grief psychology: a masculine way of grieving

Running head: A MASCULINE WAY OF GRIVEING 1

Grief Psychology: A Masculine Way of Grieving

NorthCentral University

October 2007

Author Note

David Grinstead is now in private practice at www.livealife.biz and at Alamance

Community College.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to David Grinstead,

Department of Continuing Education, Alamance Community College, P.O. Box 8000, Graham,

NC 27253-8000. Contact: [email protected].

http://www.livealife.biz/

mailto:[email protected]

A MASCULINE WAY OF GRIEVING 2

While growing up as a young boy on a rural southern farm, elders told me that if bitten by

a snapping turtle it would not let go of me until it thundered. Remembrance gave me pause for

thought causing me to be extra cautious while catching and transporting snapping

turtles—snapping turtle soup was an ethnic southern delight. This activity usually took place on

hot and dry summer days that often turned into weeks, even month long clusters of hot and dry

summer days. Based on popular folklore such was not a good time to be bitten by a snapping

turtle especially if had to wait for a thunderstorm before the turtle would let go.

To endure bereavement and encounter grief is comparable to being bitten by the proverbial

snapping turtle that holds on for what seems like an eternity. Endings and beginnings (minor or

major) are a consistent fact of life and my personal experience of immersion in American culture

did not prepare me for such events. I learned how to grieve the hard way by attending the life

school of severe bereavement hard knocks and inevitabilities. My collective experiences of

bereavement and grief have felt like I was a hard back wooden chair that was repetitively being

painted with hard enamel paint soon followed by a forced stripping and refurbishing via being

dipped multiple times in a vat of harsh chemicals followed by intense scraping with steel wool,

steel blades, a screw driver and vigorous serious sandpapering.

The way of bereavement and grieving teaches us of “the mysteries of life and its many

difficulties and surprises.” (Metz, p. 1) This means that at some level “we are all survivors”

(Despelder & Strickland, p. 267) of many different types of deaths--some small and some big--and

all survivors have passed through the stages of grief that ultimately lead to recovery. When

conceptualizing the idea that there are definable stages of grief it must be recognized that, such is a

fluid analytical construct that varies in degree (wide and narrow) according to the dictates of each


individual‘s uniqueness. “Nevertheless, most studies indicate that grief follows a generally

consistent pattern.” (Despelder & Strickland, p. 272)

An initial impression is the implication that grieving progresses sequentially in a linear

fluid fashion from stage one, to stage two, etc. until the entire process is finished. However, such

is rarely the bereavement experience and this holds true for my own grief experiences. In reality a

person can experience different stages simultaneously or move forward and backward repetitively

and maybe even skip multiple stages at any given time during the journey to recovery. Intensity

and duration also vary with different stages appearing and disappearing randomly without any way

of predicting future reoccurrences. (Despelder & Strickland)

Variance of expert opinion states that there may be as many as five stages of grief or as few

as three stages.

According to Elisabeth Kubler-Ross…people go through five different stages in

their feelings and reactions towards a death. Denial is the first stage. The

second stage often is anger. The third stage is bargaining. Next comes

depression. As we emerge from…depression, we begin the fifth

stage--acceptance. (Seibert, Drolet & Fetro, p. 73)

From their experience in family practice, two physicians describe definable stages of

grief: (1) shock, numbness, disbelief; (2) painful longing and preoccupation with

memories and mental images; (3) resolution and resumption of ordinary life

activities. (Gorman & Southard, p. 309)

My experience(s) of grief recovery--depending on the life event--has sometimes seemed to go

through five stages and at other times as few as three stages.


During my 57 years of life, I have been through five major ending and beginning scenarios.

While I was in college and serving as the associate pastor of a United Methodist Church, I had a

major melt down that ended my first marriage and ministerial career while taking me through the

five stages as outlined by Dr. Kubler-Ross.

Something…happened to me the second year of college. There were forces deep

within me which drove me and manhandled my psyche, driving me to the

edge of insanity. The terrible headaches, nights of insomnia, floating

anxiety, panic attacks, bouts of depression, thoughts of suicide, and feelings

of never being completely in control had been with me for years and were

now gaining the upper hand. I was driven to do things for reasons which

were beyond anyone’s understanding. It was hard for me to face the truth

of the real me. That external veneer that everyone else saw blinded them to

the fears and raging going on inside of me. Accompanying these

confusions were illnesses such as heart palpitations, a stomach ulcer, and

many strange body aches. I was 21 and my best friend and constant

companion was a bottle of Maalox. Disillusioned with my health, my life,

the church, and my marriage, I entered treatment as an outpatient at the

local mental health center. The psychologist…told me I was an anxious

neurotic and borderline schizophrenic. Three months after entering

treatment…I left Jackie…soon…I resigned my position as associate

pastor…I resigned my license to preach. There was a death wish in the back

of my mind…I no longer cared…parties, booze, drugs…occupied my free


time. My former religious career was nonexistent, and it seemed

impossible for me to get or keep a decent job. My subsequent recovery

and restoration was a protracted process which took place over several

years independent of any further institutional medical care. It was a

journey which, for the most part, I made alone… (Grinstead, pg. 24, 25, 26,

27, 30)

My first born son after becoming involved with illegal drugs and gang banging dropped out

of high school and lived for several years on the streets. Many mornings I would get the local

newspaper and immediately turn to the obituaries and public notices of arrests. If his name was

not listed on either, then I knew that he was probably still alive. Eventually his lifestyle resulted

in a prison sentence. This is how I expressed my sentiments of that experience which took me

took me through the five stages of grieving:

I feel a great loss, another major piece of me died today. I long to recover and

hold close memories of by gone days of chess, Stratego, and BB guns in the

back yard shooting galley of old Star Wars figurines. His first step I saw at

eleven months. Together we did most everything. He was my personal

“turkey”, his mom always objected to that term. Beside his bed at night I

often kneeled and prayed the Lord’s Prayer, sometimes with him and

sometimes without while he slept. Bible books I bought to use in pointing

the direction of his feet. My blood, my life’s blood, is tied so tightly to my

first born son. At age six, unable to speak his name and badly stuttering,

my heart hurt for him, my soul ached for him. He was L.D. labeled, a sad


faced child seeking a way to connect, disruptive and unruly.

Who understood? Who didn’t try to reach out and reel Nat in? Nat

remains disruptive and unruly--24 years long my heart, my very soul has

held him close and tight. Now I must willingly thrust my hand into my

chest ripping out that which remains within my heart and soul of long

unfulfilled dreams and hopes for my first born son. I resign myself to

Nat’s possible, seemingly predestined (maybe even self-chosen) death in

prison. I would gladly trade my life for his, but this is an option denied.

(Grinstead, A Man In Waiting)

My middle son, Aaron (now 25, married, and granddaughter soon to born), choose a life

path that resulted in a positive grief experience for me that embodied the three stage model. Soon

after graduation from high school, he joined the US Marines at the beginning of the present Iraq

conflict. This was my externalized response to the internalized grief experience I felt while

attending his graduation ceremony from boot camp.

So deep! No shallowness of grief in these bones do I feel. My God! The burden

of sorrow do I carry for heavy on my heart it is. My middle son chosen to

embody the warrior archetype, a member at large of the chivalrous Knights

of the mythic Round Table, sworn to rescue and defend the defenseless,

damsels in distress, orphans homeless they be, the lame, the weak, the old

and the innocent. All I can do is just weep! A universal weep this is as I

contemplate all those who know and share the lives of such gallant heroes

and heroines on either side of this mindless conflict. (Grinstead, A Man in


Waiting)

Over the course of 20 plus years, my second wife became increasingly angry and abusive

to our children and me (emotional, verbal, and physical). Her behaviors resulted in me having her

arrested for assault, taking out a restraining order, and almost losing her medical license when

investigated for child abuse. It was her refusal to take her prescribed medication for two

clinically diagnosed personality disorders (paranoid and explosive anger) and stalking of my

female clients that finalized my decision to get a divorce.

Aware that divorce for any reason results in a major grief experience, an experience that I

wanted to get through quickly, I created and used rituals that did exactly that. While attending

graduate school I took a class in mythology where I learned how rituals could bring closure and

significantly reduce recovery time for those who grieve. For many years, I had struggled to

stabilize our situation and save the marriage. During this time, I moved back and forth repeatedly

through the first four stages of the five-stage model. It was only when I finalized my decision to

proceed with the divorce and implemented the rituals that I was able to move into stage five and

make peace with the reality of the situation through acceptance. And this is how I put that

experience of finalization into words:

Now a party of one I soon to be. Not by desire, but by forced choice. Looking

not backward to dreams trashed and burned, forward I walk treading lightly

one step at a time applying that which I have learned one line at a time.

Imaging shows this journey of one to be a big time step into the

unknown…seen as a lone raft adrift at sea…as a lone hiker striding across

uncharted barren desert sands. Regardless how seen, it is an unexplored


landscape that looms ahead of me. (Grinstead, A Man in Waiting)

April of 2003 a new woman came into my life and February of 2004 we were engaged and

she joined my hypnotherapy and life coaching practice as an equal partner. I will refer to her as J.

Two months following our engagement she was unexpectedly diagnosed with a pineal cyst/tumor

that required immediate removal. Without going into a lot of personal detail I will allow her

written words to define the context of her and our joint reality:

This past year has been challenging and wonderful. So much to say and so little time.

I am happy, my life has purpose. David and I will soon be dating a year. April

28th and we have been engaged since the weekend before Valentine day. He has

made me so happy--he loves me and accepts me…we talk all the time, we are best

friends and lovers, we are partners in all things. I ask myself where was he all my

life? But at age 50 and now 51 I will grab this happiness… Now I am facing brain

surgery. Facing the fact that I may die but I am not afraid. I feel it will be O.K.

either way…I want to live…my life is so rich. I have found healthy love at last.

(Grinstead, A Man in Waiting)

My mutual attitudes and feelings for J. I expressed this way:

Who is this woman standing before me with hand stretched out? Her right

hand extended reaching out to me. It is a gentle hand that she gives to me.

Yet frozen in time and space I seem to be for ‘till now it is a hand 53+ years

unknown to me. I reach and this hand of gentleness I take into mine. Yet

worthy, am I worthy of such graceful exchange? It is also a kind heart she

offers to me. And eyes of compassion that penetrate seeking insight to

understand me. A mere mortal I am, just clay given life by the breath of


God having passed by. Yet she! She is so much more than this mortal I

perceive myself to be. Our eyes meet and stumped into a stupor I am and

the owner of my heart she now is.

For three months following her surgery, I was her primary caregiver while continuing my

other roles as an entrepreneur and single parent. We did not know that full recovery time for brain

surgery often takes as long as 24 months. The recovery experience was tougher than either one of

us expected. The doctors failed to forewarn us of the rare, yet nonetheless, serious complications

that sometimes come with her type of brain surgery. We were unprepared for the unforeseen

consequences that ultimately dismantled the positive life and relationship we had built prior to

surgery. The multiple trips to the hospital emergency room and the complications that came in

repetitive waves all seemed unending: extreme anger, outbursts, wide mood swings, weeping,

short-term memory loss, loss of taste, loss of affect, sensory overload, feeling of total

hopelessness, loss of coordination and motor control and permanent personality changes. After

four weeks into her recovery, this was how I was feeling:

Drip drop tired from head to toe, where did all my life force go? Marks above my

eye left to right declare exhaustion from body to absolute depths of soul.

To my journey of Jen others are aware as with raised eyebrows scan me

they do, acknowledging obvious energy drain. Shallow knowing with

eyes that surface scan for to ache of soul they do not know what the Jen

knows. It is here that exhaustion reigns. All that I am I seem to have

poured into a bottomless hole. Flat on back catatonic I lifeless stare

punching holes into starless overcast sky…and the buzzards circle


overhead. (Grinstead, A Man in Waiting)

The day prior to leaving for the hospital we purchased two trees and ritually transplanted

them into special oversized clay pots. It was J.’s idea and she explained to me how the ritual

signified our soulful relationship and that if she were to die during surgery I was to take the trees to

WoodSong (my home) and plant them close beside each other as a reminder of our eternal love.

That first night in the hospital, prior to surgery, she requested that all family members leave

the room so that we could have some private time. Then she presented me with her personal

favorite portrait--named “woman and man”--(she is a regionally popular painter) that I was to keep

in memory of her if she died. Otherwise, she would re-hang it over the master bedroom bed upon

a successful surgery. We then hugged, cried, laughed and prayed together. I remained overnight

and slept in the recliner beside of her hospital bed. The next morning I accompanied her into

surgery and kissed her good-bye. Four hours later I was there when they rolled her into intensive

care and recovery (I had special access as a hospital chaplain) and remained until she regained

consciousness. For the next three days I rarely left her side. And a week later she was released

unto my care.

Four months into recovery, J. told me bluntly that she no longer was in love with me. Her

telling me was confusing because it took place during what I thought was a moment of closeness

and intimacy. Consciously I demised her statement, but the next morning the reality hit me full

force and I went into stage one experiencing “shock and numbness, feelings of being stunned, as

well as of disbelief.” (Despelder & Strickland, p. 273) I walked outside to the yard, my knees

collapsed from under me, and I buried my face into the ground and weep loudly and profusely.

For the next two years we gallantly struggled to restore what had been forever lost. The


post-surgical J. was in many ways 180 degrees other than the pre-surgical J., especially in

personality, values, and goals. She never did come to love me again and ultimately decided that

she did not even like me. It was like trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together, we just could

not manage it even under the best of circumstances be it personal or business. Throughout this

time I would sometimes regress into stage one, however; generally, I remained in stage two. I

experienced “anxiety, apathy, and pining” for the pre-surgical J. as “feelings of disbelief” gave

“way to the realization that there will be no reprieve” and I yearned “intensely for the” J. who had

mysteriously died in surgery and was replaced by what appeared to be a clone that did not love me.

(Despelder & Strickland, p. 273)

The continuing estrangement undid us and we officially ended our engagement July 2006

and the business partnership November 2006. I surrendered all rights to the corporation to her,

and June 2007 I resigned my college teaching position, said good-bye to my Tai Chi students and

relocated back to WoodSong permanently--125 miles distant. Now I am teaching at another

college and my private practice and Tai Chi classes are steadily gaining in momentum. J. is in

graduate school and completing a hospital internship as an oncology mental health counselor.

She continues to practice as a hypnotist and life coach. On rare occasions, we communicate via

email or phone at non-personal and shallow levels.

The two trees that we ritually planted in special clay pots the day prior to J.’s surgery

remained unplanted for two years. At that time, the pot containing the tree that symbolized J. had

broken and was held loosely together by a rope wrapped around it. The tree was almost dead.

The tree symbolizing me had continued to thrive in an unbroken pot. The month we ended our

engagement we planted the trees a good distance apart in her yard. When I last saw them, my tree


was still thriving and the J. tree was equally healthy and doing well.

Over three years it has been since I started the grieving process that began when J. told me

of her lack of love for me. It now almost a year since we completely ended our personal/business

partnership. In addition, six months since I resigned a satisfying teaching position in order to

relocate back to my former home I had left three years earlier. All of this gave me much to grieve

as I mourned the loss of a way of life, my students and clients and the relationship with J.. Since

June, I have been primarily in stage three where I have slowly regained “resolution and resumption

of ordinary life activities.“ (Gorman & Southard, p. 309) Moreover, just in the past several weeks

I feel that I have completed stage three and moved into recovery.

This has been a particularly tough journey for me, which I have been through almost

entirely alone. How can I explain to anyone without coming across as an insensitive shallow

male who left his mate due to some unexpected medical complications? How do I explain that it

is as if my mate had died and there was no body, funeral or supportive network of mutual family

and friends to aid in bringing closure? Much less, what was I to do about the clone that looked

like my mate, acted like someone entirely different, and did not value me while coming across as

entirely indifferent. I recall a scene from the movie The Pursuit of Happiness where the father

and his son are homeless and on the street so they go to a woman's shelter for assistance. They are

turned away because such specialized services are not available to men with the implication being

that men are culturally expected to handle such crises alone.

Regardless of their circumstances, the toughening of most boys begins early in life.

Our predominant American male self-image is tough, strong, and cool…

numerous studies show that boys generally receive fewer demonstrative


acts of affection than girls do from their mothers, who also wean boys

earlier. Boys are touched and talked to less, and are more likely than girls

to be held facing outward, toward the world and other people.

Coincidentally, boys cry more during infancy. Girl toddlers get a quicker

and more positive response when crying for help or complaining of a minor

injury than boys. Boys, however, are generally pushed toward

independence, even to the point of isolation. (Kipnis, p. 25)

Besides, to grieve like a man is to grieve differently than a woman. It is not an option of

better, worse, or less suitable, it’s just that a man’s way of grieving is different. Since it is

different it is often confusing to others and can result in unwarranted isolation. “While women

tend to react to the loss of a loved one as abandonment, men perceive it as losing part of

themselves, as if severing an arm or leg.” (Learning to Live Through Loss)

No one had a clue what I was experiencing as I always maintained control of my emotions.

Even when sharing my experience with the closest of friends and immediate family members (all

who knew even the minutest details) I kept my emotions in check and remained stoic throughout.

“Many men find it difficult to show their grief around others. Friends and family may think ‘He’s

over it’ when, in fact, he is still hurting.” (Learning to Live Through Loss) My emotional

breakdowns and they were many and often, always took place alone and in private.

To fix it for J. is what I had wanted to do. To take action and move beyond the

overwhelming sense of failure from being unable to control the outcome and redirect J.’s recovery

to what was supposed to have happened. That is what I obsessed with doing. I was unable as a

caregiver to prevent what occurred and to protect J. from the continuing negative outcomes. I felt


like I had truly lost my life partner and soul-mate to death.

The truth about men who lose their significant other is much different than generally

perceived and the myths about grieving men abound. Some truths about grieving men are:

Men do feel lonely, even if they act strong. Loneliness, grief, and the pressures of

running a household create very real crisis for men. People don’t contact

widowers as frequently as widows, even though the widower’s need for

companionship is often greater. Sometimes people don’t know what to say.

Even couples who had been friends before the death may stop inviting the

widower to their homes. Awkwardness becomes a social barrier. Sexual

frustration may be a concern. Yet many men feel guilty about needing

sexual release, as if they were ‘cheating’ on their dead spouses. (Learning to

Live Through Loss)

Stuck in stage two, I was angry, frustrated, anxious, and lack luster in most aspects of my

living and I wanted to rejoin the land of the living. I desired to be refilled with the positive

emotions (joy, gratitude, compassion, patience, etc.) and attitudes with which I had lost touch. To

expedite forward momentum and move from stage two into stage three, I started using the services

of Mary Phyllis Horn in November of 2006. She is an ordained minister, hypnotherapist, and

shamanic practitioner and has been counseling since 1985 and doing shamanic healing/divination

since 1994. Her credentials and experience align well with my own training and professional

activities. (The Center for Living Light)

Professionally and personally I know that hypnosis can be up to ten times more effective

than traditional psychotherapy for treating certain issues such as bereavement, forgiveness, false


guilt mitigation, worry, restlessness, sadness and sleeplessness. My transpersonal training and

orientation embraces shamanistic practices that are used for soul retrieval and parts recovery and I

felt that I was in need of some major parts recovery therapy. Our sessions focused on forgiveness,

compassion, reframing past traumas/memories linked to the current situation, letting go of the

past, chakra attunement, ending a relationship, preparing for change, and self-health. Mary

Phyllis’s efforts assisted my getting unstuck from stage two and moving into stage three and

ultimately into recovery.

Throughout this entire grief journey, I remained physically active, socially involved, and

educationally progressive. It was a hard act and often I had to consciously force myself do these

things because all I really wanted was to withdraw from society and all reminders of my perceived

disastrous choices and decisions. However, I did not allow myself to date or even think about

dating until by happenstance in late February 2007 I encountered a woman who insisted that in

spite of my prolonged and stubborn standoffishness she was going to get to know me and become

a supportive friend. With much patience, compassion, light heartedness, understanding,

creativity, empathy, and perseverance she helped hasten my movement through and out of stage

three to recovery. Her continued encouragement empowered me to immerse myself in outdoor

and other activities that used to be a mainstay of my life prior to the J. experience such as travel,

biking, kayaking, hiking, fishing, and camping. Her gentle ways and companionship have helped

open a fresh pathway for my soul to find life anew. She is a dear friend and companion along the

way.

Though professionally I work with both genders my primary interests are in applied male

psychology and male spirituality. The vast majority of my students are male. For a man coming


to me for bereavement and grief alleviation I would recommend a similar, though personally

tailored, path to recovery using spiritual counseling, motivation life coaching, relaxation therapy,

active imagination, dream work, meditation, Tai Chi, centering-prayer, hypnosis, volunteerism,

and lots of mindless physical activities. I would also teach him to be patient and compassionate

with himself.

Research resources for the use of hypnosis are available through the National Guild of

Hypnotists at www.ngh.net. Suggested hypnosis scripts for the treatment of bereavement and

grief can be found in various hypnotherapist desk references and on line at

www.hypnoticworld.com. Spiritual Counseling resources are available through Spiritual

Directors International at http://www.sdiworld.org.

My experiences as an associate hospital chaplain have produced many encounters with

death with upwards to as many as five occurrences within a two-hour period. Such has never

hindered my ability or desire to work with the terminally ill and their families. However, I do not

have the stamina needed to be a fulltime hospital chaplain. I would soon burnout. As a

hypnotist, I have used hypnosis to treat terminally ill clients for chronic pain relief, forgiveness,

restlessness, sleeplessness, feelings of hopelessness, and to prepare ultimately for a positive death

experience. When using spiritual counseling I teach the use of meditation, dream work, guided

prayer, centering prayer, and some Buddhist techniques such as the practice of mindfulness.

Moreover, my personal values make my practice inclusive for all seeking peace, healing, and

restoration to any level of wholeness in soul, mind, and/or body. Hanging at the entrance door to

my client waiting room is a personal quote that embodies the essence of my private practice,

philosophy and efforts to bring healing and wholeness to all my students and clients.

http://www.ngh.net/

http://www.hypnoticworld.com/

http://www.sdiworld.org/


A space! A special place! Out of reach of regular means, techniques long go

turned sacred cows. Historical ways of doing things not meant to heal

those outside the main stream. How many? Many seek The Way, only to

be turned away dragging and pushing broken bodies, minds and spirits

along litter covered and barren cultural by-ways. A space! A special

space! The essence of One will make this space a very special place for

those of us who stand, lean, sit and lay outside the main stream. Cultural

oddities embracing the Light finding healing for broken bodies, minds and

spirits. We will find our way to this space! A very special place!

(Grinstead, A Man in Waiting)

What are some of my personal values that can create counter-transference when dealing

with clients on issues such as death and dying? Surely, it is my laid-back attitude regarding death

and the death experience as a whole. My philosophy is that in order to live life fully and without

reservation, one must proactively embrace death and pull it close. Death and life are but opposite

sides of the same coin. Here are two personal poems reflective of this attitude.

Entombed! How else do I describe this event? Struck down early in life, angry and

defiant to the very end. Though I never knew this young man, just a

momentary intro at best, I am spiritual kin to his step-mother who was so

close to him. Is this where they bring you? Is this event what it means to

die? Oppressing this atmosphere! No movement of air! Die! Hell?

The audience are the dead. The deceased--I have no empathy--it is those

attending this affair that are to be mourned for they are the living dead.


Here to remember the one passed on is not the essence of the mystery. The

fear of this mystery brings us here, hiding our faces in tears for the one that

we should not mourn. Oppressive this atmosphere for it embodies all the

lies of this illusion called life. Only those having moved through and

beyond the state of the living dead are ones to be carried beyond this

mystery called life…call death. (Grinstead, A Man in Waiting)

You…YES…You! The it thing hanging way out back, way out there behind the

broken recesses of our minds. I’ve always known you, it’s the others who

pretend. There is no shadow behind each and every light. But you and

me! We’ve always been close friends…at-a-distance friends the kind of

friends that know without looking to see. Now…you and me…we are

dance partners too, up close and very personal dance partners. Pull you

closer than breath itself in this tight embrace I do. In this tight embrace I

embrace you full on and eye ball to empty eye socket, I look you straight on

and sweat I profusely do. I sweat and let it pour. And dance! We get it on!

It is a very hot tango we dance and it is center stage. I know you are the hot

exotic lover that turned me on to life. (Grinstead, A Man in Waiting)

When dealing with clients and issues of death and dying, I consciously remove this

personal attitude from the context of our sessions and move with compassion into their frame of

mind and being. This is a cornerstone of the transpersonal orientation, the reality of stepping into

another person’s experience and walking the proverbial moccasin mile with them. Detached

analytical observance is not a transpersonal modality or model of treatment.


The middle path of moderation in all things is how I will continue to meet the challenge of

staying centered personally and professionally while dealing with death and loss in a mindful

manner and remaining in the moment.

If a life is to be lived wisely a person will find contentment. People can enjoy the

gifts from the universe and forget what they don’t possess. Because people

value their existence they need not travel far. There may be planes and

cars, but these are not a person’s path. There may be telephones and

computers but these are diversions from the path. You can enjoy eating,

spending time with friends and family, taking walks and planting a garden,

enjoying life in the community. Even though distractions are always

available with promises of forgetfulness of loss, you may find contentment

with going on, finding peace in everyday living. (Metz, p. 161)


References

DeSpelder, A. & Stickland, A.L. (2005). The last dance: Encountering death and dying.

New York: McGraw Hill

Grinstead, D. (2001) The Enneagram and centering prayer: Tools to uncover and transform

shadow qualities of the unconscious. Virginia Beach, VA: Atlantic University

Grinstead, D., (2007) A man in waiting. Unpublished manuscript.

Kipnis, A. (2002). Angry young men: How parents, teachers, and counselors can help

“bad boys” become good men. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Learning to live through loss: understanding men who grieve. (n.d.) Retrieved July 3,

2007 from http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/FY880 .

Meta, P. (2000). The Tao of loss and life. Atlanta, Frankfurt, Paris: Humanics Trade

Group.

Gorman, G. E. & Southard, S. (Eds.). (1991). Death and dying: A bibliographical

survey. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Retrieved September 22, 2007, from Questia

database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=71915570

Seibert, D., Drolet, J. C., & Fetro, J. V. (2003). Helping children live with death and

loss. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press. Retrieved September

22, 2007, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=1o5244875

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