s Behind My Eyes (2008), a collection of thirty-nine poems. In specifically focusing on Lee’s poem “To Hold,” it makes the case for a seventh grieving modality, that of preemptive loss. Employing Mitchell and Anderson’s distinction between faithful and unfaithful grieving, it argues that preemptive loss is an unfaithful form or expression of grieving, and notes the irony and sadness in this regard, as this unfaithful response to grief is informed by what is widely considered to be a faithful Judeo–Christian perspective, rooted in the inescapable sinfulness of humanity.