Healing after Parent Loss in Childhood and Adolescence: Therapeutic Interventions and Theoretical Considerations PDF
Preview Healing after Parent Loss in Childhood and Adolescence: Therapeutic Interventions and Theoretical Considerations
Healing after Parent Loss in Childhood and Adolescence Healing after Parent Loss in Childhood and Adolescence Therapeutic Interventions and Theoretical Considerations Edited by Phyllis Cohen, PhD, K. Mark Sossin, PhD, and Richard Ruth, PhD ROWMAN&LITTLEFIELD Lanham•Boulder •NewYork•Toronto•Plymouth,UK PublishedbyRowman&Littlefield 4501ForbesBoulevard,Suite200,Lanham,Maryland20706 www.rowman.com 10ThornburyRoad,PlymouthPL67PP,UnitedKingdom Copyright©2014byRowman&Littlefield Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereproducedinanyformorbyany electronicormechanicalmeans,includinginformationstorageandretrievalsystems, withoutwrittenpermissionfromthepublisher,exceptbyareviewerwhomayquote passagesinareview. BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationInformationAvailable LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Healingafterparentlossinchildhoodandadolescence:therapeuticinterventionsandtheoretical considerations/editedbyRichardRuth,PhyllisCohen,andK.MarkSossin. pagescm Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN978-1-4422-3175-7(cloth:alk.paper)--ISBN978-1-4422-3176-4(electronic) 1.Griefinchildren--Treatment.2.Griefinadolescence--Treatment.3.Loss(Psychology)inchildren. 4.Loss(Psychology)inadolescence.5.Children--Counselingof.6.Teenagers--Counselingof.7. Parents--Death--Psychologicalaspects.8.Childrenanddeath.I.Ruth,Richard.II.Cohen,Phyllis. III.Sossin,K.Mark. BF723.G75H292014 155.9'37083--dc23 2013043520 TMThepaperusedinthispublicationmeetstheminimumrequirementsofAmerican NationalStandardforInformationSciencesPermanenceofPaperforPrintedLibrary Materials,ANSI/NISOZ39.48-1992. PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica Contents Foreword vii NancyMcWilliams PartI:Overview xi 1 LossofaParentduringChildhoodandAdolescence:A PrismaticLookattheLiterature 1 K.MarkSossin,YelenaBromberg,andDianaHaddad PartII:TherapyintheOfficewithChildrenandTheirCaregivers 29 2 “DoYouKnowAnyoneWhoisDead?”:AFourYearOldBoy ComestoUnderstandtheUnexpectedLossofHisFatherinthe ContextofCulture 31 LuzTowns-Miranda 3 WalkinginTheirShoes:TherapeuticJourneysWithYoung GirlsWhoLostMothers 47 JoAnnPonder 4 “MyDaddyIsaStarintheSky”:UnderstandingandTreating TraumaticGriefinEarlyChildhood 73 ChandraGhoshIppen,AliciaF.Lieberman,andJoyD.Osofsky PartIII:TherapyintheOfficewithAdolescents 95 5 ATerribleThingHappenedontheWaytoBecomingaGirl: TransgenderTrauma,ParentalLoss,andRecovery 97 DianeEhrensaft v vi Contents 6 MourningChildhoodLossinAdolescence:AnIndirect ApproachtoFeelings 117 DanielGensler 7 Revisiting,Repairing,andRestoring:TheDevelopmental JourneyofaBereavedAdolescent 135 NorkaT.Malberg 8 AllYouNeedIsLove:PrimaryPaternalPreoccupation 159 SethAronson PartIV:TherapyintheOfficewithEmergingandOlderAdults afterEarlierLossofaParent 177 9 Death,Mourning,andaDaughter’sDiary:APsychoanalytic Perspective 179 BillieA.Pivnick 10 MourningaGhost:AChallengeforHolocaustChildSurvivors 201 EvaFogelman PartV:InnovativeApplicationsinGroups,Consultations,and CourtAssessments 219 11 WhentheContextShifts:AChildTherapistHelpingChildren WhoHaveLostaParentinForensicSystems 221 RichardRuth 12 MaintainingHopeintheFaceofDespair:TheTransference- CountertransferenceMatrixinTreatingAdolescentsCoping withTraumaticParentalLosses 237 EttyCohen 13 TakeMetotheMoonandWait:AModelforAccompanying FamilieswithYoungChildrenThroughParentalIllness,Death, andMourning 257 ArianeSchwabHugandDanielS.Schechter 14 FatherQuestandLinkingObjects:AStoryoftheAmerican WorldWarIIOrphansNetwork(AWON)andPalestinianOrphans 283 VamıkD.Volkan 15 DeathofaFatheronSeptember11,2001:Video-informed ConsultationswithWidowedMothers 301 K.MarkSossin,PhyllisCohen,andBeatriceBeebe Index 323 AbouttheEditorsandContributors 335 Foreword Nancy McWilliams This book began as a gleam in the eye of my colleague, Richard Ruth. In 2007,whenIwasnewtothepresidencyoftheDivisionofPsychoanalysisof theAmericanPsychologicalAssociation,Iaskedhimtochairataskforceon outreach that would make a contribution to dismantling the stereotype of psychoanalysis as a dated, office-bound technique of psychotherapy, fueled byarigidideology,applicableonlytomildlydistressed,cooperative,articu- late adult patients. At the time, it had become clear that the psychoanalytic therapies were being represented to the public as a set of ritualized, self- serving,anddiscreditedapproachestohelpingpeople.Thismischaracteriza- tionwasbeingperpetratedbybiologicalpsychiatristsexcitedbythepossibil- itiesofdrugtreatments,byrepresentativesoftheinsuranceindustryeagerto cuttheircosts,andbyacademicpsychologistswhoresentedthearroganceof someFreudiansandwhohadscantexposuretocontemporarypsychoanalytic practice. In the public sphere, the voices of actual psychoanalytic clinicians were seldom heard. By the time I appealed to Prof. Ruth, I had become aware of, and often close to, many psychoanalytic colleagues who were working with thepoor,thehomeless,thecomplexlytraumatized,theaddicted,thepsychot- ic.They practiced in varied settings,with diverseandoften overwhelmingly challenged populations, sometimes completely outside conventional office practice.Ihaddoneconsiderableworkmyselfthatwentbeyondthewallsof myconsultingroom,andinmyexperience,thisoutreachwastheruleamong psychoanalyticpractitioners,nottheexception. Wesawourselvesastryingtoreducethesufferingofthepeoplewecame to care about, whatever their circumstances, with a critical reliance on psychoanalytic knowledge, but not with technical rigidity. Instead, we tried to apply analytic understanding sensitively and flexibly to the demands of vii viii NancyMcWilliams whatever situation we found ourselves in. Often, such work was movingly effective. I wanted a way to speak of our experience beyond the narrow confinesofthepsychoanalyticcommunity.Inresponsetothiswidelyshared concern, Prof. Ruth invited Drs. Cohen and Sossin to present their non- traditional work with the women and children bereaved by the attacks of September 11, 2001, ataDivisionof Psychoanalysisspring meeting.Out of thatpresentationthisbookwasborn. The focus on bereavement in childhood and adolescence was only one possible outcome of many directions this group of therapists and scholars could have taken. I did not know until the project was well underway that losswastobethedomaininwhichtheirclinicalwisdomwouldbeelaborat- ed. Itwas amoving surpriseto mewhenthecommittee membersultimately zeroed in on an area that is dear to my own heart and central to my own psychology (about this, more shortly), and about which I have always felt thereis—asSossin,Bromberg,andHaddaddemonstrateintheirreadableand comprehensive literature review—a valuable but insufficient psychoanalytic bodyofwork. The accounts in this book capture some universal themes that attend early,irreversibleloss,buttheyalsocapturetheidiosyncrasyofeachchild’s experience. Across different ages and developmental phases, different expe- riencesofgenderandsexualorientation,differentfamilycircumstances,dif- ferentsocialenvironments,differentreligioussensibilities,anddifferentcul- tures, the voices of these young people can be heard here in all their com- plexity and nuance. Some were orphaned by a parent’s disease, some by violence, some by war, some by the Holocaust, some by the September 11 attacks, some by the negligence and abuse of caregivers from whom they weretakenbythejusticesystem.Thesenarrativesbringreadersintointimate connection with both the general and the particular, and they illuminate the special strengths, not justthepsychologicaldeformities, that canresult from childhoodbereavement. By depicting the therapist’s emotional engagement, theoretical inclina- tions,andeffortstowardmeaning-making,thenarrativesalsobringalivethe healingprocessthatisatthecenterofthepsychoanalyticvocation.Inmostof the chapters, a therapist sees the bereaved client in a traditional clinical setting. In others, the therapeutic interventions involve actions that may in- fluence the legal system, facilitate a group response, educate surviving par- ents, provide for social support, require political action. We meet in these chaptersnotonlythemiddle-classAmericanandEuropeanbereavedchildren who have more commonly been studied (as in Erna Furman’s classic A Child’s Parent Dies), but also children of poverty and children and families ofLatinAmerican,African-American,Vietnamese,Kuwaiti,andPalestinian origin. The disciplined humanity that each therapist brings to the task of offering comfort to a particular person or group of persons, in a particular Foreword ix context, emerges from these pages as a phenomenon that is just as complex andnuancedasthepsychologiesofthebereaved. A few of the voices, like that of John in chapter 8 or Paulette in chapter 10, are those of older people who have tried to find ways of understanding andrecoveringfromtheirearlierlosses.Inthosechapterswehavethebenefit of hard-won wisdom from individuals who can put their memories into a shared adult language of grief. But most of the characters who people these pages are children and adolescents, struggling in the present without much prior education in loss and how to articulate its effects. The therapists who aretryingtobuildrelationshipswiththemarestrugglingaswell,ofteninthe face of realities that Ruth calls “unthinkable, unspeakable and intolerable.” Both their therapeutic passion and their openness to learning from their pa- tientscomethroughinwhattheauthorshavewritten. Many of the themes developed in this book are emotionally familiar to me.Ilostmyownmotheratnineandmybelovedstepmothertenyearslater, both after extended bouts with cancer. If I had not gone into psychoanalysis inmytwenties,thepainofmyearlylossanditsweirdrepetitionwouldhave remained ungrieved, unprocessed, unreflected-upon. I have good reason to believe I would have gotten locked into a kind of arrested development in whichfortherestofmylifeIwouldhaverationalizedmytendencytoactout oneafteranotherself-defeatingversionofwhatFreudwouldhavecalled“the returnoftherepressed.” One of my central defenses—one that my analyst was determined to defeat—was a counterdependent attitude replete with unconscious contempt forpsychological“weakness”and“self-pity.”Thatorientationhadoncebeen the best adaptation my latency-age self could make to a cruel loss followed byinsufficientemotionalsupport.Asseveralauthorsheremention,giventhe survivingpartner’sdesolation,achildwholosesoneparenttendstolosethe other as well. My father, whose emotional range had been compromised neurologicallybyencephalitislethargicaintheepidemicof1916–1927,had lost his own mother at thirteen to a rheumatic heart condition. He was then told,byaresentfulauntwhoinheritedresponsibilityforhim,thathismother had died from the exhaustion she had suffered taking care of him when he was comatose with the sleeping sickness. He was, not surprisingly, psycho- logically devastated in the aftermath of his wives’ respective deaths, which recapitulated the early loss for which he had been made to feel responsible. His capacity for sensitive responsiveness to his daughters’ diverse reactions totheirownbereavementwasconsequentlyminimal. Itwouldhavebeenultimatelydeadlytomygoalsasapsychotherapistto haveretainedtheunconsciousdisdainforsufferingthatallowedmetodisso- ciate my own pain at age nine and move on developmentally in most other ways. Via my engagement over several years in the systematic mourning process that wereferto as psychoanalysisor intensivepsychoanalytic thera-
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