Personal Grief Research Articles

NeVer ForgeT

Five years after the shooting at Virginia Tech, a professor who was in lockdown on campus that day considers the relationship between personal grief and publicized mourning.

Still life

Much has been written about stillbirth in this journal over the past year. Yet the voices and faces of those whom this devastating birth outcome affects most have been largely absent. An exhibition at London's Oxo Gallery this month aims to bring parents, and the very real grief that they experience, to centre stage. 17 is so named to mark the number of babies who are stillborn or who die within the first 4 weeks of life every day in the UK. 17's exhibits were never meant for public display and it's the first time John Kemp has curated an exhibition. A personal journey, as well as an attempt to “shine a spotlight on the anguish faced by parents that lose a baby just before, during or shortly after birth”, the exhibition was inspired by the loss of Kemp's son, Alexander, after a placental abruption at 33 weeks' gestation. The exhibition comprises photographs of 17 women, including Kemp's wife, Shazia, in the full bloom of pregnancy, each of whom went on to lose the baby they were carrying to stillbirth or neonatal death. The photographs are not good in a technical sense. Some are grainy, some overexposed; many are poorly composed, with unexplained objects or people in the background. But these imperfect images are all the more powerful for the underlying knowledge that they could not be carefully recreated in a studio because one of the subjects is no longer alive. The pictures are accompanied by panels of text written by the mothers. They describe the moment captured in the photo, and the thoughts and emotions that they and their families had experienced up until that point. “We imagined we knew her already and we wondered how she would change our lives”, says one mother. The certainty of parenthood is a universal theme of the 17 stories. As Kemp explains, “somewhere along the [pregnancy] we take on a responsibility for our young. It is a responsibility that wants to nurture and love our children. It induces in us a hope, joy and expectation that goes to the core of our being.” And this is the crux of the exhibition. Through these happy photographs and proud words, one can no longer doubt, if one ever did, the ultimate devastation of such a loss. Reading the descriptions of such personal grief is almost too much to bear. “I could never have imagined the pain and devastation the loss of a child would cause…I still love, I still laugh, I still hope for the future but a little part of me is broken forever”, says the mother of baby Elias, who died aged 16 days. “When you're expecting a baby you see the whole of the rest of your life with them in it and, when that is taken away, the void that is left is unbearable”, says Paula, who lost twin girls at 30 weeks. I ask what made Kemp choose this as a way to honour his son's memory. “It was difficult to know how to mark his life and at the same time to get people talking”, he says. “We have photos of Alexander after he was born, but these are too personal for us to share. The photo of Shazia pregnant shows him while he was alive and captures the essence of what he meant to us.” The joy and serenity that emanate from all the images contrast starkly with the women's descriptions of the anguish of delivering a baby who is already dead or who dies shortly afterwards. But what shines out most is the certainty that these women, and their partners, are already parents: “Our baby had been born and he was beautiful and I loved him.” 17 is a powerful tribute to the love parents feel for their children, whatever their (gestational) age.

Death on a Smaller but Equal Scale.

In 2007, I "retired" from teaching in New Zealand and moved back to the United States. Within a year, I found myself back in the classroom again, this time teaching a course entitled "Perspectives on Death and Dying" at the local community college. This article begins with an exploration of some of my own grief that I brought to the new task, and my challenges to engage an unfamiliar culture (Mexican Americans making up about 80% of the students in the class). It then surveys the topics the students chose to write about in their final summative essays over the three semesters that I have taught this course so far, as a glimpse into what troubles tertiary-age American college students about dying, grief, and death. The paper concludes with a description of how remaining aware of my own personal grief, processes, and the grief of others, outside of, but simultaneously with, the classroom experience better equipped me to teach the course and to be more sensitive to the encompassing grief that these socially marginalised students bring with them into the academic setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of New Zealand Journal of Counselling is the property of New Zealand Association of Counsellors and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The Personal and the Political: Social Networking in Manila

In 2001, during the Second People Power Revolution, Philippine activists used the mobile phone to help disseminate messages and coordinate actions leading to the ouster of President Joseph Estrada. At the time, the affordances of the mobile short message service (SMS) in particular made for a politically effective communications media. In the weeks that followed the death of ex-President Corazon Aquino in 2009, social networking sites (SNS) became important affective media for the expression of personal grief. When Typhoon Ketsana (called Typhoon Ondoy in the Philippines) struck in 2009, both social media and SMS were appropriated for effective and affective purposes. Although the deployment of SNS extends earlier modes of civic engagement and media, it departs from older media by providing various forms of visual and aural communication with greater affective personalization. Moreover, within the highly networked and personalized worlds of SNS, the capacity for politics and its relationship to the personal take on new forms. In this article, we ask how a media designed and promoted for the conduct of interpersonal relations is deployed in the local expression of national politics and civic action and in the global politics of exported labor. In the areas of national party politics and global labor politics, can we think of the personal as political in the context of SNS and the Philippines? In turn, how would adopting such a perspective affect our understanding of communications culture?

The Lived Experience of Grief, Loss, and Coping Among Pediatric Oncology Nurses (733)

1.Describe pediatric oncology nurses’ experiences with both professional and personal grief.2.Discuss efforts toward developing interventions to minimize stress and distress in this population. Background. Pediatric oncology nurses face numerous and continual stressors, including supporting distraught families, understanding complicated protocols, and caring for children with cancer, many of whom will die. The literature suggests coping with the death of a pediatric oncology patient with whom the nurse has developed an intense relationship places considerable stress on a nurse. In addition, pediatric oncology nurses may be faced with personal losses and grief, which may contribute to their moral distress, grief, bereavement, or burnout. Although the stress involved in oncology nursing is well documented in the literature, there is a paucity of research identifying the specific determinants of stress and support measures to effectively remedy the situation. Research objectives. The aim of this study was to assess inpatient pediatric oncology nurses’ lived experience of burnout and bereavement and to identify the nurses’ perceptions about strategies to alleviate these negative outcomes. Methods. Using a phenomenological approach, the research team conducted semi-structured interviews with focus groups of 4-6 pediatric nurses at a comprehensive cancer center. Interviews were audio-taped, transcribed verbatim, and reviewed for accuracy. Results. Both the transcripts and the interviewers’ notes and memos were included in the analysis, which sought to reflect on the essential themes that characterize the central phenomena of grief, loss, bereavement, and coping. Data analysis occurred simultaneous to data collection; preliminary results suggest nurses feel both personal and professional loss when a patient dies. Conclusion. Once all interview data have been analyzed and specific themes and categories emerge, potential interventions targeting pediatric oncology nurses will be developed for testing in future studies. Implications for research, policy, or practice. Interventions such as grief-reduction workshops or support groups have had limited success. Although the literature acknowledges the stress, distress, and grief, oncology nurses experience, there remains a need to identify and implement effective strategies to minimize distress and relieve the burden of cancer on pediatric oncology nurse.

The Experience of Grief

Art-making is one way to help process the complex set of emotions that occur with grief. It is a useful method for art therapists who are experiencing personal grief while practicing therapy. Examining their self-awareness and the countertransference effects may have both personal and professional implications. This inquiry examines the questions: What is the experience of grief as expressed by an art therapist? How is that experience of grief related to my work as an art therapist? The literature review examines the topics of grief, art therapy and grief, self-awareness, and countertransference. A heuristic inquiry of my personal grief as an art therapist is also presented, including my art and writing. Implications and possible future research are discussed.

An “Eye on the Sparrow?” Joan Didion and C. S. Lewis Read the Prayer Book

At the book's core is a recurring motif, a credo, a statement of anti-faith: No eye on the sparrow. Against this set the memory of my mother grandmother in church, singing a duet: eye is on the sparrow. As Pascal says, we make our wager. --John Wilson, (First Things, 43) In the months following its publication in October 2005, the critical reviews for loan Didion's memoir Year of Magical Thinking, a chronicle of the death of her husband, John Gregory Dunne, her own crushing personal grief, were overwhelmingly positive, at times to the point of near absurdity. New York Times ran three glowing reviews in succession, the first two by renowned critic Michiko Kakutani former American Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky, the third featuring an extensive author profile written by Rachel Donadio. That followed two months later by at least two articles mentioning producer Scott Rudin's plan to bring the story to Broadway (McKinley, Downes). In addition to the Times coverage, three of the four biggest names in book-review publications--Publishers Weekly (Rev. of The Year), ALA Booklist (Seaman), Library Journal (Kochis)--all gave it laudatory starred reviews. Only Kirkus Reviews (Didion, Joan:) lukewarm. John Leonard, writing in New York Review of Books, effusive with praise. I can't think of a we need more than hers, he wrote; then, in an echo of Didion's own incantatory style: I can't imagine dying without this book (12). As winter turned to spring in 2006, however, lengthier more equivocal analyses of Didion's memoir began to appear in a handful of publications (for examples, see Gurstein, Nelson, Schulman, Skloot). Few reviewers criticized Didion's prose style, usually agreed to be lyrical (Review, Publishers Weekly), achingly beautiful (Briefly Noted New Yorker), lacerating, yet peculiarly stirring (Yardley, Washington Post). But what several less charitable reviewers noticed--some within religious contexts, such as Wilson's review in First Things quoted above--is that for all of Didion's descriptions of Christian faith practice, particularly the rituals of the Episcopal Church, her repeated references to scripture the Book of Common Prayer, the conclusions she reaches on the far side of her grief are profoundly skeptical of religious belief. example, she mentions in an offhand way her (and Dunne's) disbelief in the resurrection of the (Year of Magical Thinking 149-50). But though this view is manifestly unorthodox, directly denying the Apostles' Creed Didion quotes on the same page, it is not the one that her religious critics most seized upon. Perhaps the contradictory nature of the passage held her critics in check--Didion says just a few lines later that her way of thinking was so muddled as to contradict even itself (150). passage also holds out the possibility that Didion does not reject all hope of life after death--after all, she leaves intact the next phrase in the Creed, and the life everlasting, amen (149). Rather, what most religious critics found more disturbing Didion's revision of a well-known proverb from the Gospel of Matthew, the subject of a popular early 20th-century American hymn: No eye is on the sparrow. original title of the hymn, written by Civilla D. Martin in 1905, is Eye Is on the Sparrow. lyrics of its three stanzas offer spiritual encouragement to those who are, in turn, lonely, doubtful, tempted by sin. central two-line phrase is repeated twice in every verse again in the refrain: For His eye is on the sparrow / know He watches me. Gospel passage which inspired the hymn is often considered part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, though technically it comes afterward, as Jesus draws his disciples aside to prepare them for persecution-filled missionary work: And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul body in hell. …

Using Expressive Art in a Nursing Course on Death and Dying

art communicating the experience. Students used various art forms including drawings of personal grief and loss to written words and letters expressing emotions. A number of art supplies were provided including paint, markers, crayons, ribbons, buttons, glue, glitter, and magazine clippings. Both activities created a nonverbal means for students to understand and deal with their feelings and anxieties. By engaging in art-making activities, students participated in their own healing, using the language of their own mind. Attitudes were guided from within, rather than imposed or influenced by another. Following each activity, students were encouraged to share their feelings about their art in small groups. Faculty created a safe and caring environment; therefore, students were comfortable sharing their work reflecting personal experiences, emotions, and meaning. With the completion of each activity, students were guided through a debriefing session led by faculty and the certified art therapist.

The public private sphere: family narrative and democracy in Argentina and South Africa

This article explores the paradoxical prominence of seemingly private family stories and memories in the democratic public spheres emerging in the wake of the ‘Dirty War’ in Argentina and apartheid in South Africa. In part because the discourse of the family was used in these cases to both uphold and protest dictatorial regimes, individuals who lost family members to state violence became powerful moral agents in the post‐dictatorship and post‐apartheid periods. Narratives told by and about these individuals – ranging from personal testimony given in each country’s truth commission to representations in theatre, fiction and film – have worked to constitute what may be called a ‘public private sphere’. They not only express personal grief, but also (and especially in wider cultural circulation) have been emplotted and mobilised to construct democratic publics. These may or may not correspond to the nationwide publics envisioned in state discourses of reconciliation. Using genealogical fiction surrounding ‘disappeared children’ in Argentina as a lens to analyse South Africa, this article argues that stories of children attempting to piece together their family histories reveal this dynamic as they become sites for convening democratic publics and critiquing transitional politics.

Sunday's Child? A Memoir by Leslie Baruch Brent

Sunday's Child? A Memoir by Leslie Baruch Brent

John Elias Skandalakis, MD, PhD, FACS (1920–2009)

The impact of a person’s life can often be measured accurately by notable contributions to humanity, whether the benefits are in ones own country or are internationally recognized. Dr. John E. Skandalakis impacted the lives of his countrymen as a leading member of the Greek Resistance in World War II, and many thousands of patients, physicians and students throughout the world. He was a beloved healer, teacher, and respected scholar, who left a remarkable legacy with his expertise, dedication, time, and skill in medical practice and research. Known affectionately to many (including his secretarial staff and colleagues) as ‘‘Dr. Skan,’’ he was our teacher, esteemed scholar, mentor, and, most importantly, cherished friend. Dr. John Elias Skandalakis was born in 1920 in Sparta, Greece, as the son of a district attorney. In 1946, he earned a medical degree from the University of Athens (summa cum laude). He received his certification in General Surgery from the University of Athens in 1950. His training was at the First Surgical Clinic, Athens University and at the Naval Hospital in Piraeus, Greece. His patriotic zeal led him to fight honorably for his nation in the Greek Resistance during World War II and continued military efforts against Communism thereafter. For his bravery and commitment to his country, Dr. Skandalakis was awarded a medal by the Greek government for his clandestine activities that helped save many lives, including the Jewish residents of Athens. He was a man who endured many personal hardships, including the deaths of members of his family and friends, who were murdered during World War II. Putting aside personal grief and the avenue of bitterness in favor of a life dedicated to humankind, he desired to expand his knowledge and skills. This internal drive led him to the United States and to a surgical residency. Thereafter, his love of human anatomy led Dr. Skandalakis to complete the requirements for a doctorate in Anatomy from Emory University School of Medicine in 1962. He rose quickly through the academic ranks and became Professor of Anatomy and Professor of Surgery. With contributions both from his avid interest in research, his numerous publications and his expertise as an educator, Dr. Skandalakis excelled in molding some of the best physicians and researchers in the United States and abroad. During his time at Emory University, Dr. Skandalakis served as Professor of Anatomy, Professor of Surgery, and Professor of Surgical Anatomy and Technique, and he established the Thalia and Michael Carlos Centers for Surgical Anatomy and Technique and the Alfred A. Davis Research Center for Surgical Anatomy and Technique. The compassion with which he taught students, combined with his immense knowledge of human anatomy, made him one of the most beloved professors at Emory University. In 1981, he was awarded the Aven Cup by the Medical Association of Georgia for outstanding service to the community by a doctor. In 1999, he received the distinguished Medical Achievement Award from the Emory University School of Medicine (Bendavid, in press). During his active time at the institution, Dr. Skandalakis authored more than 300 publications, including journal articles, books, book chapters, and monographs. His love for the art and science of human anatomy is demonstrated in his three most famous books: Embryology for Surgeons, Anatomical Complications in General Surgery, and Surgical Anatomy and Technique: a Pocket Manual. His twovolume text, Surgical Anatomy, the Embryologic and Anatomic Basis of Modern Medicine, could be

Trauma online: Public exposure of personal grief and suffering.

This article considers how traditional physical memorials to war and other catastrophic events differ from online memorials in the Web 2.0 environment and it asks what the benefits and drawbacks of each may be. There has always been an awkward fit between the public statements embodied in monuments to those who died in war and the personal stories told by individuals who returned. This disjuncture serves to demonstrate that the two ways of remembering traumatic events—the collective and the individual—have traditionally been poles apart and often contradictory. Gradually, over the past two decades, with the increasing influence of critical theories that have questioned national and other dominating discourses—and also with growing interest within the field of clinical psychology in what is now labeled posttraumatic stress disorder—there has been an increasing interest in the vast underlayer of personal stories that national narratives have shut out or silenced. What can new interactive digital modes for r...

On the Aporetic Borderlines of Forgiveness: Bereavement as a Political Form

This article focuses on representations of forgiveness as adopted or assumed by processes of collective amelioration experienced in the aftermath of mass atrocity. It seeks to demonstrate how each representative approach to forgiveness captures some of the torment, pain, and suffering of survivor and successor generations, but also that each fails to accommodate the depths and complexities of personal grief and collective mourning. Too often transnational justice in the aftermath of political evil becomes grounded in assumptions of justice, truth, and apology that are severely delimited. Such strategic and theoretical perspectives are insufficiently attuned to the needs of bereavement as a political form because they fail to promote social solace by means of collective atonement on the part of survivor and successor generations who inherit the legacies of sorrow. If political bereavement conducive to collective amelioration is to occur in any one polity, it should be legitimated by a transnational system of “transnational legacy sites” exclusively devoted to the designation, protection, and intercultural connection of all the many places where political evil may be said to have occurred.

A contemporary parable on Good and Evil: James Bond as moral compass

The latest Bond film, ‘Quantum of Solace’, was released in the autumn of 2008 on the centenary of Ian Fleming's birth. He and his literary hero, James Bond, have continued to enjoy an enduring popularity over six decades in our contemporary culture. This paper explores possible reasons for this phenomenon, and argues the hypothesis that Fleming depicted Bond intentionally as a moral compass, embodying a conscious psychological attitude with which to make moral choices and to confront conflicts of duty. Bond, a modern day St. George, slays dragons that expose the contour of modern evil and that are personified by villains who reflect Fleming’s (1962) list of ‘Seven Deadlier Sins’ for the modern era. The paper examines the pivotal sin, accidie, the loss of passion or joy for life through the lens of Fleming’s novel ‘You Only Live Twice’ (1964). James Bond’s personal grief from the loss of his murdered wife precipitates a spiritual and moral dilemma. Should he succumb to his own accidie, despair and suicidal thoughts and become evil (i.e. remain regressed in a primitive state of unconsciousness) like his arch-enemy, Blofeld? Or does he grieve and kill (007 – the right to kill the seven deadlier sins) the despair and accidie personified in his Shadow, Blofeld? The paper also proposes that Bond’s life is a projection of the archetypal image of the hero’s journey. We review the psychological Jungian perspective on moral and ethical conscience in relation to good and evil, and consider Bond’s struggle to own and integrate his shadow self as a reflection of the individual and collective contemporary moral problem facing humanity. Finally, we explore Bond as a cultural expression of shifting perspectives and attitudes to gender image, masculinity and the archetypal male.

Personal Grief and Public Mourning in Plutarch's Consolation to His Wife

In this article, I argue that Plutarch's consolation letter to his wife is not merely an act of public posturing but a moving personal document, a public statement on correct grieving, and a demonstration of the syncretistic trend in philosophy in early Imperial times. The letter can be connected to a tradition of ancient consolatory activities which established an ancient form of psychotherapy. Here I draw particular attention to the syncretistic aspect of philosophical stances. The case study provides a new and richer interpretation of this remarkable document, opening up further avenues for the study of the ancient consolation genre.

The Writerly Reader in Memoir: Inter/subjectivity and Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking

In recent years, much attention has been given to the construction, writing, and reading of the memoir as a literary genre. Debates surrounding life-writing have been invariably concerned with narrative truth because autobiographical narratives center on subjectivity, identity, reflexivity, and representation (of self and other). Moreover, matters of self and subjectivity are inherent to the writing, reading, audiencing, and experiencing of autobiographical writing. This paper is a reflective engagement with Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking, a memoir which won the National Book Award for non-fiction in 2005. The book is the story of the year after the sudden death of Joan Didion's writer husband of 40 years, John Gregory Dunne, and how circumstances compelled the author to create a magical psychic space in which she could believe that her husband was still alive. My goal in this essay is three-fold. I engage with what overtly seems like a trauma narrative of personal grief to show the reader/myself how life-writing swings the tensions between the public and the private as well as the personal and cultural, thereby giving us a picture of the “becoming” self in the writing of memoir. I then turn my attention to an examination of how this tension enables the creation of what Philippe Lejeune refers to as the “autobiographical pact” between the memoirist who writes her self into being and the reader who reads her “selves” in association with the writer. In discussing this, I show how these two elements are crucial to understanding the intersubjective nature of autobiography and life-writing.

Peering Through the Crack & Good-Bye to All that

Social relationships are enacted and remembered through interpersonal relationships and replayed through the media as the author uses a defining personal experience, that of her son's drug addiction, to rethink, analyze, and resituate herself in the world. The result draws attention to the messy juxtaposition of social structures and policies with personal loss, grief, anger, and episodes of joy and courage. Crack, whether drug, fissure, gibe, highlights remembered fragments which allow the author to tell her stories in ways other than those originally considered. As those personal stories are interwoven with public moments such as school desegregation and changes in telecommunications and popular culture, a social commentary is offered that defamiliarizes the familiar, evokes rather than represents, and therefore offers the reader entry into the narrative, the cultural critique.

Affordable assisted reproductive technologies in developing countries: pros and cons

Infertility in developing countries is pervasive and a serious concern. In addition to the personal grief and suffering it causes, the inability to have children especially in poor communities can create broader problems, particularly for the woman. Infertility services in developing countries span the spectrum from prevention to treatment. From a societal and public health standpoint, prevention is cost-effective and is considered by many governments and public health care providers to be a priority for service delivery. While prevention remains paramount, taken alone it ignores the plight of infertile couples, including those with non-infectious causes of infertility. Two key arguments are frequently used to challenge the development of new reproductive technologies in developing countries: overpopulation and limited resources. Evidence supports the conclusion that there is a compelling need for infertility treatment beyond prevention. In many instances, assisted reproductive technologies (ART) are the last hope or the only means to achieve a child for couples. In an effort to make much needed ART to developing countries accessible and affordable, developing countries should look to public-private partnerships. Governments have a responsibility to ensure safe and effective services including the control of standards for clinical procedures and the regulation of professional practice.

Clinician Confidence About Conversations at the End of Life Is Strengthened Using the Four Habits Approach

ABSTRACT Can attending a communication skills workshop focused on advance care planning, shifting focus to palliative care, personal grief, managing anger, and culture and communication result in changes in attitudes and knowledge? One hundred and three clinicians completed surveys prior to and following the workshop resulting in significant changes in knowledge, attitudes and intent to change that persisted for at least 3 months. As most clinicians are not routinely exposed to learning communication skills for end-of-life conversations, opportunities to practice these skills in a safe supportive environment should be made available in medical schools, residency programs, and in the practice community.

Peace or Pacifism? The Soviet 'Struggle for Peace in All the World', 1948-54

This article examines the Soviet 'Struggle for Peace in All the World' between 1948 and 1954. The 'Struggle for Peace' was a vital arena in the early Cold War within which a new image of the Soviet relationship with the outside world was forged. 'Peace' emerged in this context as a shorthand for the USSR's muscular and moral patronage of the oppressed peoples of the world. Soviet citizens responded to the 'Struggle for Peace' with great enthusiasm. This enthusiasm has been cited as evidence that the Soviet population were naively duped into accepting a harsh post-war settlement in return for peace. In reality, Soviet citizens were not so passive in their engagement with the late-Stalinist state. Drawing on Kotkin's description of the 'little tactics of the habitat' this article suggests that some participants in the Peace Campaigns creatively reappropriated them as a platform for the articulation of their personal grief from the past war and their pacifist sentiments. It also offers some provisional suggestions about how the 'tactics' employed by Soviet citizens in relation to the government changed after 1945. The Soviet government could mobilize its population to 'Struggle for Peace', but it could not guarantee that they shared its understanding of what 'peace' meant.