The Myth of Closure

Today's episode is about the "myth of closure," a phrase I've borrowed from the recent book by family therapist, researcher and author, Pauline Boss (The Myth of Closure: Ambiguous Loss in a Time of Pandemic and Change). The basic idea is that, when it comes to grief, "closure" is an unhelpful and unattainable idea. In many ways, "closure" is a made-up media word that fails to capture the complexity of the grieving process. It's more helpful to speak about grief in terms of learning to live it or finding meaning in it or beginning to carry it differently. Boss is most well known, however, for a term she coined in the 1970s as a graduate student: "ambiguous loss." This type of loss as a graduate student in the 1970s to articulate the type of grief that doesn't have official verification or immediate resolution (e.g. the death of a loved one when the body is not recovered; a loved one with Alzheimer's).Feedback? I'd love to hear from you at [email protected]. Thanks for listening, friends. You are loved and never alone!