Lois Wyse: ThirdAge Insider |
| |
Ambiguous Loss, Unresolved Grief
Grief and loss are inevitable elements in all of our lives. But what happens when we're frozen in our tracks by an ambiguous loss, one that seems to have no resolution?
Recently some friends came over for dinner and brought with them another couple I'd never before met. Formerly a Washington power player, the husband is now incapacitated by the effects of Parkinson's Disease, and his articulate and involved wife has found herself in charge of his care. She was gentle and kind with him during dinner, but I saw the look of horror on her face when he toppled over as he tried to get up from his chair after dinner.
Their story is not unique. They are both living what Dr. Pauline Boss, a professor of family social science at the University of Minnesota, calls unresolved grief. Dr. Boss is the author of Ambiguous Loss: Learning to Live with Unresolved Grief, to be published next month by Harvard University Press. Dr. Boss states that this loss results from one of two situations: the lost person is either physically present and emotionally absent, or physically absent but still emotionally present.
Under these circumstances, we become frozen in time--but we still keep changing. My new friend said her husband told her, "You've changed so much." She confessed she'd angrily replied, "If I hadn't I would have gone mad. Don't you understand you've changed, too?"
"Ambiguous loss"--now we have a name for that presence and absence that most of us will face one way or another in our lifetime. The writer of today's first letter is wondering how to deal with this.
Want to comment or ask a question? Write to Lois Wyse, WYSE WORDS, 22 West 23d St., New York, NY 10010, or contact our support department.
More about Lois Wyse.
Missed a week? Peruse past editions.
| 
