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Grief theory: stage or process.

Article Excerpt
McCabe, Marilyn. (2003).

The Paradox of Loss: Toward a Relational Theory of Grief. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger. Hard Cover. (xiii + 219). $70.00. ISBN 0-275-97986-5.

Marilyn McCabe is a psychologist in private practice and Adjunct Faculty member for the Georgia School of Professional Psychology at Argosy University, as well as the Advanced Psychodynamic Psychotherapy Program sponsored by the St. Louis Psychoanalytic Institute and the Nashville Psychoanalytic Study Group.

Many therapists have had the experience of working with a client in bereavement who seems to almost refuse to acquiesce to the expected stage models of grief. These same therapists have probably questioned these stage models, even suggesting to their clients that there is no correct way to grieve. In The Paradox of Loss, McCabe turns classic grief theory on its ear by challenging such long held accepted wisdom as grief proceeds in expectable stages, that one should "get over" grief in a timely fashion, and that grief is itself (or may become) a kind of pathology.

McCabe uses two main strategies to critique prevailing grief theory. As the subtitle indicates, McCabe is interested in the developing field of Relational psychoanalysis and uses it and constructivist philosophy to shape her arguments....