The purpose of the current study was to test the effects of participation in a treatment grief choir vs. standard care grief group (verbal) on bereaved persons’ perceived grief, coping, energy, social support and health and to examine the experiences of those participating in both groups. In this mixed-methods study, the results from the qualitative phenomenological focus groups were used for explaining and interpreting the findings of the Randomized Control Trial (RCT). Within the RCT, five people completed the treatment grief choir and four completed the standard care grief group (N=9). A repeated-measures ANOVA was employed to detect any statistical significance among the adult grievers. A significant within-subjects effect was found in both groups for the Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) start-of-session grief, NRS end-of- session grief, Hogan Grief Reaction Checklist (HGRC), and NRS end-of-session coping measures. These results indicate that both groups showed significant improvement over time in these areas. A between-subjects effect was found for the NRS end-of-session grief and for the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS) with the standard care grief group scoring significantly better over time than the treatment grief choir. Finally, one interaction effect was found for the NRS end-of-session health scores at week sixteen, with a significant gain for the standard care grief group. For the qualitative portion of this study, five members of the treatment grief choir and three of the four members from the standard care grief group participated in separate focus group interviews. A seventeen-step analysis of the interview data was employed to discover meaningful descriptions and experiences while maintaining validity and integrity of the process. The following categories emerged from the analysis of the treatment grief choir interview: The Grief Choir Did Help; Songs were Important in Grief; Making Musical Connections Helped; Interactions with Grievers were Valued; The Music Therapists Influenced the Experience; and Gained Insights about Grief. The following categories emerged from the standard care grief group: Standard Care Did Help; Timing and Composition of Group Mattered; Standard Care was a Complex Experience; and The Experience of Being in Research. Recommendations for future grief choirs and standard care grief groups are discussed. / Music Therapy

published_or_final_version / abstract / Clinical Psychology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

published_or_final_version / Mental Health / Master / Master of Social Sciences

This thesis explores how the ancient Near Eastern Book of Lamentations can be read and interpreted cross-culturally today, so that the reader stays with the structure of the text but also listens to the spontaneity of cries from a bereft and humiliated people as they grapple with grief. The first part sets the scene and develops a hermeneutical model: a double-stranded helix, which demonstrates the tensions between the textual form and psychological content of Lamentations 1-5. The two strands are connected by three cross-strands, which representat frameworks, cries and metaphorical images introduced by the opening stanza of each lyric. In the second part, the model becomes the basis for an examination of the frameworks of the Lamentation lyrics and of psychological grief, which together demonstrate how regular patterns are difficult to maintain without interuuption, so an analysis of the translation of cries of lament shows how strong feeling of emotion become audible or are silenced as they break through the containment of traditional borders and structures. In the third part motifs already introduced by the forms of frameworks and the sounds of cries are developed further, through metaphotical imagery. Through this fresh approach each poem becomes a new venture by means of stance, voice, and dynamic movement, as communities of men, women and children develop coping strategies for feelings of grief.

The original contribution to the body of knowledge in this thesis explores the lived experience of males who have experienced grief following the loss of a significant other. Natural male grief, as defined in this study, is a painful reaction for a bereaved male in the absence of complicated or pathological symptoms; as defined in International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) (WHO 1990) or the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV)(American Psychiatric Association 2000) categories. Natural grief is whereby, an individual manages to continue their activities of daily living, without additional support from health services for their grief. Unfortunately, defining the term "natural grief" had additional challenges as the bereavement literature is flourished with pathology-focused studies (Rothaupt and Becker 2007). Little evidence exists in the nursing literature regarding the topic of natural male grief and this study set out to address this gap. The methodological approach used in this study was that of hermeneutic phenomenology as influenced by Hans-Georg Gadamer (1976). Using purposive sampling, thirteen men openly shared their grief stories in unstructured tape recorded interviews. Finally, the data was manually analysed to generate the themes of the findings. The findings in the study discuss the importance families play in natural grief and the reforming of family bonds after a bereavement, especially for eldest sons; the importance of death language in bereavement especially in relation to grief stories, euphemisms, black humour, self-talk and "not talking ill of the dead"; the importance of the empty chair syndrome; the hierarchical bereavement pyramid; compartmentalisation and orchestration of grief. It is recommended that further research be undertaken to examine issues raised in this study, and guide practitioners against stereotypical assumptions in relation to male grief and the importance of family dynamics.

M.Ed. (Educational Psychology) / Storytelling as a therapeutic intervention entails the narrating of events by externalising emotions, thoughts and responses to life-changing events such as loss and grief. This creates the opportunity for clients to engage with psychologists by projecting various beliefs and challenges, such as grief, through a range of therapeutic modalities. This study conducts an inquiry into the ways in which storytelling can be utilised by educational psychologists with adolescent clients to address behavioural challenges relating to grief. This qualitative study therefore aims to facilitate an understanding of the use and benefits of storytelling as a therapeutic intervention. This has been achieved by examining interviews with four educational psychologists who have utilised storytelling as a therapeutic intervention with adolescent clients to overcome challenges with grief. The participants (educational psychologists) discussed case studies during interviews, which provided evidence of their practical administration of storytelling as a therapeutic intervention incorporating integrated theoretical approaches through the use of blended therapeutic techniques. Behavioural challenges relating to grief were also predominant in the case study information provided by the participants. The participants further confirmed that the term ‘grief’ included different types of loss that were experienced among adolescent clients ...

About Her is a story of grief, regret, and the lengths some of us will go to avoid confronting and healing from trauma. Charlotte Day is a twenty-year-old college student embarking on her senior year of college when her younger sister Abby dies in a botched fake suicide attempt. In the wake of said tragedy, Charlotte is left behind with her loving, well-intentioned father and sedated, increasingly distant mother. As Charlotte attempts to cling to normalcy, her efforts fail once she returns to school, seeking out a path of unhealthy relationships and partying, which culminates in the former honors student dropping out of her senior year. A coming-of-age story at its core, About Her explores the dysfunctional ways one young woman navigates grief and fractured relationships while learning to forgive herself along the way. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.F.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2019. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

b o y is an extended lyric poem/essay that uses repetition, fragment, and syntax to continually build a form that continually falls apart. The poem is both a meditation and an investigation into loss, and into the relationship of loss to identity, with making a poem, and with holding on to something. What does mourning look like and how does it change as it accrues? How is mourning inherited? This work does not claim release; it reenvisions or argues against narratives that insist that the end of great loss is to "let go," "set free" or "rest."

The poems that comprise Murmuration are an act of vigilance in the face of loss. At certain moments in the distorted timeline of grief one searches the remaining world around them for signs of the beloved, signs that they are not simply gone but instead transformed or dispersed into another way of being. In this looking one's relationship to the external world undergoes a radical transformation of its own and demands a sustained attention from the bereaved that often draws from, but ultimately outruns cataloguing acts of memory. These poems attempt to render the movements of that attention as it learns to track a body made formless. These are moments of a consciousness dispersed in language as it follows the undulations, ambiguities, absences, presences, and transformations of form after death. Here, the speaker of these poems listens and watches for the languages of the transformed in whatever form they take; an attempt to listen to the murmur and eventually to learn to murmur back.

This study investigated the relationship between intensity of grief and coping patterns of parents of individuals affected by psychotic disorders. The study investigated the intensity of grief in a sample of parents of individuals with psychotic disorders in Western Australia to determine if the results replicate international studies. It further examined if the characteristics of the psychotic disorders of children, had an impact on the grief reactions of parents and if the disorder had a measurable impact on the nature of the relationship between parents and children. The study also identified specific coping strategies that parents consider as being most helpful to them in dealing with their grief, the relationship between intensity of grief and coping patterns of respondents and gender differences in grieving and coping strategies. The research findings suggest that there is measurable grief in a cross section of parents of individuals with psychotic disorders in Western Australia with many similarities to studies done internationally. The findings also suggest that this grief increases in intensity from the time of first diagnosis and peaks at 1-2 years after diagnosis and again 20 years after diagnosis. There was a strong association between past behaviours related to grief reactions and present feelings related to grief. To the best of my knowledge, these findings have not been reported before. IV Certain characteristics of the disorder of children had an impact on the grief reactions of the parents. Higher levels of grief were reported in parents whose children needed frequent assistance with personal care and children with a late onset of the disorder. / There was a positive correlation in parents who had a close relationship with the child before the onset of the disorder and following onset of the disorder suggesting that the disorder did not affect the relationship. To the best of my knowledge, these findings have not been reported before. While this research has replicated other studies, it has also researched coping strategies that have not been identified before. Although cognitive coping strategies were most frequently used by parents and subjectively found to be more helpful, parents using predominantly behavioural methods of coping showed less intensity in their grief. Parents oscillated between approaching the feelings of grief and distracting themselves from them, which highlighted the idiosyncratic nature of coping. Although there were no gender differences in the intensity of grief, there were distinct differences in coping strategies used by fathers and mothers. These findings have important implications for social work practice and policy development within the mental health settings of Western Australia.