{"id":341,"date":"2010-08-23T08:26:19","date_gmt":"2010-08-23T08:26:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thinplaces\/2010\/08\/the-gift-of-grief.html"},"modified":"2010-08-23T08:26:19","modified_gmt":"2010-08-23T08:26:19","slug":"the-gift-of-grief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2010\/08\/the-gift-of-grief.html","title":{"rendered":"The Gift of Grief"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have an essay about the gift of grief on Christianity Today’s website. It begins:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\nA<\/strong>fter my mother-in-law died, I remember thinking that I finally understood the word depressed<\/span>.
\nIt felt as though I had been pushed underneath a heavy boulder, one
\nthat wasn’t crushing me but instead confining me and keeping out the
\nlight. Although I cried on occasion, I didn’t feel unbearably sad.
\nRather, I felt emotionally anesthetized, as though joy and sorrow had
\nbeen pressed out of my life. It didn’t last forever, and as I look
\nback, I can even say that I’m grateful for the experience. My former
\ngrief seems like an appropriate response to the reality that my
\nhusband’s mother, my friend, died prematurely. <\/p>\n

So when I read the New York Times<\/span> op-ed<\/a> by psychiatrist and professor emeritus Allen Frances about a recent proposed change to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders<\/span>
\n(D.S.M.), I shared his concerns. Frances–chairman of the task force
\nthat created the previous version of the D.S.M.–is no skeptic when it
\ncomes to using therapy and medication to treat mental disorders. But he
\ndescribes this scenario: “Suppose your spouse or child died two weeks
\nago and now you feel sad, take less interest and pleasure in things,
\nhave little appetite or energy, can’t sleep well and don’t feel like
\ngoing to work. In the proposal for the D.S.M. 5, your condition would
\nbe diagnosed as a major depressive disorder.” <\/p>\n

This, he warns, “would be a wholesale medicalization of
\nnormal emotion, and it would result in the overdiagnosis and
\novertreatment of people who would do just fine if left alone to grieve
\nwith family and friends, as people always have.” Although the rationale
\nbehind the proposed change–helping people before they form
\nself-destructive patterns–is good, Frances argues that grief is a
\nnecessary part of human development. To bypass grief via medicine is to
\nbypass a core part of our humanity. <\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

To keep reading, click here<\/a>. <\/p>\n
<\/div>\n
And in light of that essay, I’ll take the time to mention a few other resources that might be of interest:<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Penelope Ayers<\/a>, my own reflections on the experience of getting to know my mother-in-law as she was diagnosed with cancer and coming to see hope, goodness, and purpose in her life even as she fought the disease. To read excerpts or hear audio clips, click here<\/a>. <\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
The Art of Dying: Living Fully Into the Life to Come<\/a>, by Rob Moll, discusses the ways Christians can and should approach death.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Accompany Them With Singing: The Christian Funeral<\/a>, by Thomas Long. This reflection on the history and practices of Christian funerals offers a striking contrast to many modern funeral practices. <\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
“The Reality of Hope<\/a>,” an essay I wrote for First Things last year, another essay about Christian hope as a response to sorrow that balances optimism and despair.  <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have an essay about the gift of grief on Christianity Today’s website. It begins: After my mother-in-law died, I remember thinking that I finally understood the word depressed. It felt as though I had been pushed underneath a heavy boulder, one that wasn’t crushing me but instead confining me and keeping out the light.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-faith","category-family"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Gift of Grief - Thin Places<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2010\/08\/the-gift-of-grief.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Gift of Grief - Thin Places\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I have an essay about the gift of grief on Christianity Today’s website. It begins: After my mother-in-law died, I remember thinking that I finally understood the word depressed. 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Two major life experiences have shaped her writing and her faith\u00e2\u20ac\u201dcaring for her mother-in-law as she battled cancer and welcoming her daughter Penny into the world after she was diagnosed at birth with Down syndrome. Both experiences expanded and enriched her understanding of what it means to be human and to receive each and every person as a gift.\u00c2\u00a0 A graduate of Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, she is the author of Penelope Ayers: A Memoir, and the forthcoming A Good and Perfect Gift (Bethany House). Her essays have appeared in First Things, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Christian Century, ChristianityToday.com, and Bloom, among other online venues.","sameAs":["http:\/\/amyjuliabecker.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/author\/amyjuliabecker"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/88"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}