Chapter 36: The Experience of Loss, Death, and Grief Flashcards
Necessary loss
A part of life.
Maturational loss
A form of necessary loss and includes all normally expected life changes across the life span.
Situational loss
Sudden, unpredictable external events.
Grief
The emotional response to a loss, manifested in ways unique to an individual and based on personal experiences, cultural expectations, and spiritual beliefs.
Mourning
The outward, social expressions of grief and the behaviors associated with loss.
Bereavement
Encompasses both grief and mourning, and includes the emotional responses and outward behaviors of a persona experiencing loss.
Normal (uncomplicated) grief
A common, universal reaction characterized by complex emotional, cognitive, social, physical, behavioral, and spiritual responses to loss and death.
Anticipatory grief
The unconscious process of disengaging or letting go before the actual loss or death occurs, especially in situations of prolonged or predicted loss.
Disenfranchised grief
The relationship to the decreased person is not socially sanctioned, cannot be openly shared, or seems of lesser significance.
Ambiguous loss
A type of disenfranchised grief, occurs when the lost person is physically present but not psychologically available.
Complicated grief
A person has prolonged or significantly difficult time moving forward after the loss.
Bowlby’s attachment theory
Describes the experience of mourning based on his studies of children separated from their parents during World War II.
What are the four stages of mourning?
Numbing, yearning and searching, disorganization and despair, and reorganization.
Numbing
The grieving person describes this stage as feeling stunned or unreal; shorted stage.
Yearning and searching (separation anxiety)
Emotional outbursts of tearful sobbing and acute distress.
