...significant life events Introduction The social change such as passing away of a loved one makes a lot of impact on the behavior and the individuals, especially when they are aged or disabled. The case study points out to an elderly lady, who is mentally disadvantaged and the impact of the passing away of her spouse of 40 years. In this short reflection, we are going to assess the Physical, Psychological and Social Impact of Bereavement on Individuals, look at the different group responses to the bereavement of individuals and the impact and implication of the people in health and social care when an individual is bereaved. 1.1 Explain the impact of significant life events on individuals. Bereavement is the condition of having being deprived of something or someone valued, especially through death. The individual feels yearning, pining and longing for the one who has died. The bereaved feels empty inside. It can greatly impact the way in which a person deals with events in later stages of life. We also call it grief. One of the biggest reasons of grief in humans is the loss of loved ones. The grief can have multifaceted effects on physical, psychological and social behavior of the people. When grief overpowers an individual, he can be adversely affected in various ways. If an individual hears the news of loss of loved ones, this shock causes the adrenal system to release adrenaline steroids in body causing a variety of physical reactions. It can cause physical ailments...
Words: 3059 - Pages: 13
...people who have been bereaved whilst they are on the cusp of adulthood can find the emotions that they are experiencing to be frighteningly intense. Grief is individual and the processes of mourning are never the same between two people. However some of the responses to death and bereavement can be similar depending on the age, level of comprehension, relationship with the person who has died and the emotional resilience of the mourner. The following responses are common Alternating play and sadness Members of the school staff may be the first to recognise changes in the bereaved child or young person’s behaviour outside of their immediate family, who may not have noticed if they too are grieving. Young children may appear to be sad and withdrawn one minute then might begin playing with building blocks or dolls the next. This is because unlike adults, bereaved children do not possess the emotional reserves to grieve continuously and they will need respite from their grief. Play allows the bereaved child to shift their focus from their grief, albeit for a short while, until they are sufficiently mentally restored to recommence grieving. It is of paramount importance not to view such play breaks as the child “getting over the death” because this is not only inaccurate but can lead to the child being chastised or criticised for attention seeking when they resume grieving. Play breaks are just that – momentary breaks from perpetual grief which the bereaved child does not have...
Words: 1242 - Pages: 5
...workplace. This literature review explores what grief is, its processes, the different impacts loss and grief have on the workplace, and the various ways to cope up with the grieving process – from the bereaved, co-workers, and employer’s perspective. Introduction People can experience personal and professional losses from many different sources. Losses can result from a death or any significant life-changing event such as job loss, relationship loss, loss of home, the diagnosis of a life-threatening disease and other more private losses like experiencing a miscarriage (Dr. Kristi Dyer, 2009). Understandably, grief, the response to these losses, can and most often does follow employees and employers alike into the workplace, affecting people's work performance on several different levels (Dr. Kristi Dyer, 2009). What is Grief and it’s Process? Grief is a natural painful response to loss. It’s the emotional suffering an individual feels when something or someone he loves is taken away. Like all other emotions it can be unpredictable and usually incorporates sadness, fear, and guilt after any particular loss. If someone associates grief with the death of a loved one, this type of loss often causes the most intense grief that incorporates unbearable pain to the bereaved individual (Melinda & Jeanne, 2012). Moreover, grief is experienced from the moment we start breathing, we tend to loose the secure and safe world of the mother’s womb to arrive in a loud, cold...
Words: 3158 - Pages: 13
..."when the bough breaks" in real life until I found myself with a close friend one night, trying to comprehend the loss of her older brother, who had just been killed in a car accident. The circumstances required me not only to cope with my own sense of grief but also to understand and respond to the intense trauma her and her parents were experiencing. Since that night, I have considered how parents respond when a child dies. Given the complexity and gravity of individual human responses, I hope is that this paper will provide insight into my experience as well as help members of families and friends to better understand how the loss of a child affects parents and siblings while highlighting ways to provide meaningful support. For most bereaved parents, the consequences of the death of a child cannot adequately be expressed in words. Despite extreme efforts to empathize, those who have not experienced a child's death cannot fully know what it is like. However, I have found that knowledge surrounding bereavement can provide a helpful glimpse of understanding, as well as ideas for how to respond to parents and needs when their child dies. For most people, our family defines who we are. We do not identify ourselves simply as mothers, fathers, spouses, in-laws, or grandparents, but as family members. For example, "I am not a mother of 3 children. I am a mother of Haley, Emma and Brent." A child's death challenges our sense of identity. It is best summed up by a quote I read from...
Words: 2069 - Pages: 9
...Control and Prevention (CDC), 42,328 children died in the year of 2013. Due to the prevalence rate of pediatric mortality, the National Institute of Health (NIH) launched a campaign to increase the accessibility of palliative care for these children, to reduce the suffering of the terminal patient and his/her family (National Institute of Health, 2016). The World Health Organization (WHO) defines palliative care for children as a service that is provided to the terminally ill and their families to alleviate and prevent the suffering of both the patient and their loved ones. Palliative care addresses physical, spiritual, psychological, and social stressors in the family’s life from the time of the diagnosis to the death of the child. Following the death of the child, most palliative care organizations provide a type of bereavement support...
Words: 1555 - Pages: 7
...Anjana Khadka Student ID No: S00133749 Discuss how developmental factors are important in the way a 5 year old child conceptualizes and responds to loss. Introduction Almost every person in the world, at one time or another, experiences events that can be considered major losses (Harvey and Weber 1998). Loss weather personal, material, or symbolic will affect us all, children too can face different levels and types of losses (Hooyman and Kramer, 2006; Viorist, 1986) cited in The Person Health and Wellbeing,(1st ed.,pp.211). There is a misconception in our society that children cannot understand or have little knowledge about death. But children of various ages and stages understand death and loss in different ways. (TRAUMA AND LOSS: Research and Interventions, Volume 3, Number 1, 2003) Jean Piaget cognitive stages of development in children are proved to be very important in children’s understanding of death, dying and grief. Childhood grief and development factors are interrelated: the age and stage of development of a child at the time of his or her parent’s death will strongly influence the ways in which the child reacts and adapts to the loss.( Garber, 1988, p. 272) The Death of a Parent: Healing Children’s Grief September( 3rd, 2009);Beth Patterson, MA, LP) A child Understanding of Death A child understanding of death occurs in the age 5-7, when according to Piaget’s theory child progress through preoperational stage of development to concrete-operational stage. (Kenyon...
Words: 1285 - Pages: 6
...dead and the clinical writings of J. Bowlby (1980) and V. D. Volkan (1981) on maladaptive variants of CB expression. The aim is to highlight the value of the attachment literature on unresolved loss in clarifying the conditions under which CB is likely to be maladaptive. There is increasing agreement among bereavement theorists and practitioners that an ongoing attachment to the deceased can be an integral part of successful adaptation to bereavement (Klass, Silverman, & Nickman, 1996). This position, commonly known as the ‘‘continuing bonds’’ perspective, is counter to that presented by Freud (1917=1957) in his classic work ‘‘Mourning and Melancholia,’’ in which he proposed that successful adaptation to loss required the bereaved to detach his or her psychic investment in the deceased, or ‘‘relinquish’’ his or her attachment to the deceased, in order to complete the mourning process. Much of the bereavement literature on the continuing bond to the deceased (CB) has emphasized its adaptiveness while paying minimal attention to conditions under which it may be maladaptive (Fraley & Shaver, 1999). Despite its value in identifying CB as a normative aspect of...
Words: 6138 - Pages: 25
...CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Grief was not a subject of scholarly attention until recently. Although assumed to be experienced since the beginnings of human attachments and separations, Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, was the first one to make a thorough study of grief and loss. His early paper “Mourning and Melancholia”, published in 1917, is regarded as a classic text on bereavement (Mallon, 2008). He contributed the idea that grief is not “pathological” and that grief occurs not only for the loss of a loved one but also for things, values, and statuses (Walter & McCoyd, 2009). Since then, the study of grief had been popularized. More experts have specialized in the field and more publications regarding death and grief were released. Kübler-Ross, Doka, Bowlby, and Worden are just few names who had pioneered the study of grief and other related studies. And in fact, a new field of science had been found which includes the study of grief; that is thanatology. Indeed, the study of grief was granted what academic interest it had been lacking before. The sudden spurt of studies in this field has certainly increased people’s understanding of grief in certain aspects. But it is ironic that despite being a subject of thorough research, the experience of grief remains more or less a vague occurrence which people has to go through at some point in their lives. Attempts had been made in defining grief but the definitions given by different theorists still vary to...
Words: 3692 - Pages: 15
...is dead and the clinical writings of J. Bowlby (1980) and V. D. Volkan (1981) on maladaptive variants of CB expression. The aim is to highlight the value of the attachment literature on unresolved loss in clarifying the conditions under which CB is likely to be maladaptive. There is increasing agreement among bereavement theorists and practitioners that an ongoing attachment to the deceased can be an integral part of successful adaptation to bereavement (Klass, Silverman, & Nickman, 1996). This position, commonly known as the ‘‘continuing bonds’’ perspective, is counter to that presented by Freud (1917=1957) in his classic work ‘‘Mourning and Melancholia,’’ in which he proposed that successful adaptation to loss required the bereaved to detach his or her psychic investment in the deceased, or ‘‘relinquish’’ his or her attachment to the deceased, in order to complete the mourning process. Much of the bereavement literature on the continuing bond to the deceased (CB) has emphasized its adaptiveness while paying minimal attention to conditions under which it may be maladaptive (Fraley & Shaver, 1999). Despite its value in identifying CB as a normative aspect of bereavement...
Words: 6120 - Pages: 25
...Nurses and other Healthcare providers need to assist and support individuals and families in many different situations. Nurses who encounter an expected death or an unexpected death of a patient need to be aware of proper care for an individual or family who is bereaved. The individual or family involved may grieve differently depending on the nature of the loss and the grieving person’s needs, which can be challenging for the Nurse. “Caring for people whose relatives have died suddenly and unexpectedly is one of the most difficult and challenging events to which healthcare professionals must respond” (Purves & Edwards, 2005) and “The healthcare team’s response to bereavement can play a valuable role in the recovery process, and they need to...
Words: 525 - Pages: 3
...there were 499,331 deaths registered in England and Wales, a rise of 3.1% compared with 2011. Almost half of these occurred in National Health Service Hospitals. (Office for National Statistics, 2012). These figures indicate a substantial amount of individuals dying in a hospital setting each year, therefore a large proportion of patients will be receiving some form of care prior to and at death (Blackwell 2010 p.1). Numerous research studies have been carried out by theorists identifying the impact of bereavement on different individuals. The earliest thorough study of grief and loss developed from Freud with his classic paper ‘Mourning and Melancholia’ (Freud 1917 cited in Payne et al 1999). Freud believed that for the bereaved to detach from the deceased one must work through their grief by reviewing memories and thoughts of the deceased (Ellman 2010). Other theorists have recently identified death and the importance of understanding it. 'Death is a natural progression from life. Most nurses will be exposed to the physical and emotional effects of this experience as they care for a dying patient. The nurse is taught how to provide support for the patient and family as they proceed through the stages of grief. Often, however the nurse may not realise his or her own need to grieve'. (Brosche 2003 p. 173). Although nurses try to remain professional whilst at work, once they are home and the uniform is removed , emotions that were kept at bay...
Words: 3385 - Pages: 14
...and reflections; they talk of the powerful and often conflicting emotions involved in "the pain of grief and the spiral of mourning; [they refer to] the heartbreak at the heart of things...grief's contradictions"; they speak of parents devastated by grief (Moffat 1992, xxiii). It is frequently said that the grief of bereaved parents is the most intense grief known. When a child dies, parents feel that a part of them has died, that a vital and core part of them has been ripped away. Bereaved parents indeed do feel that the death of their child is "the ultimate deprivation" (Arnold and Gemma 1994, 40). The grief caused by their child's death is not only painful but profoundly disorienting-children are not supposed to die. These parents are forced to confront an extremely painful and stressful paradox; they are faced with a situation in which they must deal both with the grief caused by their child's death and with their inherent need to continue to live their own lives as fully as possible. Thus, bereaved parents must deal with the contradictory burden of wanting to be free of this overwhelming pain and yet needing it as a reminder of the child who died. Bereaved parents continue to be parents of the child who died. They will always feel the...
Words: 14595 - Pages: 59
...Enhancing end-of-life care (EoLC) is a core component of international governments’ health policies. Across the globe, nurses make significant contributions to EoLC and, at this delicate time, have the power to positively influence the health and wellbeing of those facing death. Indeed, health promotion is a core component of the nurse’s role. Originating in the UK, EoLC pathways have been adopted around the world.Their broad aim is to optimise the quality of the dying process, enabling people to ‘die well’ across care settings. This paper examines EoLC pathways in terms of promoting health and wellbeing in this discrete stage of the dying trajectory. Concepts of health and health promotion are described briefly and the idea of health-promoting palliative care and its association with a good death examined. The ensuing discussion relates to two EoLC documents. While acknowledging that much has been achieved it is argued that, despite the potential for promoting health and wellbeing, a professionally led, biomedical approach predominates, and in terms of promoting health and wellbeing at the end of life there is a pressing need for proactive advance care planning at an earlier point in the illness trajectory. Key words: End-of-life care l Care pathways l Terminal care l Health promotion Michael Allen is Staff Nurse, Chemotherapy Day Unit, Singleton Hospital, Abertawe Bro- Morgannwg University Hospital Board, Swansea, Wales; Tessa Watts is Senior Lecturer, Swansea University,...
Words: 5422 - Pages: 22
...disease progresses, patients will need advanced care. This poses a burden to our society, as it will create an enormous strain on the health care system,...
Words: 1581 - Pages: 7
...opposed to modern ones. Unfortunately, the American funeral customs put a lot of more emphasis on some activities that turn out to be very costly. Worst of all, the economic burden that this traditions put on the bereaved families is even more detrimental. Most of the old folks are the greatest defenders and proponents of the traditional funeral customs. Since these are people who have the greatest if not the final say when it comes to family matters, many American families have found themselves becoming slaves of this old and outdates funeral practices whose greatest achievement is soaring the expenses of such a process. Yes, that is very true. American funerals are one of the most expensive funerals to undertake in the whole world. The funerals expenses plans or insurances have done nothing but to augment the funerals expenses as well (Leamy). It is very important for Americans to realize that there are many hidden charges that come with such plans. Funeral rituals have remained part of the American funeral process for many years. Just like in other parts of the world, the history of the funeral services in an American setting is a history of mankind as well. Funeral customs date as old as civilization itself. Every culture and civilization attends to the proper care of their dead (Misarina 81). Every culture and civilization ever studied has three things in common that relate to death and the disposition of the dead. The first...
Words: 1673 - Pages: 7
