Grieving in a Crisis

-
Just imagine if you had a loved one on Malaysian Airlines flight M370 which vanished into thin air on the March 8, 2014. Imagine for a moment the pain you would have experienced not knowing what had happened to your loved one. The emotional toll on the families has been heart rending as seen from footage on the television.  The process of grieving has been around ever since the creation of mankind. Humans tend to make strong bonds of affection or attachment with others. When these bonds are broken, as in death or separation, a strong emotional reaction occurs, which is defined as grief. Grieving can occur at anytime throughout an individual’s lifespan. Grief counselling refers to a specific form of therapy or a focus in general counselling with the goal of helping the individual grieve, and address personal loss in a healthy manner. The purpose of grief counselling is to assist the individual work through the feelings, thoughts and memories associated with the loss of a loved one. Grief counselling is very important in that the process helps the individual work through acceptance of the loss, as well as, determines how life can go on without that person, and consolidate the memories in order to move forward in a healthy way.
Children especially have a difficult time dealing with the loss of a loved one, such as, a parent and it is very important that all the support be provided to them in order to help them overcome that period of bereavement.
As human beings were are not immune to crisis. In fact from the moment we are born we enter a crisis filled world. It is imperative that we develop coping skills to deal with inevitability of crisis. A crisis is the experiencing of an event or situation as an intolerable difficulty that exceeds the person’s current resources and coping mechanisms. As a result grief counselling is a useful tool as it provides us with a variety of direct and action-oriented approaches to help us find resources within ourselves to deal with crisis
It must be very painful for the families of those passengers of flight M370 especially since there is no concrete evidence as to what happened to the flight. Many family members are in a state of denial and will be in such a state until some physical proof is given alongside the theory that the plane crashed into the ocean. The family of passengers on Flight M370 will require long term crisis counselling in order to cope with the untimely death of their loved ones.
Let us continue to pray for the families so that they too might find peace in this their moment of stress and immense loss.

Wayne Campbell
waykam@yahoo.com

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Insecticides, Air Travel And Safety

-
Image
We are not insects, we are human beings. To travel by air is a privilege. Air travel is a costly adventure as well.   Those of us who have been fortunate to travel oftentimes experience some amount of excitement leading up to that moment. This heightened sense of emotion happens to almost all of us irrespective of whether we are a frequent flyer or a first timer. This buzz never goes away regardless of whether you travel economy or first class. However, for some folks there is a sense of nervousness during travel. There are numerous lessons we can learn whenever we travel. For example, our outlook on life is often altered due to the interaction with other peoples and cultures. Once the airplane takes off and you begin to ascend into the clouds, sometimes of altitude unbelievable to those without this experience, one can feel like someone who is imprisoned until your flight lands and you disembark. It is usually at those altitudes that the airline crew informs you that they are goin...
Read more

Vessels of Honour: Celestial Treasures

-
Image
“Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.”- Psalm 51:10. Many of us have a skewed understanding of God our creator. In many instances we believe or are led to believe that in order to be used by God we must be pure and sinless. This tainted view undoubtedly also impacts our relationships we have with God. Having such a distorted view of God and what God demands from us oftentimes lead us into disobedience. The same is true concerning the weight of condemnation. It is for this reason why it is critical for us to spend time in the Word of God which is the Bible. We all need to know God for ourselves. We often make excuses to study the Bible, yet, we will spend hours on social media or hours gossiping people’s business. Nowhere is gossiping more pronounced than in the church. The church as we know it is not a place of honesty. Why do I say this? Oftentimes we turn to the church in our moments of weakness and vulnerability yet, the solace and compassion that ...
Read more

Interrogating Black Fatherhood

-
Image
“What I've realized is that life doesn't count for much unless you're willing to do your small part to leave our children all of our children a better world. Any fool can have a child. That doesn't make you a father. It's the courage to raise a child that makes you a father.”- Barack Obama. Fatherhood, especially black fatherhood oftentimes is not as celebrated as it should. As a result we continue to hear of the arguments surrounding my mother who fathered me. There are specific roles concerning the sexes and frankly speaking mothers cannot father children, likewise fathers cannot mother children. Indeed as a society we need to move the discussion away from these examples of oxymoron. This flawed premise has been around so long and unfortunately has become normalized in many societies. However, the time has come for us to have a serious and honest discussion as this argument must be interrogated and replaced with a sense of responsibility. In fact, there is one m...
Read more