Ambiguous Loss

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Ambiguous loss is a loss that occurs without closure or 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.

There are two types of ambiguous loss:

• Type One: Occurs when there is physical absence with psychological presence. This includes situations when a loved one is physically missing or bodily gone. Catastrophic examples of physical ambiguous loss include kidnapping and missing bodies due to war, terrorism, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and natural disasters such as earthquake, flood, and tsunami. More common examples of physical ambiguous loss are divorce, adoption, and loss of physical contact with family and friends because of immigration.
• Type Two: Occurs when there is psychological absence with physical presence. In this second type of ambiguous loss, a loved one is psychologically absent—that is, emotionally or cognitively gone or missing. Such ambiguous loss occurs from Alzheimer's disease and other dementias; traumatic brain injury; addiction, depression, or other chronic mental or physical illnesses that take away a loved one's mind or memory. Psychological ambiguous losses can also result from obsessions or preoccupations with losses that never make sense, e.g., some suicides or infant deaths.   (Pioneered by Pauline Boss.)

  

   So little I know.  In conversation with a friend when the topic turned to loss and grief she talked about the difficulty of the grieving process with 'ambiguous loss.' While I recognized the difficulty in such situations I'd never really focused on the syndrome nor used that frame, 'ambiguous loss.' 

   Everything always loops back to Joanne, for me. In her last years she suffered some memory loss, while not severe it was very frustrating for her, i.e., a cause of grief. This women who could call a phone number once and recall it accurately weeks later, now once could not remember the the pin number of her ATM card...yes, she grieved. She was aware enough of her new limitations that she could compensate by writing notes to herself, but it was very frustrating.  We both grieved the new reality though we didn't know to call it 'ambiguous loss.'

   "Loss and grief, loss and grief, go together like a horse and carriage."  These are my thoughts today from the land of grief.

Takk for alt,

Al