Practicing Good Grief!

Multiple research sources indicate that a small subset of cases draw extensive resources from the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (FCFCOA) remain consistent over time (Harris, 2019; Smyth & Moloney, 2017, 2019).? A large portion of this subset present with entrenched anger (Smyth and Moloney, 2017).? Entrenched anger was resistant to conflict management interventions presenting with multiple issues of family violence, mental health issues, or substance abuse (Smyth & Moloney, 2017).? Moloney and Smyth (2019) suggest that the greater the combination of adversarial legal process, family violence, mental health issues, substance abuse and diversification of parental values the greater likelihood for conflict to be enduring (p.81).? They suggest in such cases, focus on practical structures of parenting ignores the underpinning emotional drivers of the conflict (Moloney and Smyth, 2019, p.81).

This is problematic in that there are limited specialised frameworks that acknowledge expressions of intense emotion like hatred to inform case management planning for clients who have experienced ruptures in familial relationships. Further, a lack of clinical basis leaves practitioners vulnerable to their practice being informed by authority of the court system (Rathus, 2021; Rathus et al., 2019) This article will seek to review knowledge of grief how it may present as entrenched anger within the FCFCOA, and if there are mechanisms within FCFCOA that may moderate grief positively or negatively.

If it is indicated that grief and hatred may be related this may be relevant to the development of the Parental Coordination sector to support parents adjust to Orders, to Conflict Coaches who are in a unique position to work with clients independently without limitation based on application of legal procedure and inform Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner assessments for mediation suitability and responses as tensions appear during discussions. In such a case, efforts to support grief to exist within culturally normal parameters would be a goal of interventions rather than the eradication of grief.

Moloney and Smyth (2017) highlight ¨that if specific questions about hatred are not included in validated screening and assessment tools are not asked about, especially at the intake and assessment phase, the existence of this dynamic can be easily dismissed¨ (p.410). Moloney and Smyth (2017) support that when entrenched hatred is present structured court interventions will be necessary to keep children and parents safe particularly to monitor and report progress for change such as mental health trained Parenting Coordinators (p.412) and if parents are unable to relinquish their hatred, capacity for safe ongoing relationships between that parent and their children may need to be reconsidered (p.413).? If grief is in fact some what linked to presentations of entrenched hatred then perhaps the argument Moloney and Smyth states for hatred may be actionable through grief work interventions.

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Understanding Grief

There is good reason why grief many not have been explored as a central focus in the parent separation literature yet. The DSM-5TR published in 2022 is the first edition to introduce grief as a set of criteria for clinical diagnosis as follows:

A.??? Death at least 12 months ago or 6 months ago for children.

B.??? Persistent grief response as one of:

a.??? Intense yearning

b.??? Preoccupation of thoughts containing the deceased person

C.?? Since the death, three of the following persistent every day for last month:

a.??? Identity disruption

b.??? Disbelief about the death

c.???? Avoidance of reminders of death

d.??? Intense emotional pain relate to death

e.??? Difficulty reintegrating into one’s relationships and activities after the death

f.????? Emotional numbness as a result of the death

g.??? Feeling life is meaningless as a result of the death

h.??? Intense loneliness as a result of the death

D.?? Causes significant distress and disturbance to social function, duration exceeds cultural expectations and not better explained by another disorder (American Psychiatric Association, ?2022, p.130-131)

The primary issue of diagnosing grief is that death is a prerequisite, and thus families in transition are excluded.? Grief Australia states ¨Grief Australia Counselling and Support Service, provides a specialist bereavement service for individuals, children, and families who need assistance following the death of someone close to them.¨ (Grief Australia, 2022).? A parent who is informed that they cannot have contact with their children is not experiencing grief purely because their child has not died.

Family separation does fit definitions of ambiguous loss. Ambiguous loss refers to the experience of loss without certainty, often occasions in which there is no community or family ritual to acknowledge the loss (Boss, 1999; Harris, 2019; Hollander, 2016). Ambiguous loss can be further dissected into two categories, psychologically absent or physically absent.?

Psychologically absent is when the object of loss is present though not recognisable as the entity of attachment (Boss, 2016; Harris, 2019; Zasiekina et al., 2023). An example may be a separated parent hears their child speaking to them with a change in tone that may have been learnt from school, or from their shared parent’s home.? There is an exposure to loss while the entity is present. Ambiguously the parent is expected to feel like a parent as they have their child with them while paradoxically experiencing a psychological disconnection.

¨The greater the ambiguity surrounding one’s loss, the more difficult it is to master it and the greater one’s depression, anxiety, and family conflict. ¨ (Boss, 1999, p.7).? Shared parenting maybe a flux between psychological and physical absent ambiguous loss.? Ambiguous loss is helpful to acknowledge the impact of uncertainty but places focus on circumstance rather than psychological capacity or individual difference as a diagnosis offers.? Ambiguous loss may be a source for emotional pain however may not explain entrenched hatred without additional factors.

The author does not believe incompatible categorisations warrants dismissing grief without further review because many of our assumptions of emotion categories are misguided (Barrett, 2017).? Research that defines categories will then find reinforcement of those categories by using those definitions as a source of measurement. Anger is anger because we lump a group of observations together and call them “anger”, not because they are actually the same thing. Is it possible that ambiguous loss and grief are close if not the same thing?

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Neurological evidence for Grief

There has been much change in the theoretical understanding of grief since the metaphor of waves of emotions in stages (Kübler-Ross, 1970). Research has demonstrated that this prescriptive model moving from denial, via anger to something looking like acceptance is far from generalisable to experiences of grief and contributes dangerously to the isolation of persons who do not experience grief as expected (O′Connor, 2022).

Mary Francis O’Connor approaches the differentiation of bereavement, grief and loss by stating:

?¨The type of grief that I focus on in this book applies to those who have lost a spouse, a child, a best friend or anyone with whom they are close.? I also explore other losses, such as the loss of a job, or the pain we feel when a celebrity whom we admire greatly and have never met dies. I offer thoughts for those of us who are adjacent to someone who is grieving, to help us understand what is happening for them.¨ (O′Connor, 2022)

O’Connor explains the following premises:

1. The brain creates neurological networks based on exposure to experiences.
2. Repeated exposure strengthens networks.
3. The brain does not create networks on what is NOT there. Just on what IS there.?
4. Therefore, there are no neurological pathways for death or loss.
5. The immediate confusion associated with loss comes from the many repetitions of a pattern and then having one element of that pattern missing, creating a dilemma, what to do when that element simply is not.

The evidence indicated by neuroscience may support a review of our assumption that grief is a contributor to family transitions.? A neurological understanding of grief may help explain the presentation of entrenched hatred and even many of the other high risk presentations such as increased risk of harm, substance misuse, blame, and even parental misinterpretations of their children’s needs.

There are three concepts mapped neurologically associated with relationship and subsequent grief.? The foundation for these concepts are learnt early in life, congruent with attachment theory, emerging as children experience these dimensions through their interaction with caregivers (Harris, 2019; O′Connor, 2022).? The concepts include measurements of space (here/there), time (now/later) and closeness. The closeness measurement is a set of bidirectional questions of importance and availability for help.? Closeness tests:

●???? “How important am I to you?”

●???? “How important are you to me?”

●???? “You are there for me when I need help?”

●???? “I am there for you when you need help?”

As an equation to be hypothesised may look something like:

Space + Time + Closeness (reciprocal importance and availability to help) = Virtual Map of Relationship (VMR)

Loss is the perception of something missing. An automatic response that challenges the person to first find the missing object, called yearning. When closeness is not achieved grief starts by gathering information to adjust to the change (O′Connor, 2022).? The author will explore yearning later in a separate article.? The VMR is an automatic subconscious process involving semantic memory, the type of memory you might use to drive a car after you have driven the same route repetitively for years. You usually only attend to it once you notice a problem in contrast to what you had anticipated.?

The memory that needs to be revisited whenever the VMR is activated could be remembering when you found out they had died, or the moment you signed the agreement, or watching your children being driven away.? These painful moments are vitally important to the grieving process of ongoing learning and adjustment. Normally when there is a death, these are the moments where family, friends, other connections become important to reinforce the memory while at the same time ease the psychological pain.?? Even a silent presence is comforting as it provides closeness in space and in time (O′Connor, 2022). Closeness supports adaptation to pain (Sahi et al., 2021). However, what environment do consumers of FCFCOA find themselves in when asked to refer to their Orders? The author contends that no such closeness is available, and in fact may be perceived as threatening closeness.

With improved knowledge of grief, there has also been improvements in “grief work”.? According to the Dual Process Model for Coping (Stroebe & Schut, 2010) the griever experiences oscillations between loss stressors and restoration stressors.? A person cannot attend to loss stressors and restoration stressors at the same time. This explains presentations of denial when you present a restoration stressor in your professional role and they respond with loss stressors or vis versa.? It is functional to oscillate between loss stressors and restoration stressors when grieving.? In addition the Centre for Prolonged Grief describes derailers as pathways that limit exposure to grief related learning experiences (The Center for Prolonged Grief, 2023). A grief informed practitioner will flow between changes of loss and restoration stressors alongside improving resiliency against derailers. To do otherwise may isolate the person from their natural grief processing. The table below differentiates what a practitioner might see in each.

The author wonders about what is required of an FCFCOA consumer when preparing or responding to affidavits. Could legal interactions pressurise loss or restoration stressors and present as avenues to amplify derailers? How is an FDRP to respond when one party is engaged in loss stressors and the other party engaged with restoration stressors?? Are Conflict Coaches or Parenting Coordinators better equipped procedurally to contend with these challenges?

Interestingly entrenched hatred is described as creating a sense of self efficacy, vindication and blame (Moloney & Smyth 2017, p.409) which may be compatible with presentations of derailers. In fact this may also account for contraventions by self-represented parents as indicated by recent research (Carson et al., 2022).? In this study a review of statistically significant reasons for contravention applications revealed that the proportion of respondents stating that the other parent/carer did not comply because they were trying to be difficult or vindictive (79%) was much higher compared to children refusing to follow orders (15.9%) or it was not safe to comply (7%) (Carson et al., 2022). While blame is a disruptor for functional “getting on with life” it is also a primary reason for contraventions to be heard.

To consider this further the author reviewed submissions to the 2019 Inquiry on Australia’s Family Law System. Of 1718 Submissions, 261 were accessible which means that any thematic analysis results could not be generalisable to all submissions or concerns of consumers in general however a preliminary enquiry revealed the following:

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The above table presents some interesting observations.? Often “grief” appeared closely with loss as part of the same statement. Loss also referred to the institution rather than a person.? The same occurred for “anger”, “guilt”, “protect”, and “isolat*” words associated with presentation of grief appeared to reference institutional issues. In fact, grief did not appear as a self-expression but rather an interpretation of others.? Interestingly “isolat*” was comparable in quantity within and between documents to “blame”. “Grief”, “suicide”, “blame”, “anxiety”, “frustrat* and “Urgen*” appeared to describe observation of other people’s experience. A limitation of this exercise was not only accessing representative data but also context. Despite this the term “blame” which appeared more frequently than “attack”, “grief” and “frustrat” in this less-than-ideal analysis has been identified as related to both contraventions, and disrupted grief processing suggests that further exploration is warranted.

Due to this preliminary finding Family Relief has prepared an eBook based resources for consumers of parental conflict industry. These resources are designed to help clients find their own words to define experiences of grief, become active in their perception of safety and wellbeing and be able to communicate their needs to FCFCOA practitioners.? The eBook specific to creating safety, “Safeguarding the Sanctuary” is currently available to the public.? “Practising Good Grief” is available to clients of Family Relief. It is anticipated that these resources will be appropriately challenging for clients before during and after FCFCOA interventions.

It is the intention of Family Relief that through data collection generated by client engagement that we may be able to understand avenues to improve consumer agency in their family transitions. Family Relief is currently accepting Parenting Coordination clients.

References:

Barrett, L. F. (2017). How Emotions Are Made. Brilliance Audio.

Boss, P. (1999). Ambiguous Loss : Learning to Live with Unresolved Grief. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/jcu/reader.action?docID=3300190&query=

Boss, P. (2016). The context and process of theory development: The story of ambiguous loss. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 8(3), 269–286. https://doi.org/10.1111/jftr.12152

Carson, R., Kaspiew, R., Qu, L., De Maio, J., Rhoades, H., Stevens, E., Horsfall, B., Press, Louise, & Dimopoulos, G. (2022). Compliance with and enforcement of family law parenting orders: Final report. https://www.anrows.org.au/publication/compliance-with-and-enforcement-of-family-law-parenting-orders-final-report/

Grief Australia. (2022). Counselling. Grief Australia. https://www.grief.org.au/ga/Support/Counselling.aspx

Harris, D. L. (Ed.). (2019). Non Death Loss and Grief: Context and Clinical Implications. Routledge. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/pdfviewer/

Hollander, T. (2016). Ambiguous loss and complicated grief: Understanding the grief of parents of the disappeared in northern Uganda. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 8(3), 294–307. https://doi.org/10.1111/jftr.12153

Kübler-Ross, E. (1970). On Death and Dying. Macmillan. https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=f-9GAAAAMAAJ

O′Connor, M.-F. (2022). The Grieving Brain: The Surprising Science of How We Learn from Love and Loss. Audible.

Rathus, Z. (2021). Social scientists operating in the law: A case study of family assessment experts in the Australian family law system. International Journal of Law, Policy, and the Family, 35(1), ebab051. https://doi.org/10.1093/lawfam/ebab051

Rathus, Z., Jeffries, S., Menih, H., & Field, R. (2019). “it’s like standing on a beach, holding your children’s hands, and having a tsunami just coming towards you”: Intimate partner violence and “expert” assessments in Australian family law. Victims & Offenders, 14(4), 408–440. https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2019.1580646

Sahi, R. S., Dieffenbach, M. C., Gan, S., Lee, M., Hazlett, L. I., Burns, S. M., Lieberman, M. D., Shamay-Tsoory, S. G., & Eisenberger, N. I. (2021). The comfort in touch: Immediate and lasting effects of handholding on emotional pain. PloS One, 16(2), e0246753. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0246753

Smyth, B. M., & Moloney, L. J. (2017). Entrenched postseparation parenting disputes: The role of interparental hatred? Family Court Review, 55(3), 404–416. https://doi.org/10.1111/fcre.12294

Smyth, B. M., & Moloney, L. J. (2019). Post‐separation parenting disputes and the many faces of high conflict: Theory and research. The Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy, 40(1), 74–84. https://doi.org/10.1002/anzf.1346

Stroebe, M., & Schut, H. (2010). The Dual Process Model for Coping with Bereavement: A Decade On. OMEGA, 61(4), 273–289. https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/43772827/The_Dual_Process_Model_of_Coping_with_Be20160316-28310-nsyph-libre.pdf?1458115236=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DThe_Dual_Process_Model_of_Coping_with_Be.pdf&Expires=1728265947&Signature=PtHF8WBfkUo3xYZK8MpjkUfzd25sYc20WyWM1S3DgHE3mtc~fr7fV5k2F1RMtO-w9BC-SHaAI40uJ6zZ7zR7AXTcdcWOL5Fw~LInZGNOrzdKLMVofBalbawlg6s0UKrWbKCtYqij4Upu9oRLYaPtiA2tQ16zmkcvOGB8QbNbrEdjQgNevuHB6mLIoVBgrjXBuqFpQvXvWDK9vuWST8zx0IgglFD0RNq7aiVDqI933MqRgpJVSp3LabFzuBuuSNjJVUBB0PVAbZEns~3HgmYGq9HIoq0qHBUjxXLUbb28ZKiDmsEKQ~V2gVJnO0T5UPE0xeV58otdGRUYIjU2xPed1g__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA

The Center for Prolonged Grief. (2023). Healing Milestones and Derailers Handout.

Zasiekina, L., Abraham, A., & Zasiekin, S. (2023). Unambiguous definition of ambiguous loss: Exploring conceptual boundaries of physical and psychological types through content analysis. East European Journal of Psycholinguistics , 10(2), 182–195. https://doi.org/10.29038/eejpl.2023.10.2.zas