Understanding Student Grief

Experiences of Loss

• Experiences of loss are normal and essential in human life, allowing individuals to change, develop, and fulfill their innate human potential.
• Loss can be planned, expected, or sudden, and can be beneficial or devastating and debilitating.
• Examples of necessary losses accompanying growth include:
  • Abandoning a favorite blanket or toy
  • Leaving a first-grade teacher
  • Giving up the adolescent hope of becoming a famous rock star

Grief and Bereavement

• Grief refers to the subjective emotions and affect that are a normal response to the experience of loss.
• Bereavement, also known as grieving, refers to the process by which a person experiences the grief.
• Bereavement involves not only the content (what a person thinks, says, and feels) but also the process (how a person thinks, says, and feels).
• All people grieve when they experience life’s changes and losses.

Types of Grief

• Anticipatory grieving: when people facing an imminent loss begin to grapple with the possibility of the loss or death in the near future.

Mourning

• Mourning is the outward expression of grief.
• Rituals of mourning include:
  • Having a wake
  • Sitting shiva
  • Holding religious ceremonies
  • Arranging funerals