ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines strategies and procedures for assessment and treatment of the pathological grief syndrome that we shall refer to, for reasons made clear below, as traumatic grief (TG). It provides definitions of this condition and of other terminology that has thus far remained ambiguous, for the sake of clarity, but without making any special claim for the validity of these specific terms. The chapter reviews the history of psychological approaches to the understanding of bereavement and its pathologies, as well as what more empirical investigations have discovered about the specific nature and effects of TG. It describes the goals, strategies, and techniques we have used in individual treatment of patients with TG, as well as our ideas for adapting our approach to a group treatment setting. The chapter concludes with brief consideration of the empirical status of our treatment approach, and of the further work that remains to be done.
