How is the treatment of grief in boys and girls?

The loss of a loved one is something inherent to life and people are naturally trained to respond to it through a process as complex as what it is mourning, which was an accumulation of emotional, psychological and also behavioral reactions that develop when someone is lost nearby.

The younger a person is, the grieving process is usually more complex and, therefore, for the treatment of grief in boys and girls we can find various types of Psychological therapies: cognitive-behavioral psychological therapies, prevention and support programs during the grieving process or intervention at the family level, among others.

In this article we will try to explain in more detail What is the treatment of grief in boys and girls?; First of all, we are going to make a brief introduction about a process as complex, as well as natural, as mourning is.

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What is grief in Psychology?

According to the Dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE), the word "duel" has 3 definitions:

• Pity, grief, pain or feeling.
• Demonstrations that are carried out when expressing the feeling that one has for the death of someone.
• Gathering of family or relatives, friends and/or guests, who attend the mortuary or funeral.

In this article we intend to refer rather to the first two definitions, when talking about mourning as that reaction, manifestation or feeling that a person manifests for the death of a loved one. For this reason, we speak of mourning as that set of phenomena produced in human beings at different levels: psychological, social and biological after death. death of a close and dear person, mourning consisting of a process that develops step by step as it is one of the adaptive processes of being human.

It should be noted that in some of the reference manuals we can find a classification about mourning, where mourning can be divided into two different categories: the normative duel and the complicated duel. In general, the physical, psychological, and behavioral manifestations of complicated grief are the same as those that usually occur in normative grief, only that in complicated grief all of them tend to interfere in a more significant way in mental health and in different areas of people's lives affected.

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Types of grief treatment in boys and girls

If we search among the main reference manuals on the treatment of grief in boys and girls, probably not we will find psychotherapy treatments that are proposed as first choice treatments based on empirical evidence, since that today more studies are needed that are based on the efficacy of treatment for grief in childhood and the adolescence.

Despite this, some systematic reviews and also meta-analyses have been carried out where the usefulness of some psychological interventions or therapies has been collected (p. g., family therapy, cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy, play therapy, etc.). Next, we will explain in more detail what these psychological treatments that are usually used for the accompaniment and treatment of grief in boys and girls consist of.

1. Prevention and support programs

For the treatment of grief in boys and girls, there are prevention programs and also accompaniment that are made up of multi-component programs that include psychoeducational components, support sessions for help parents or close relatives and, of course, children to understand grief, that they can feel free to talk about complex and sensitive topics such as suicide and also encourage the expression of emotions.

On the other hand, these psychological programs also try to detect possible psychopathological reactions or some risk factors. associated risk, as well as helping to promote the correct functioning at a social and emotional level of the child who is going through the duel.

It should be noted that this type of psychotherapeutic programs are based on a series of principles related to counseling and are usually focus fundamentally on providing psychological support to those children who are going through a duel for the loss of a parent or some other close relative and also to support when a parent is suffering from a serious illness that could become terminal.

However, although these programs are used quite frequently, there is insufficient evidence about their effectiveness against grief in childhood, although any help that could be provided in this type of situation is never helpful. further.

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2. family intervention

The intervention would be a treatment of grief in boys and girls, fitting here the family grief program, which consists of a psychological intervention program that is focused on the promotion and development of resilience in those children who have suffered the loss of one or both parents and, more specifically, it is aimed at addressing those factors that are mediators of the soil process in these children.

This family psychological intervention is made up of 12 sessions in a group format, with sessions focused exclusively on the psychological support for children and another for the help of the children's caregivers or tutors, although sessions are also carried out joint. In these, skills are trained and then tasks are assigned so that the children practice between sessions and thus can consolidate the learning in session. Among the techniques used, it is worth mentioning role-playing, group feedback or modeling, among other.

In studies about the efficacy of this type of therapy we can find very favorable results in the short term, since it has been possible to observe a decrease in the symptoms of depression and also fewer behavioral problems on the part of children and can also help increase children's warmth with caregivers and greater satisfaction with support social.

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3. Cognitive-behavioral psychological therapy

Another treatment for grief in boys and girls that we can find is psychological therapy. cognitive-behavioral, which in these cases would be the one that is focused on the trauma, was developed aiming at Provide psychological support to children over 6 years of age in the face of grief for the death of a close person due to circumstances that could be traumatic.

Said psychological treatment consists of approximately 17 sessions, carried out separately but Simultaneous therapy with the affected child and with her parents, doing a joint session at the finish.

This treatment is focused on helping to understand one's own reactions to the trauma suffered and also on the development of a series of skills that could be used to cope with the circumstances that are happening and the event suffered.

On the other hand, some of the techniques used will be oriented towards the development of a narrative of the trauma that could allow desensitization to memories. traumatic and also seeks to make a restructuring of those maladaptive thoughts associated with trauma and others of another nature that could cause discomfort significant. Furthermore, within this therapy Other techniques are included such as psychoeducation, relaxation, emotional imagination, etc.

In this case, there are studies that have shown evidence of this therapy for reducing depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress and also other behavioral and emotional problems associated with the event suffered, which is why it can be a recommended option in cases of complicated grief in childhood and adolescence.

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4. narrative therapy

Narrative therapy is a grief treatment for boys and girls. It is mainly based on the narration of a series of stories that can help to verbalize and also to process the children who are going through a duel for the death of someone close, such as a progenitor. In these stories, the narrator is in charge of tell a story, counting the beginning and the middle, incorporating a series of elements that are associated with the loss of a loved one and then it would be the child who is in charge of counting the end.

The professionals in charge of developing this type of therapy to help cope with grief have concluded that in their research It has been observed that the children, although they are sad at first, are fearful and shy as the sessions progress Little by little, they feel more comforted and are more capable of expressing their loss and pain through stories.

5. play therapy

We can also find as a treatment for grief in boys and girls the game therapy that has been developed in order to establish an environment safe so that they can express their pain, since children usually experience certain difficulties when it comes to expressing in words what they feel. That is why play therapy encourages children to fearlessly express their emotions, thoughts, worries and fears.

Various materials are used in play therapy such as paints, toy building blocks and all kinds of toys (eg. g., dolls, children's medical kits, toy cars, etc.). The objective of using this type of material is that children can represent their own version of their fears, worries and also the scene of death.

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6. Art therapy and music therapy

Finally, when talking about the treatment of grief in boys and girls, art therapy and music therapy should also be highlighted. The first one is used in order to help children who are going through a grieving process to express their pain to through the drawing when they cannot find the words for it, since it is likely that this will be easier for them and that way they can help them process the traumatic and painful event they have suffered.

On the other hand, music therapy is made up of various techniques associated with the world of music such as musical improvisation, lyrical analysis and, of course, composing songs.

It should be noted that in some music therapy programs there are sessions of behavior modification, cognitive-behavioral techniques, techniques of expression of emotions through the composition of songs, as well as psychoeducation about grief in order that these children can process and normalize this process. Furthermore, studies carried out on music therapy have found some promising results.