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Functions of Grief Counseling

The stories have grown so commonplace that we can scarcely keep them apart in our minds anymore. A country that thought it would have years to recover from the tragedy of the shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado is almost immediately assaulted by a day trader with a gun, and then another man visiting his two work places to kill people and then another man with another gun at a preschool in Los Angeles.

And these are just the stories about the violence brought about by guns. There is also the psychic violence that comes to people when a plane crashes, or a school bus overturns or the earth opens up along its ancient fault lines and maims and mangles and kills.

So much grief, by the hand of nature or our fellow humans.

And just as commonplace as are the stories and images of terrible things befalling communities is the tag line that we have become accustomed to hearing: ôCounselors will be on hand to help the students/parents/survivors deal with their grief.ö

But what good does grief counseling do in the aftermath of tragedies felt by entire communities? This paper looks at the issue of grief counseling, examining whether it provides lasting benefits or is simply a fad that like primal scream therapy appeals to a passing and overly simplistic model of human behavior and human emotional needs at those times when people are most bereft.

Grief counselors provide a number of important benefits for people in communities struck by terrible events, including providing a chance for people in the community to talk to those who are not personally affected by the tragedy, a long-term view of the grief process brought about through professional training and professional experience, a legitimization of grief, and finally what might be called the ôwitnessö function of counselors. Each of these will be discussed briefly below.

It is a truism about human nature that sorrow shared is sorrow lessened, and so when something t...

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Functions of Grief Counseling. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 08:31, March 29, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1691194.html