Disenfranchised grief is a term coined by Dr. Kenneth J. Doka in 1989. This concept describes the fact that some forms of grief are not acknowledged on a personal or societal level in modern day Eurocentric culture. For example, those around you may not view your loss as a significant loss, and they may think you don’t have the right to grieve. They might not like how you may or may not be expressing your grief, and thus they may feel uncomfortable, or judgmental. This is not a conscious way of thinking for most individuals, as it is deeply engrained in our psyche. This can be extremely isolating, and push you to question the depth of your grief and the loss you’ve experienced. This concept is viewed as a ”type of grief”, but it more so can be viewed as a "side effect" of grief. This also is not only applicable to grief in the case of death, but also the many other forms of grief. There are few support systems, rituals, traditions, or institutions such as bereavement leave available to those experiencing grief and loss. [1]
Even widely recognized forms of grief can become disenfranchised when well-meaning friends and family attempt to set a time limit on a bereaved person's right to grieve. For example, the need to regulate mourning and restore a state of normal work activity severely impacted the grieving process of victims of the Oklahoma City bombing, according to American scholar Edward Linenthal. Grieving for deceased children was redefined as post-traumatic stress disorder if parents were not "over it" within two weeks. [2]
Examples of events that may lead to disenfranchised grief include:
Sometimes, people believe that a particular person is not capable of grieving. This commonly happens with very young children and with disabled people. [5]
Additionally, grieving people may be disenfranchised because of their circumstances.
Loss of a grandchild can be extremely difficult for a grandparent, but the grandparent's grief is often disenfranchised because they are not part of the immediate family. Attention and support is given to the child's parents and siblings, but the grandparent's grief is two-fold as they have not only grieving the loss of their grandchild, but are also grieving for their adult children who have lost the child. This phenomenon is termed double-grief by Davidson [11] and it makes bereavement even more difficult.
Loss of an ex-spouse is disenfranchised due to the lack of a current or ongoing personal relationship between the former couple. Although the marriage has ended, the relationship has not, and there are ties between the two people that will forever be there including: shared children, mutual friendships, and financial connections. Research has shown that those couples who never resolved conflicts after the relationship ended experienced much more grief than those who had. [11] The grievers experience guilt and thoughts of "what might have been", similar to those of widows. [11]
Loss of a child by adoption is often disenfranchised because the decision to give a child up for adoption is voluntary, and therefore it is not acceptable by society to grieve. Birth mothers lack support, and are expected to just move on and pretend the child does not exist. Many birth mothers experience regret and have thoughts of what might have been or of reuniting with the child. [11]
Many types of relationships are not legitimized by society; therefore when one person in the relationship dies, the other may not have their grief legitimized and it can become disenfranchised. For example, following the death of a partner in a homosexual relationship, societal supports can tend to prioritize the immediate family, invalidating the significance of the romantic relationship and loss for the grieving partner (McNutt & Yakushko, 2013).
Another example may be a former partner, such as the death of an ex-spouse (a person who the griever was previously married to, but eventually divorced). The death of an ex-spouse does not typically receive the same recognition as the death of a current spouse. Another type of relationship is one in which the griever and the person who died did not necessarily have a close personal relationship. This relationship may include coworkers, doctor and nurse relationships with patients, or even people that the griever does not know personally at all, such as celebrities. [12] Relationships formed online are often not recognized or validated by society, for example where friendships are made through online games and social media. However, when one person dies, the griever or person that did not die in the relationship will often experience disenfranchised grief (Doka, 1989).
There are many models for dealing with grief. The Kübler-Ross model describes grieving in five steps or stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance (Kübler-Ross, 1969). In other words, in order to begin grieving one must first endorse the loss, and then express emotion. The griever must then accept the loss and adjust to the change the death or loss caused in his or her life (Cordaro, 2012). Over the years, however, how grief is conceptualised has moved away from predictable stages that lead to 'recovery' or 'closure', towards an understanding of grief that addresses the complexity and diversity of the grieving experience (Australian Psychological Society, 2016). Models such as Worden's tasks of grief (2008) and the dual-process model (Stroebe and Schutt, 1999) offer frameworks for dealing with grief in a way that enhances the self awareness of the grieving person (Australian Psychological Society, 2016).
Disenfranchised grief presents some complications that are not always present in other grieving processes. First, there are usually intensified reactions to death or loss. For example, the griever may become more depressed or angry due to not being able to fully express his or her grief. Secondly, disenfranchised grief means society does not recognize the death or loss; therefore, the griever does not receive strong social support and may be isolated. As disenfranchised grief is not legitimized by others, the bereaved person may be denied access to rituals, ceremonies, or the right to express their thoughts and emotions (McKissock & McKissock, 1998). When supporting someone through disenfranchised grief it is important to acknowledge and validate their loss and grief (McKissock & McKissock, 1998).
Mourning is the expression of an experience that is the consequence of an event in life involving loss, causing grief, occurring as a result of someone's death, specifically someone who was loved, although loss from death is not exclusively the cause of all experience of grief.
Grief is the response to the loss of something deemed important, particularly to the loss of someone or some living thing that has died, to which a bond or affection was formed. Although conventionally focused on the emotional response to loss, grief also has physical, cognitive, behavioral, social, cultural, spiritual and philosophical dimensions. While the terms are often used interchangeably, bereavement refers to the state of loss, while grief is the reaction to that loss.
According to the model of the five stages of grief, those experiencing grief go through five emotions: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Although it is in common use, studies have not confirmed these stages, and the model has been criticized as outdated as well as unhelpful in explaining the grieving process.
The loss of a pet or an animal to which one has become emotionally bonded oftentimes results in grief which can be comparable with the death of a human loved one, or even greater, depending on the individual. The death can be felt more intensely when the owner has made a decision to end the pet's life through euthanasia. While there is strong evidence that animals can feel such loss for other animals, this article focuses on human feelings, when an animal is lost, dies or otherwise is departed.
Anticipatory grief refers to a feeling of grief occurring before an impending loss. Typically, the impending loss is the death of someone close due to illness. This can be experienced by dying individuals themselves and can also be felt due to non-death-related losses like a scheduled mastectomy, pending divorce, company downsizing, or war.
A broken heart is a metaphor for the intense emotional stress or pain one feels at experiencing great loss or deep longing. The concept is cross-cultural, often cited with reference to unreciprocated or lost love.
Grief counseling is a form of psychotherapy that aims to help people cope with the physical, emotional, social, spiritual, and cognitive responses to loss. These experiences are commonly thought to be brought on by a loved person's death, but may more broadly be understood as shaped by any significant life-altering loss.
Effects of adoption on the birth mother include stigma and other psychological effects a woman experiences when she places her child for adoption.
The terms delayed grief and unresolved grief are variations of grieving after a loss. The meaning of unresolved grief is any aspect of grieving that has yet to be resolved.
Ambiguous loss is a loss that occurs without a significant likelihood of reaching emotional closure or a clear understanding. This kind of loss leaves a person searching for answers, and thus complicates and delays the process of grieving, and often results in unresolved grief. Some examples are infertility, termination of pregnancy, disappearance of a family member, death of an ex-spouse, and a family member being physically alive but in a state of cognitive decline due to Alzheimer's disease or dementia. An ambiguous loss can be categorized into two types of loss: physical or psychological. Physical loss and psychological loss differ in terms of what is being grieved for, the loss of the physical body, or the psychological mind. Experiencing an ambiguous loss can lead to personal questions, such as, "Am I still married to my missing spouse?," or "Am I still a child to a parent who no longer remembers me?". Since the grief process in an ambiguous loss is halted, it is harder to cope or move on to acceptance from the type of loss experienced. There are various types of grief that can occur due to the type of ambiguity experienced and corresponding therapy techniques to address the certain types of grief. The overall goal of therapy to cope with ambiguous loss is to overcome the trauma associated with it and restore resilience.
Compassionate Friends UK (TCF) is a peer support group operating in the United Kingdom. It is a registered charity formed by and for parents whose children have died, irrespective of the child's age at death and the cause of death, and is independent of any religious, philosophical or government body.
The Dougy Center, The National Center for Grieving Children & Families is a nonprofit organization based in Portland, Oregon that offers support groups and services to grieving children and young adults. Its peer support program and network of children's grief services make the organization the first of its kind in the United States. 500 independent programs around the world are based on its model, more than 300 of which have staff who were trained by the organization's staff. The Dougy Center serves 400 children and 250 adults from the Portland metropolitan area each month, free of charge. Its main building is located in the Creston-Kenilworth neighborhood, and its satellite locations in Canby and Hillsboro are called The Dougy Center Walker's House and The Dougy Center Linklater Commons, respectively.
In psychology, meaning-making is the process of how people construe, understand, or make sense of life events, relationships, and the self.
Intuitive grief and instrumental grief are two patterns of grieving styles identified by psychologists Terry Martin and Kenneth Doka.
The dual process model of coping is a model for coping with grief developed by Margaret Stroebe and Henk Schut. They studied grief in their work "The Dual Process Model of Coping with Bereavement: A Decade On". It examines this model of coping and how it could be of benefit compared to others.
Bo's Place, established in 1990, is a nonprofit organization based in Houston, Texas. It offers free support programs for children, ages 3 to 18, and their families who have experienced the death of a child or an adult in their immediate family, as well as programs for grieving adults. Services include grief support groups offered in English and Spanish, community outreach programs, education and training, and an information and referral line staffed by mental health professionals. The referral line assists individuals that have experienced a death as well as family, friends, co-workers or other concerned individuals who want guidance to support the bereaved. Bo's Place serves over 1,200 children and adults each year and families stay an average of 14 to 16 months.
Miscarriage and grief are both an event and subsequent process of grieving that develops in response to a miscarriage. Almost all those experiencing a miscarriage experience grief. This event is often considered to be identical to the death of a child and has been described as traumatic. "Devastation" is another descriptor of miscarriage. Grief is a profound, intensely personal sadness stemming from irreplaceable loss, often associated with sorrow, heartache, anguish, and heartbreak. Sadness is an emotion along with grief, on the other hand, is a response to the loss of the bond or affection was formed and is a process rather than one single emotional response. Grief is not equivalent to depression. Grief also has physical, cognitive, behavioral, social, cultural, and philosophical dimensions. Bereavement and mourning refer to the ongoing state of loss, and grief is the reaction to that loss. Emotional responses may be bitterness, anxiety, anger, surprise, fear, and disgust and blaming others; these responses may persist for months. Self-esteem can be diminished as another response to miscarriage. Not only does miscarriage tend to be a traumatic event, women describe their treatment afterwards to be worse than the miscarriage itself.
Child bereavement occurs when a child loses someone of importance in their life. There is substantial research regarding grief in adults, but there is less focus in literature about grief among children. Children will experience instances in their life that could involve losing a parent, sibling, or friend through suicide, unintentional injury, homicide, or natural causes. The levels of grief and bereavement differ among children, including uncomplicated and complicated bereavement. Unlike adults, children may experience and express their grief and bereavement through behaviors, and are less likely to outwardly express their emotions. The children who experience bereavement and grief can receive treatment involving group intervention, play therapy, and cognitive behavioral therapy. Different forms of treatment for children experiencing bereavement and or grief can help to reduce symptoms of anxiety, depression, social adjustment, and posttraumatic stress. Research has shown that it is important to be aware of the difficulties in predicting how losing a closed one can impact a child’s emotionality and how their coping abilities will differ across ages and cultures.
Suicide bereavement is the experience of those who are grieving the loss of someone to suicide. Over 800,000 individuals die by suicide every year. It was stated by Shneidman (1978) that every suicide leaves behind 6 "survivor-victims". However, new research shows that each suicide leaves behind approximately 135 who personally knew the decedent. The #not6 hashtag has been used by Cerel and colleagues to represent that suicide bereavement is many more than publicly portrayed.
Bereavement groups, or grief groups, are a type of support group that bereaved individuals may access to have a space to process through or receive social support around grief. Bereavement groups are typically one of the most common services offered to bereaved individuals, encompassing both formalized group therapy settings for reducing clinical levels of grief as well as support groups that offer support, information, and exchange between those who have experienced loss.
