Ripples in the Pond: Caring for Extended Family Members After a Perinatal Loss

Chichester, Melanie

Monday, 31 October 2011

Melanie Chichester, BSN, RNC
Labor & Delivery, Christiana Care Health System, Newark, DE
Nina Bennett, MS
HIV Program, Christiana Care Health Services, Wilmington, DE

Learning Objective 1: incorporate grandparent's grief into the concept of disenfranchised grief.

Learning Objective 2: name 2 ways which assist bereaved grandparents in memorializing their deceased grandchildren.

Background / Significance: Contemporary grief theory supports the concept that grief is a lifelong process, and that it is normal to desire a continuing connection with the deceased (Neimeyer, 2001). Parents who have lost a baby are offered time to see their baby, memory items to validate the baby’s existence, and support. However, the mother and father are not the only family members touched by grief and loss. The grandparents may well be forgotten mourners, their role relegated to part of those supporting the bereaved parents, denying them the recognition as mourners in their own right.

Method: This was a simple survey study which was posted on the Internet.

Results: Eighteen surveys were returned. Ninety four percent of the respondents have pictures of their deceased grandchild and 67% wear jewelry that symbolizes their grandchild. All do something to remember their grandchild on special days. Other ways they have chosen to memorialize their deceased grandchild include putting up an ornament, donating to charity, visiting the cemetery, starting a memorial garden, and getting a tattoo. Limitations of the study include the small, homogeneous sample size, making it difficult to generalize the data.

Implications for Practice: Bereaved parents and grandparents report that their greatest long term concern is others forgetting their child. As time passes, grandparents often search for ways to incorporate their dead grandchild into their family in a manner which permits recognition and remembrance. “Healthcare providers who care for women and families who experience a loss need to be educated on how to provide sensitive and thoughtful grief support” (USDHHS, 2002), which includes offering evidence-based support options to families experiencing perinatal loss. This pilot study confirms that bereaved grandparents feel a need to be included with parents to help remember and memorialize their deceased grandchild.

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