Disrupted Bereavement

Course Description:

This course deals with the phenomenon of 'disrupted bereavement' as it took shape following the October 7 attacks, and focuses on how mass trauma and ambiguous loss create multi-systemic disruptions in the grieving experience of bereaved families, and even more so of the families of the kidnapped victims.

In the absence of established literature and models, the course presents an organizing framework developed in the last two years in the field, which maps disruptions and interruptions along the normative continuum of bereavement: from the pre-announcement and pre-burial stages, through ceremonies and commemoration, to the mourning stage.

Throughout the meetings, we will analyze how the collapse of the mourning continuum, lack of information, receiving news of death without burial, delays in identification, burial without farewell, and institutional-public gaps shape patterns of delayed and unresolved mourning, along with ongoing disruptions in psychological-emotional, procedural, interpersonal-social, and political aspects.

Through a discussion of clinical examples and elaboration of dilemmas from the field, the course will provide therapists with conceptual and practical tools for working with disturbed bereavement, and will provide a response to the unique rehabilitation challenges of the current reality - even after the deceased have been reburied.

Course objectives:

1. To provide participants with a current theoretical and clinical conceptual framework for understanding the phenomenon of disrupted bereavement, with its unique characteristics in the context of mass trauma and ambiguous loss.

2. Develop the ability to identify and conceptualize disruptions along the grief continuum and their clinical manifestations, including emotional, functional, and interpersonal symptomatology, and examine principles for tailored therapeutic intervention over time.

About the lecturer:

Dr. Einat Yahana , clinical neuropsychologist and rehabilitation psychologist-instructor. Faculty member at the School of Behavioral Sciences at Tel Aviv-Yafo Academic. Lecturer and instructor at the Mifrasim Institute for Research and Teaching of Psychotherapy and director of "Namal Mivtachim" - a training center for the treatment and rehabilitation of victims of kidnapping and ambiguous loss. Since October 7, she has accompanied families of kidnapped and captive survivors and served as head of the rehabilitation department in the health system of the Abductees' Families Headquarters. She has over two decades of clinical experience in the public and private sectors working with adults, children and families in situations of trauma, bereavement, loss and change (Lewinstein Hospital, Sheba-Tel Hashomer, and NYUMC). She treats October 7 victims in a private clinic and is also involved in training treatment personnel, counseling and continuing education for various organizations. Her research and scientific publications deal with the psychological mechanisms that influence perception and adaptation to loss following life events.

Target audience:

Specialist and intern psychologists, clinical social workers or social workers with a master's degree with experience in therapeutic work, expressive and creative therapists with a master's degree, psychiatrists, clinical criminologists and graduate students in psychology.

Course cost:

750 ₪

The price of the course is subsidized thanks to a donation from an anonymous organization, with the aim of promoting the training of abduction-informed therapists and expanding knowledge and professional tools for dealing with the trauma of abduction and its clinical and social implications.