Divorce and Loss

Helping Adults and Children Mourn When a Marriage Comes Apart

By (author) Joshua Ehrlich

Publication date:

15 May 2014

Length of book:

186 pages

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Dimensions:

236x162mm
6x9"

ISBN-13: 9781442231818

Divorce and Loss: Helping Adults and Children Mourn When a Marriage Comes Apart places loss and mourning at the center of the divorce experience and details how therapists can facilitate mourning through individual therapy and through interventions with parents. The book offers detailed clinical vignettes to illuminate family members’ reactions to divorce and to highlight interventions. Ehrlich also explores how failures of mourning in response to divorce create difficulties for people, including bitter, high-conflict divorces. He examines how therapists can intervene more effectively with difficult divorces and avoid ethical and clinical pitfalls. In addition, the book examines the very strong feelings that divorce elicits in therapists and how to deal with these constructively.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments
Introduction

PART I: DIVORCE AND MOURNING: CHALLENGES FOR CHILDREN AND PARENTS

Chapter 1: The Losses in Divorce
Chapter 2: Mourning
Chapter 3: Failures of Mourning
Chapter 4: Breakdowns in Connection Between Parents and Children Around Divorce
Chapter 5: Entanglement with the Ex-Spouse: Its Impact on Children
Chapter 6: The Effects on Adolescents of Parents’ Difficulties Navigating Divorce

PART II: INTERVENING: HOW THERAPISTS CAN FACILITATE MOURNING

Chapter 7: Bearing Feelings, Facilitating Mourning
Chapter 8: Working with Parents Together to Help Children
Chapter 9: Helping Parents Bridge the Divide with their Children
Chapter 10: Working with the High-Conflict Divorce
Chapter 11: Individual Therapy with Children and Adolescents Dealing with Divorce
Chapter 12: Individual Therapy with Adults

References
About the Author

Ehrlich successfully constructs a bridge between the two literatures of divorce and child custody. . . .His potential to reach parents, clinicians, and legal professionals with this book and through his clinical work is vast. Written in a highly readable and accessible style, unencumbered by excessive jargon, this practical book offers lucid headings, clinical vignettes, and not a little wisdom. It can inform legal and mental health professionals about the unconscious processes displayed in their offices and courtrooms with knowledge that can significantly affect their assessments, recommendations, and decisions.