Annual Meeting Recorded Sessions

Changing Patterns in Bereavement: Research, Experience & Baby Boomers Equals Changes in Grief Support

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The content of this presentation is based on three factors that lead us to new understanding of grief and changes that can be made in grief support to better meet the needs of today’s griever.

1. Research in thanatology has given grief specialists incentive to see grief from an adjusted perspective and to develop support sensitive to these findings.

2. Baby Boomers, primarily those born in the second half of the 20th century, have been exposed to “in your face” death and violence for most of their lives. Exposure to all this death of the body demanded an emotional and cognitive shift from their parents’ understanding of what is gone and how to live through a loss. Spirituality has become an essential change in the grief journey from the generations coming up age in the 1960s and forward.

3. Most of today’s population in the American culture expects Specialists to address their needs, also connected with the Baby Boomer experience. With the death of a loved one, they look for support and education to be delivered very specifically for the type of death event they are grieving.

This presentation will explore these three factors and conclude with practical application and concrete suggestions using this knowledge in serving bereaved persons.

Learning objectives:

1. Identify three results of research that suggest changes in our understanding of the grief process
2. Discuss the effect of the baby boomer experience on today's mourners including spirituality as a focus
3. List five alternative ways to meet the needs and expectation of many of today's mourners

About your instructor:

Ginny Chappelear received her M.Ed. from Ohio University and her Fellow in Thanatalogy in 2005. Ginny has worked in hospice for over 20 years and currently serves a senior coordinator of bereavement services at TideWell Hospice and Palliative Care.

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Updated: April 20, 2010