Perpetual loss and pervasive grief
daughters speak about the death of their mother in childhood
Keywords:
bereavement, daughters, mothers, grief, coping strategiesAbstract
AbstractThe impact on daughters of the death of their mother in childhood has been little researched. This article reports a qualitative study of the experiences of women in Ireland who were bereaved of their mother in early life, and the lifelong impact of this loss. The death of their mothers had a profound impact throughout these women's childhoods and adult lives. The women described the silence surrounding the death, their hunger for information about their mother, their coping strategies, their yearning for a mother figure, particularly in adolescence and when they married and gave birth themselves, and the effects on their own parenting capacity. A strong theme was their wish to speak publicly about their experiences, in the hope that they could help other women bereaved of a mother in childhood, and inform and enlighten those in a position to make a difference to bereaved children's lives.
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