11 Conclusions 295
the bond must change and the new relationship with paid work must evolve.
Nearly everyone knows someone who stayed active in their work for too long,
failing to accept the loss and transform their bonds to work ties in time. The
transformation of bonds is a critical aspect of continuing bonds.
Meaning-Making as a Process of Growth
Grief and loss, although uncomfortable, are part of human existence; likewise,
humans inevitably try to make meaning of their world. Neimeyer, Prigerson,
and Davies (2002) argue that “human beings seek meaning in mourning and
do so by struggling to construct a coherent account of their bereavement that
preserves a sense of continuity with who they have been while also integrat-
ing the reality of the changed world into their conception of who they must
be now” (pp. 235, 236). Hogan & Schmidt (2002) tested a “grief to personal
growth model” and suggest that the bereaved are transformed by their experi-
ence with loss when they are propelled to revise their worldview and create a
new identity. From the experiences of parents who have lost a child, teens who
have lost a friend, and bereaved adults who have lost a life partner, it seems
clear that meaning-making is a key to surviving (and growing) from the loss.
Indeed, it is possible that the ability to make meaning differentiates those who
grow from grief from those who remain immobilized.
Efforts to preserve a coherent self-narrative are disrupted by the loss
of significant others upon whom “our life stories depend” (Neimeyer et al.,
2002, p. 239). When the bereaved individual creates a story where the loss has
meaning, she or he can see how to move forward with a revised narrative of
how to function in the world without their loved one. Going on being—merely
surviving—propels the bereaved to keep putting one foot in front of the other,
and keep retelling the story until the past is again woven with the future. The
loss of significant others who provided a particular “fund of shared memo-
ries” (Neimeyer et al., p. 239) may prompt the bereaved to “relearn the self”
and “relearn the world” (Attig, 1996, 2015). As illustrated in the experience of
parents who lose a child (Chapters 2 and 3), teens who lose a friend through
murder (Chapter 5), and bereaved partners and spouses (Chapters 7 and 9),
commitments to “living with a new intent”—to appreciate life more and to
make each day count—issue from meaning-making.
Joyce Carol Oates and Meghan O’Rourke (2011) exchanged thoughts
about what led them to write memoirs about their grief, and each acknowl-
edged that their writing evolved as a way to create order out of chaos, to
“slog through” grief, and to “attempt comprehension.” They bemoan pro-
fessionals who put time limits on grief and discuss how merely surviving
is what allows the bereaved to move through grief eventually. As we hope
to have done in this text, they capture the individual and contextual quali-
ties of grief and show how “stages of grief” are unlikely to exist in any
universal way.
Practitioners cannot ever “make meaning” for their clients. After help-
ing clients tell their stories of bereavement, they may help by asking a deeper
set of questions. Questions such as “Where did you find surprise sources of
strength?”; “What untapped strengths have you discovered?”; and “How has
