Week 6: Death Anxieties and Loss Flashcards
Explain death anxiety
- Happens in young, middle, and older adults
- Highest for adolescents; lower for older adults
- Other factors can influence death anxiety in older adults (loneliness)
Explain the loss of a child
Ronald Knapp interviewed 155families who lost a child between the ages of 1-28
- Women: Never forget, legitimize the loss, search for a cause or reason, change in values, sense of vulnerability, increased tolerance and sensitivity, shadow grief
- Men: pushing forward to avoid a breakdown, keeping a child present in everyday life, finding meaning in their experience of grief
Death in the lives of adults __% of deaths
19%
Middle age (45-64) : 535,330
- Encounters with death will increase
- Loss of children/grandchildren
- Dear of death starts to lessen
- Adult orphan: loss of both parents and finding oneself in a position of carrying on family traditions (past, present, future)
Death in lives of older adults __%
Older adults (65+) makes up 74% of all deaths
- Fear of death decreases over time (inverse relationship
- Losses occur on a more frequent basis
- Death of a spouse (death in anxiety and concerns about spousal death)
- Men will generally remarry (instrumental strain); women do not have as many options (issue is the financial strain)
What are the top 5 leading causes of death in 2019?
- Heart disease
- Cancer
- Chronic lower respiratory disease
- Cerebrovascular disease
- Alzheimers
Who created the 5 patterns and 2 themes of death?
Philippe Aries
What is the first pattern of Death?
Tame death (5-9 centuries)
Attitudes toward death
- First typical pattern death related attitudes
- Death was on familiarity
- Children were present
Attitudes toward the dead
- Bodies were buried in public graves near churches
What is the second pattern of death?
Death of the self (12-13 centuries)
Attitudes towards death
- Image of last judgment (persons life flashing before him/her) death from the plague or Black Death was through to be god’s punishment
- Children were STILL present
Attitudes toward the dead
- Coffins were used for the upper class
- Coffins were covered with a cloth
- Body was sewn in shroud
What is the third pattern of death?
Remote and Imminent death (16-18 centuries) death is beautiful —-> frightening
Attitudes toward death
- Fear of death
- Skull and bones from tombs to furniture and fireplaces
Attitudes toward the dead
- Survivors kept some part of the loves on (hair/heart)
- Cemeteries moved away from churches
- The while (13-18 centuries)
What is the fourth pattern of death?
Death untamed (19th Century)
Attitudes toward death
- Relationships are broken by death (focus on survivors)
- Death brought release from suffering
- Death included all ages (especially children)
Attitudes toward the dead
- Spirit used instead of the soul - fear of cemeteries
- Private graves become more common
- People wore dark clothing to let others know they were mourning
- Photography of the dead
What is the fifth pattern of death?
Death Denied (forbidden death 20th century)
Attitudes toward death
- Tried is a private activity (not in public)
- Death is banished from view
Attitudes toward the dead
- Coffins are caskets
- Private graves and markers
- Attempt to make dead appear alive (sleeping)
- Family portraits taken with the dead
What is the sixth pattern of death?
Cult of death (David Brooks) 21st century
Attitudes toward dead
- death cafe
- Begin with the end in mind
Attitude toward the dead
- Is the funeral for the living or the dead?
What is death cafe?
At a Death Cafe people, often strangers, gather to eat cake, drink tea and discuss death. Our objective is ‘to increase awareness of death with a view to helping people make the most of their (finite) lives’. A Death Cafe is a group directed discussion of death with no agenda, objectives or themes.
What is an ethical will?
- The things that matter most to you in life
- Create a list of things you value in life
What are the 4 phases of self-mourning by Thomas Attig
Phase 1: An awareness of our own personal finiteness (accept reality of loss)
Phase 2: Coming to terms with the prospect that, like other in my like, I will also die one day (accept grief is painful)
Phase 3: Letting go of goals, desires, and wishes from the past by considering new objectives, dreams and hopes for the present and future (adjusting to the environment without deceased)
Phase 4: Finding meaning for one’s own life despite the constraints of time (find an enduring connection with the deceased in the midst of embarking on a new life)
