A year after the mysterious death of Petra, her twin sister Dash convinces the scattered and estranged members of her Scout troop to re-form in order to return to Exploration Expedition, the site of her sisters passing. Though the troop have all been dealing with the loss of their defacto leader in different ways, their arrival at Expedition forces them to work together to confront their guilt in the events surrounding Petra’s death and its effect on their own lives and friendships.

At seventeen, I lost my fourteen-year old brother in a shooting accident. After hearing the news of my brother’s death, my Great Aunt Mary wrote a letter to my family. The one line I remember was “I’ve heard that it takes three years to heal from the passing of a loved one.” Five years after Jacob’s death, I was once again confronted with losing a brother. Jaxon was born and died within twenty-four hours. I hadn’t yet “healed” from Jacob’s death, and I didn’t know how to do so. The elusive nature of memory when confronted with personal trauma calls into question issues of identity. Does the previous self still exist after loss? In this memoir I document the impact of tragic grief and how death not only informs how we perceive the future, but how we interpret our past selves. Through the tri-part structure, I experiment with viewpoint, beginning with a first person “I,” struggling to fit my brothers’ deaths into a single narrative line. From here, the narrative shatters as I reflect upon my childhood self with a different lens and the distance of third person--the self being so fractured, there is no “I” left. Finally, the memoir moves to direct address, speaking to Jacob. Jacob is now a “you,” an alive and vibrant presence that becomes a part of the narrator as she explores her grief and begins to piece herself back together. Through this exploration, she discovers that “healing” is complex and that art can both aid in the process and chart the path.

"Write about what you know" is a familiar mantra in fiction workshops, but writing facts or details about what is known doesn't necessarily create character or reveal conflict. The story must develop from the alchemy of these elements and stand as a whole, and the story must pull the reader into its own particular world. "The Nature of Grief" and other stories center around one character named Loren Shay and her experiences as a first-time teacher in the small rural town of Folkston, Georgia. With the exception of "Free," these stories represent her conflicts with students and faculty and her struggle to know herself through her experiences. She does not always succeed, but the mystery of her life changes and grows with her identity. I tried to experiment with style and structure in these stories. "The Nature of Grief," "Adultrysts," and "In The Blackout" are written in episodic scenes pieced together to form a whole. For inspiration and guidance, I studied Lorrie Moore's stories from __Self-Help__and Susan Minot's __Lust__. "10-30," "Quonda B.," amd "Free" are more conventional, following traditional lines of conflict and resolution. My main goal in writing this thesis was to inhabit the fictional voice and create a rich, dimensional world of how one woman dealt with her triumphs and losses during her first year as a teacher. / Thesis / Master

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Client satisfaction is recognized as an important indicator in performance monitoring and evaluation. The Silver Chain Grief Support Service was evaluated using client satisfaction as a performance indicator. Data were collected via mailed, telephone and personal interviews utilizing the Client Satisfaction Questionnarie-8, dimensions of the Evaluation Ranking Scale, and open-ended questions. Results indicate high levels of satisfaction with the service. Findings and limitations of the evaluation are discussed. Recommendations for improvement of the service are presented.

Despite the introduction of road safety measures and media campaigns, crashes are a leading cause of death in Western Australia. While economic costs of crashes are relatively easy to determine, their psychosocial burden remains appreciably under-studied, as are the social, cultural, historical, temporal, and political contexts within which grief experiences are housed. As such, I explored the experience of grief resulting from losing a loved one in a crash in Western Australia and described the influence of contextual factors on those grief experiences.

Thesis (M.F.A.) -- Montana State University -- Bozeman, 2006. / Typescript. Chairperson, Graduate Committee: N. Rick Pope.

Thesis (MSD(Play therapy))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Abstract in English and Afrikaans. Includes bibliographical references. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

Exposure to traumatic events has deleterious effect resulting in considerable psychological (cognitive and affective/emotional), physical and social impairments. In contrast to natural disasters, victims of man-made disasters have been reported to be vulnerable to severe psychological and psychiatric disorders affecting a large number of abilities and lasting for many years. Among the most common psychiatric diagnosis associated with violence exposure is the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Like adults, children and adolescents are not exempt from this situation. In 1994, Rwanda experienced an unprecedented genocide in which about 800.000 Tutsi, for their majority, were atrociously murdered (UN). This genocide generated multiple and massive stressors that may lead to severe and long-lasting PTSD among its survivors, including children and adolescents. Report on traumas exposure and psychological reactions to genocide among young survivors in Rwanda (Dyregrov et al., 2000) unanimously indicate a precarious situation. At the social level, children and adolescents heading household (CHH) are presumably the most vulnerable given their social deprivation. Moreover, the increased number of significant losses (parents, siblings, relatives, family and community cohesion) and the traumatic nature of the death predict traumatic grief among the young orphans of the genocide in Rwanda. The embedment of traumas and bereavement in this population is postulated to increase the likelihood of severe and persistent posttraumatic distress. With regard to the genocide in Rwanda, especially the extent of its damages; it is hypothesized that psychological consequences from such disaster are crucial. Considering social categories of young survivors, CHH are hypothesized to be vulnerable to several psychological sequels given their social and economic living conditions. The trauma exposure history, traumatic bereavement of key caretakers and attachment figures (parents and other relatives), lack of adult guardianship, insecure family structures and precarious social support are risk factors predicting poor outcomes. About the structure, this thesis consists of seven chapters, the general introduction and conclusion excluded. The two first chapters are theoretical and overview the literature related to PTSD (Chapter 1) and the association of trauma and bereavement (Chapter 2) resulting in a conjunction of PTSD and grief. They clarify issues related to symptoms and semiotic concepts, diagnostic and assessment protocols, and demonstrate how PTSD and grief can be embedded on certain aspects but not on others. At the empirical level, findings from PTSD prevalence (chapter 3) and the association of PTSD and grief (chapter 4) among young people survivors of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda are presented. Furthermore, continuous exposure to post-genocide trauma reminders, deleterious socio-economic life conditions, coping strategies and PTSD comorbidity are presented as major risk factors to persistent and complex post-traumatic distress (Chapter 5). Finally, given our findings, a rumination focused cognitive and behavioural therapeutic (RFCBT) protocol is tested in a pilot sample (Chapters 6) and in a Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) (chapter 7).

Loss is an inevitable human experience. How each individual reacts to loss may be affected by various factors among these is ones attachment style. The present studies examine the ultimate form of loss, the death of a significant attachment relationship in ones life. Specifically, the research focuses on how people respond to and cope with the death of an attachment figure. In so doing, the relationship between grief and attachment theory is discussed and an integrated model of grief and attachment is proposed, which accounts for various differences in how individuals respond to the death of an attachment figure in adulthood.<p> Study 1 examined the notion that in order to maintain an ongoing relationship with a deceased person and engage in behaviours that maintain this relationship, one must have had a close relationship to the deceased prior to his or her death. Seventy-three undergraduate students who reported having experienced the death of someone they knew were recruited to complete the online survey. This study utilized a measure specifically designed for the present research, the Ongoing Relationship Scale (Waskowic & Chartier, 2006), to demonstrate the necessity of a close relationship in order to engage in behaviours that maintain an ongoing relationship with the deceased.<p> The ORS was used to distinguish between whether one perceived engaging in ongoing behaviours with the deceased attachment figure as positive or negative, that is, whether engaging in certain behaviours brought an individual comfort or discomfort. The findings showed that those who identified themselves as having had a closer relationship to the deceased were more likely to engage in behaviours consistent with maintaining an ongoing relationship; whereas those who did not report having had a close relationship to the deceased were less likely to do so. Preliminary psychometric data for the ORS demonstrated good reliability. Convergent and discriminant validity for the measure are also provided.<p> Study 2 extends the findings from the first study by exploring a specific type of close relationship, the attachment relationship, and how one copes with the grief upon the death of the attachment figure. One hundred and ninety three participants who experienced the death of either a partner or parent were recruited to participate in the study. Participants were asked to complete a survey containing measures of attachment style, relationship closeness, grief, coping with the loss, interpersonal dependency, ongoing relationship with the deceased, and resilience. Utilizing Stroebe, Schut, and Stroebes (2005) Dual Processing Model and OLeary and Ickovicss (1995) Outcome of Challenge Model the differences in coping with the death of an attachment figure were explored based on ones type of attachment. Based on the findings from the present research that there are differences between the four types of attachment (i.e., secure, preoccupied, fearful, and dismissing) in how each copes with the death of a significant attachment figure, a new comprehensive model of grief, which integrates previous theories within an attachment theoretical framework is offered. This new model, referred to as the Grief Attachment Model, accounts for observed differences in the way people cope with the death of a significant attachment figure in their lives, and suggests that researchers focus on the attachment relationship to explain variability in a persons grief response.<p> The results of Study 2 provide support for this new integrated model and encourage others to consider using attachment theory, and its theoretical speculations, for how individuals with different attachment styles (i.e., secure, preoccupied, fearful, and dismissing) will respond to the death of an attachment figure in adulthood.<p> The present studies findings advance our understanding of the relationship between attachment theory and grief in that they go beyond present theory and provide empirical data for the current theoretical assertions. Further, the findings are reported in regards to specific attachment styles, rather than the secure versus insecure distinction that has been more commonly utilized when conducting research on attachment style differences. Implications and directions for future research are also proposed.