Portraits of Life After Loss: Understanding Parental Loss Within A Social Context

Abstract

Parental loss at any age is a life transition that brings with it unprecedented changes. Encountering this loss in emerging adulthood can be especially challenging because of the many consequences characteristic of this stage of life. Existing research has excluded the experiences of young people grieving the death of a parent. Thus, the present study attempts to bridge this gap by focusing on the experiences of emerging adults dealing with parental loss with an emphasis on their journeys of coping with the loss, and how grief unfolded in a social context. In this exploratory research, four participants in the age range of 18–28 years were interviewed, and the data were subjected to interpretative phenomenological analysis. Three superordinate themes emerged from the data, namely, early days following the loss, changing relational realities, and coping in the context of the other. Limitations and implications of the study have been discussed.

Introduction

Life brings with it unavoidable experiences of losing a loved one at different points in time. How individuals experience and deal with loss varies depending on a multitude of factors. Grief, traditionally, represents a universal reaction to loss, or bereavement; it is observed across all cultures and throughout human history. Grief is inevitable and can be seen as ‘nature’s way’ (Gross, 2018, p. 5) of helping us accept the death of a loved one.

Grief, Bereavement, and Mourning

Though the terms bereavement and grief have been used synonymously in related literature, their meanings are significantly different. In The Psychology of Grief, Gross (2018) defined bereavement as the loss of someone, through death, with whom one had an emotional attachment or who was an important figure in one’s life. Grief on the other hand refers to how one responds to bereavement and it involves a variety of emotional, cognitive, spiritual, behavioural, and functional responses of an individual following the loss of a significant person (Zisook & Shear, 2009). The manifestation of grief, referred to as mourning (Özel & Özkan, 2020), is influenced largely by social and cultural factors, such as gender roles and religious beliefs, and rituals, including funerals, abstinence, and so on.

Theories on Grief and Coping

Explorations in the field of death studies have contributed to the development of various theories and ideas about the process of grieving.

The psychoanalytic approach to grief, resting on Freud’s (1958) theory, assumes that the primary task of mourning involves the gradual surrender of psychological attachment to the deceased. In her review of the grief work hypothesis (GWH), Margaret Stroebe (1993) challenged the importance of grief work in coping with loss. Her investigations revealed a lack of scientific evidence of the GWH. She also points out the cross-cultural differences in grieving across societies. Stroebe’s redefinition of grief work as ‘a cognitive process involving confrontation with and restructuring of thoughts about the deceased, the loss experience, and the changed world within which the bereaved must now live’ (p. 33) rejects the existence of a normal or standard process.

According to the stage model perspective, a natural psychological response to loss involves a sequential progression through specific stages. However, this model has received criticism, as it is interpreted as being prescriptive of the grief response (see Avis et al., 2021; Strobe et al., 2017).

Bowlby and Parkes (Bowlby, 1961, 1980; Parkes, 1972; Parkes & Weiss, 1983) proposed the first stage theory of grief which included four stages, namely, the phases of numbing, yearning and searching, disorganization and despair, and reorganization. Another popular theory is Kübler-Ross’ (1969) Five Stages of Grief which include denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and lastly acceptance. Empirical evidence for the stage theory of grief by Kübler-Ross is minimal. The studies that have been carried out yield contrasting results, with a few lacking support for the theory (e.g. McCoyd et al., 2023) and others finding evidence in favour of it (e.g. Meuser & Marwit, 2001). Holland and Neimeyer (2010) examined the relation between several grief indicators and the time since the loss, while also attempting to shed light on the role of a meaning-oriented perspective. The results did not validate the stage theory, nor were they entirely contradictory to it. There was a general pattern of grief distress and acceptance increasing and decreasing asynchronously. Further, sense-making proved to be a greater predictor of grief indicators, as compared to time since loss. Research exploring grief and people’s adjustment to the restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic have also employed various stage models of grief to make sense of the losses and transitions (e.g. Mortazavi et al., 2020; Valliani & Mughal, 2022).

More recently, the psychosocial transition theory has come to the forefront. Psychosocial transitions (PST) are life events that require people to revise their assumptions about the world, have long lasting implications, and take place over a relatively short time-span (Caplan, 1961; Rahe, 1979). The ‘assumptive world’ comprising people’s expectations that they believe to be true are often invalidated in the course of a PST. The death of a loved one tends to negate the various assumptions underlying different aspects of life and the familiar world changes into an unfamiliar one (Gross, 2018). To prevent the rising anxiety from becoming disorganizing, bereaved people use a variety of coping mechanisms, such as avoidance or denial (Parkes, 1988).

Worden (1991) conceptualized mourning as an active process composed of four tasks, including acknowledging and accepting the reality of death, processing the pain of grief, adjusting to a world without the deceased, and lastly, finding an enduring connection with the deceased. These tasks don’t necessarily follow a prescribed order, and allows the bereaved individual some amount of control. Another model is the dual process model proposed by Schut (1999), which is applicable to various losses and has made a distinction between two categories of stressors, namely, loss-oriented and restoration-oriented stressors. Loss-orientation points to the bereaved individual’s focus on, appraisal of, and processing of certain features of the loss experience, that is, the primary stressor, and involves grief work. Restoration-orientation, on the other hand, refers to a focus on secondary stressors, which are the consequences of bereavement. Restructuring one’s life following loss can be necessary, with a focus on what needs to be dealt with and how (Gross, 2018). Both orientations can be linked to outcomes such as distress and anxiety, while also being involved in coping. The dynamic process of attending to or avoiding both kinds of stressors is called oscillation (Stroebe & Schut, 1999). Its underlying principle is that occasionally, the grieving person will confront aspects of loss, and at other instances, avoid them and focus on restoration tasks, and vice versa. Adaptive coping, therefore, comprises a complex regulatory process of confrontation and avoidance, with oscillation between the two being crucial.

Experiencing Grief in Relation to Others

Within the family system, relationships between and within subsystems may be altered following parental loss, as suggested by the solidarity and kin-keeping hypotheses proposed by Kalmijn and Leopold (2019). According to the solidarity hypothesis, the death of a parent enhances cohesion amongst siblings who rely on each other for social and practical support and also come together to achieve greater intergenerational solidarity with the surviving parent. The kin-keeping hypothesis, on the other hand, states that the death of the second parent is accompanied by weaker cohesion amongst the siblings as the previous integrating force is absent.

Individuals’ experiences of grief are often influenced by the societal context they are situated in, which lay implicit or explicit frameworks for mourning the loss of a loved one. Klapper et al., (1994), in their study on the social context of grief as experienced by adult daughters, found that societal expectations and norms led grieving daughters to control the feeling and expression of grief, often modifying their emotions. They also experienced anticipatory grief prior to the loss of a parent and viewed their grief as selfish, as yearning for their deceased parent was understood as extending the parent’s suffering. Grief processing also takes place differently in different relational settings. For instance, Pressman & Bonnano (2007) discovered that individuals engaged in grief processing with family or by themselves more than they would with friends, but it was hypothesized that their friendships contributed towards the continuation of normal activity and social reintegration.

A study by Skalski et al. (2022) investigating grief during the COVID-19 pandemic in Poland found that perceived social support and resilience were correlated with each other and linked to lower levels of dysfunctional grief. Limited research has shown that social support of various kinds, including support from peers, mentors, and parents, has been found to be helpful in coping with grief (Sharp et al., 2018). However, contrary to popular belief, existing research also indicates that there is no significant interaction between social support and bereavement outcomes (e.g. Stroebe et al., 2005; Wagø et al., 2017).

Rationale Behind the Present Study

Parental loss in adulthood is viewed as an inevitable step in the circle of life, and the belief that it is normative and timely contributes towards its conception as disenfranchised grief (Abrams and Arnett, 2013). Contrary to the prevailing belief regarding parental loss in adulthood, it is neither timely nor normative to lose one’s parent in emerging adulthood, yet the experiences of this population have been neglected in available research. An exploration into idiosyncratic experiences of loss will yield an in-depth understanding of the diverse ways people encounter loss. Arentt (2000, 2004) proposed the developmental phase of emerging adulthood as an age marked with many challenges unique to individuals in this stage of life. The bi-directional relationship between the natural consequences of this age and the grief associated with the death of a parent was of key interest and led to the selection of the demographic of emerging adults in the present study.

A review of literature indicated a prevalence of research involving quantitative modes of inquiry and minimal qualitative explorations into the lived experiences of dealing with parental loss. A qualitative approach will facilitate such an investigation, as well as provide insight into the various domains shaped by and impacting the experience of loss. In the Indian context in particular, research (e.g. Bhana, 2007; Kaneez, 2015) in the field of death studies largely pertains to perinatal grief and the experiences of widows, while parental loss as experienced by young adults is yet to be explored. The present study aims to fill these gaps in literature and discover how people from diverse backgrounds in the Indian context experience parental loss.

Method

Purpose

The present study was aimed at exploring the experiences of emerging adults dealing with the loss of a parent, and the ways in which they engage in meaning-making regarding the same.

Research Objectives

(i) To understand the experiences of emerging adults coping with the loss of a parent.

(ii) To explore the impact of parental death on a bereaved person’s relationships with others.

Qualitative Research

The present study adopted a qualitative approach as it allows access into areas that are otherwise complex and impermeable. The detailed and interactive nature of data collection involving meaningful communication between the researcher and participants, with a focus on establishing understanding and collaboration, makes qualitative methodology all the more beneficial (Buckle et al., 2010). Particularly in the case of bereavement research, a qualitative approach facilitates the exploration of questions related to meaning, experience, and understanding following loss, allowing the participants to provide deeper levels of insight than would not be accessible using quantitative methods. Thus, it was seen as the most appropriate method to develop an understanding of the problem under study.

Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis

Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) seeks ‘to explore in detail how participants are making sense of their personal and social world’ (Smith & Osborn, 2007, p. 53). It is an approach to qualitative, experiential, and psychological research influenced by three key philosophical underpinnings – phenomenology, hermeneutics, and idiography (Smith et al., 2009).

The analytical method of IPA was chosen for the present study as it is consistent with the research question and objectives. IPA’s concern with the detailed exploration of lived experiences makes it especially suitable to the study, facilitating an understanding of how the participants make sense of their unique experiences of loss and grief. Considering IPA’s emphasis on the particular and the relative uncommonness of facing parental loss as an emerging adult, the method creates scope to delve into each participant’s unique narrative with attention to the specificity of each experience, placing each individual in a particular context. It also allows the researcher to take a social constructionist position, which holds that there are multiple realities with each participant having their own reality.

Participants

The sample for the present study was composed of four individuals (two males and two females) in the age group of 18–28 years, with the mean age of the sample being 24. Each participant had lost a parent 1–5 years prior to the data collection. Three of the participants were students, while one was employed. The participants came from diverse religious backgrounds, with one being Agnostic, one Muslim, and two Catholic. In terms of family composition, one of the participants hailed from a single-child household, whereas the other three had one or more siblings. The sample was recruited using purposive sampling.

The inclusion criteria for the sample in the present study were males and females who were 18–28 years of age and had lost either of their parents in the past 1–5 years. This age range was selected as individuals in this range are in the developmental phase of emerging adulthood, facing a variety of challenges unique to this phase of life. Proposed by Arnett et al. (2004), emerging adulthood, lasting from the age of 18–28 years, is an age marked with profound importance and change for most young people in industrialized countries. While faced with the challenges of this age, encountering the loss of a parent is bound to create additional pressures and have a significant impact on various domains of life. Further, the experience of the loss in itself is likely to be impacted by the developments in the individual’s life, characteristic of the phase of emerging adulthood.

The exclusion criteria included individuals who lost a parent less than one year or more than five years prior to data collection. The researcher chose the time-span of 1–5 years post the loss, as it was assumed that any less than one year would be too proximal to the death of the parent and individuals may not be comfortable talking about the loss and may not be able to provide information of how they coped with it because of its recency. The upper range of five years was decided upon as the experiences of people who encountered the loss more than five years prior to data collection may be far too diverse and distinct from those who experienced it more recently. Individuals who had lost both their parents were also excluded from the study.

Procedure

The method of data collection chosen for the present study was interviews, defined by Kvale and Brinkmann (2008) as a method having the purpose of gathering the interviewees’ descriptions of their life world so as to interpret the meaning of the phenomena under focus. It was selected keeping in mind its capacity to create a personal and safe environment for the participants to reveal their stories of dealing with parental loss in great detail, providing richer insights. It would allow the participants to freely and comfortably express their thoughts and feelings in a one-to-one setting. In light of the analytical method of IPA chosen for the present study, the method of face-to-face interviews also made it possible to take into account the non-verbal behaviour and paralanguage of the participants. Various ethical considerations were kept in mind over the course of the study. Participation in this research was entirely on a voluntary basis and the participants were not coerced in any way. They were free to withdraw at any point. Participants were required to fill an informed consent form and the interview commenced only after ensuring they had a complete understanding of what participation would entail. In order to maintain confidentiality, pseudonyms were assigned to each individual, and the recordings were only accessible to the researcher. The researcher was sensitive to the participants’ body language; and if they appeared distressed or uncomfortable during the interview, the researcher halted the interview and offered to discontinue it. Further, the interview schedule was constructed such that the participant and interviewer were given a chance to build rapport first and the emotional triggers were minimized through the careful sequencing of the questions. Participants were provided with a list of resources of mental health service providers in different parts of Delhi whose help they could seek if they felt the need, as well as online resources to aid in coping with the distress they may face.

Development of the Interview Schedule and Pilot Study

Based on the review of literature and objectives of the study, the domains of focus in the present study were decided upon, and an interview schedule was formulated. Two pilot interviews were then conducted to understand the feasibility of the method of interviewing, as well as the appropriateness of the questions included in the schedule. The pilot interviews were conducted with individuals who responded to the call for participation and who fit the inclusion criteria. However, both interviewees came from family backgrounds that had distinct features which separated them from the remaining participants, therefore, their data was not included in the study. Apart from this, the schedule was also reviewed by subject matter experts and their suggestions were duly incorporated. The final interview schedule comprised four dimensions, namely – (i) immediate experience, (ii) impact on relationships, (iii) coping with loss, and (iv) moving forward.

Data Collection

Following the conductions of the pilots, the process of data collection began. A message was sent out on various social media platforms to acquire participants for the study. Once participants were given the necessary information regarding the study and consented to participate, they were required to fill an online demographic form.

The location of the conduction of the interviews was decided upon taking into consideration where the participants would be comfortable to talk about a sensitive topic such as their experience of the loss. It was ensured that the setting wasn’t noisy or crowded, so as to allow the participants to freely express their thoughts and feelings in a safe space, with minimal distractions and without being apprehensive about the presence of other people.

Following the interview, the participants were provided with a list of resources, for them to seek professional help in case they felt the need.

Data Analysis

While the IPA researcher is primarily interested in the lived experiences of the participant and how they make meaning out of it, the final result is always an account of how the analyst makes sense of the participants’ sense-making processes, leading to the double hermeneutic (Smith et al., 2009). The analysis is, therefore, a joint product of both the analyst and the participant. The steps proposed by Smith et al. (2009) were followed to analyze the data in the present study.

Results and Discussion

Making Meaning of the Data

While parental loss is considered a natural part of the circle of life, experiencing the same as an emerging adult brings with it consequences in multiple spheres of life that no amount of preparation can extinguish the impact of. The sudden turmoil caused by such a life transition drives the bereaved individual to cope with their emotions, the transformed family system, and the wide range of changes brought about in their life, while simultaneously dealing with the challenges characteristic of their stage of life. However, recent literature in the field of death studies and bereavement has ignored the population of young people and their experiences of parental loss. The analysis of data under the present research revealed four superordinate themes, with underlying subordinate themes. These include: Early Days Following the Loss, Changing Relational Realities, and Coping in the Context of the Other. These have been elaborated upon and discussed below. For confidentiality purposes, the participants have each been assigned a pseudonym – Alan (28 years old), Maheen (24), Arun (24), and Mona (19).

Theme 1: Early Days Following the Loss

This theme focuses on the participants’ experiences during the early days following the loss of a parent. Participants reported that the initial days post the loss were marked by a range of emotions and incidents and they all seemed to have vivid memories of these early days and recalled how events unfolded over time. Each participant responded to the diverse challenges, functional and emotional, in ways unique to themselves, with some commonalities arising in terms of the emotions they felt, how they dealt with it, and the immediate responsibilities and changes in their lives.

Emotional Response to the Loss

The participants’ reactions to the loss were mediated by the conditions surrounding each of their parent’s death. Alan, Maheen, and Mona’s now-deceased parents had been living with cancer for a significant duration of time prior to their passing.

The period prior to the loss, wherein their parent’s illness was particularly salient, allowed these participants to prepare themselves for what they saw as an inevitable consequence of the illness. This preparation facilitated the process of acceptance which followed the death of their parents. When asked about her immediate experience, Maheen stated,

“But I think it probably wasn’t all that hard for me because I think the moment someone tells you that somebody has cancer you sort of understand that death is imminent.”

This premature acceptance of their parents’ ‘imminent’ death, particularly evident in the cases of Alan and Maheen, may have also been attempts made by them to protect themselves from the future loss and subsequent pain and prevent their hopes from being crushed. Thus, acceptance acted as a defence not only against anticipatory grief, but also against the grief that would have followed after the loss of their parents. Such an approach to dealing with the loss laid ground for the defences they used to cope with parental loss.

For Mona, ever since her mother was diagnosed with Leukemia eight years prior to her death, living with her mother’s illness became a way of life that she was all too familiar with. She acknowledged that her mother’s loss was an idea that constantly loomed in her mind for a large part of her childhood and adolescence. Yet, when she found out about her passing, she found it difficult to accept the loss as reality because despite having expected it, she didn’t view it as something that would actually happen to her.

Unlike the other participants, although Arun’s father was sick in the weeks preceding the loss, suffering from jaundice and liver damage, Arun did not expect to lose his father to his illness. Recalling the incident of when they heard about the loss, disbelief and shock characterized the experiences of both Mona and Arun. When asked about his thoughts and feelings at the time, Arun stated,

“I got stunned because I was… like… must be around 19 at that time[…] it is something that you know no matter how hard I try, I will not be able to explain it fully, I mean what I was going through, because it was happening so jaldi, jaldi (fast) and you were not getting the time to you know understand.”

This shock acted as a barrier against Arun’s acceptance of his father’s death and made it difficult for him to comprehend the reality of loss. The loss was unexpected and Arun’s perceived unpreparedness to deal with such a life event is evidenced in his emphasis on his age at the time. Hence, he admitted he initially bargained with the alternate possibility of his father being saved had it not been for one careless error made by the medical staff. The initial stages of Arun’s reactions to the loss are thus in line with the Kübler-Ross (1969) stage model of grief with denial and disbelief being followed by bargaining.

Encountering their parent’s bodies for the first time sparked similar emotions and thoughts in Maheen and Arun who found it difficult to deal with the idea of their fathers’ bodies now being lifeless. Arun experienced contradictory feelings of pride and distress upon realizing his father’s departure from the physical world, reflected in his statement,

“…the hardest thing I had to do was you know, when the body came to our place, I had to you know remove that beard and it was very sad. I mean, I got the chance of you know trimming my dad’s beard but then eventually when you realize that he was no more, you know, it was such a painful experience.”

Another predominant emotion was that of guilt, reported by Maheen and Mona. Having been exposed to models of grief where rumination and sadness were the only visible emotions, carrying on with daily life, feeling positive emotions, and not experiencing an extreme grief reaction, triggered feelings of guilt, as evidenced in Mona’s comment,

“The thing that I would associate in like the immediate period like the next one or two weeks after that was like this really weird sense of guilt whenever I tried to enjoy something.”

This was felt as a result of internalized expectations of how one should react to grief, creating a dissonance between their expectations and behaviour. Maheen, however, also experienced guilt because she engaged in self-blaming for her father’s death, assuming responsibility for the incidents that led to his final medical emergency. This guilt had particularly overpowering effects at night, resulting in sleep disturbances and nightmares that Maheen coped with by distracting herself with TV series before going to bed.

Adapting to an Altered Reality

Prominent in all participants’ accounts about the days immediately after the loss was their involvement in rituals related to the death, including organizing the funeral, travelling to another city for the burial, arranging facilities for the guests, amongst other things. As a result, thoughts about the loss didn’t occupy their mind, as evidenced in Alan’s revelation,

“Early 3-4 days toh like, there are so many rituals, there are so many people around, you don’t get time for yourself. You have to see relatives coming, their going, arranging that. […] the cremation and all we have to do. The thing of losing her didn’t come to mind…”

Being the older children, hearing about the loss acted as a call for Alan, Maheen, and Arun to remain strong for their widowed parents, behaviour arising out of empathic concern for them. Their immediate focus was to protect their parents and support their family. Coming to know of his father’s death immediately drew Arun’s attention to his mother, as he revealed,

“When my dad passed away, that very night, me and my brother and my mother, we all, my mother was sleeping between us and we held both her hands and we told her that we are there for you.”

Returning to regular life once the rituals were carried out required them to accommodate to a new life without the deceased. Maheen was often reminded of her father’s absence because of her expectancy to see him in familiar places, a searching behaviour that triggered her realization of the loss because of denied expectations.

“Initially for a couple of months maybe… so I used to pray, we offer namaaz, so the place I offer namaaz was where his side of the bed was […]. Every time I would go to pray, I would see that okay nobody’s here and it would strike me. It doesn’t strike me anymore.”

Each participant adopted different approaches to coping with their new circumstances, occasionally engaging in problem-focused coping and at other times emotion-focused coping. Over the course of the interview, Maheen’s narrative confirmed an avoidance-oriented approach, possibly arising out of her efforts at protecting herself from the depth of emotions she actually feels about the loss and because of a fear of being unaware of how to deal with these emotions. Mona’s experience was influenced by various stressors present at the time, including her upcoming exams and thoughts about her mother. Her family immediately attempted to establish a routine, as she stated,

“That same evening (following the funeral) we came home and kind of tried to get back into some kind of routine.”

Similar to Mona, other participants’ grief also took the form of restoration-orientation, with occasional oscillation to loss-orientation. Participants reported avoiding ruminating over the loss and focusing on adapting to their transformed reality, despite occasional difficulties in acknowledging the continuity of life. This oscillation is in accordance with the dual process model proposed by Stroebe & Schut, 1999, which suggests that a bereaved person will engage in a dynamic process of confronting or avoiding loss-oriented stressors and restoration-oriented stressors at different points of time, a fluctuation that is key to adaptive coping.

Additionally, the death of their parents brought with it certain financial responsibilities and secondary consequences, such as altered relationships, redistribution of tasks within the family, changed behaviour of family members, and the loss of the various roles played by the deceased parent. A unique finding in this study is that despite these narratives about the ways their lives changed, all four participants claimed that there was no significant, observable change caused by the loss in the day to day. The inconsistency in their disclosures about the changes that came about and the perceived absence of change is suggestive of attempts at denying change. This can also be attributed to a difficulty in recalling the changes because of the emotional and mental turmoil that marked their initial experience. Studies examining memory of autobiographical events have shown a greater tendency to recall positive memories as opposed to negative ones (e.g. Linton, 1975; White, 2002). Further, the changes that came about may have been specific to certain domains, rather than an overriding alteration in all spheres of life. Bonanno (2019) suggests that being able to endure a traumatic or painful event equanimously creates the assumption that the event wasn’t particularly severe. This may account for the perceived absence of any significant changes.

Theme 2: Changing Relational Realities

Losing a parent was equivalent to losing a pillar in the structure of the family as well as one’s individual life. Thus, it was accompanied by major modifications in each of the participants’ relational dynamics within and beyond the family.

Transformed Familial Dynamics

Participants reported that experiencing the loss of an immediate family member had unprecedented changes in the family environment in some form or another. Evident in the transcripts of all the participants was an observable transformation in the roles played by the family members.

Alan and Arun, being the eldest children in the family, assumed the responsibility to fill in the shoes of their deceased parent. They acknowledged that there was a reversal of roles between the surviving parent and child such that they felt the need to protect their family. This was a prominent finding in Work’s (2013) thesis exploring the experiences of male grief, wherein the participants felt an overwhelming responsibility for the role of the eldest son, a tendency they labelled ‘eldest son syndrome’. Consistent with these findings, Alan and Arun also believed that by virtue of being the eldest sons, it became their duty to look after the family in the absence of their deceased parents. While Arun was more concerned with his mother’s emotional state, in Alan’s case, this role called for him to be a protective figure for his brother and sister. This is reflected in his response to how his role has changed within the family,

“Basically, what my parents have done for us, I have to do now. I’m the one who has to take care of everything. The caretaker has to be me, a guardian, a brother, a son has to be me.”

Alan’s experience presents a case of parentification and his role of being a caregiver in his family superseded all else. As is seen throughout his account, his experience of dealing with the loss from the early days to the present are interpreted through the lens of this role.

Also common to all participants was a redistribution of responsibilities with family members taking on different tasks that were formerly under the purview of the deceased parent, such as carrying out financial errands. This is in line with the third task of mourning as prescribed by Worden (1991), adjusting to a world without the deceased by recognizing the roles played by the deceased person and acquiring new skills to carry out these roles.

Similar to Arun, Maheen too felt empathic concern for her mother and was committed to being an emotional pillar for her, eventually leading to the strengthening of their relationship resulting in increased openness and intimacy. Her mother’s perception of Maheen as more mature also has a part in extended boundaries in the mother-daughter relationship. Talking about her relationship with her mother, Maheen stated,

“I think she’s also started opening up to me about a lot of things, not just her relationship with my father, but generally things in the family that you don’t talk about with your kids.”

This is in line with Scott’s (2007) finding that children tend to acquire an increased understanding of their parents and about the concept of death following the demise of a parent, enhancing the feeling of being connected to the deceased and facilitating acceptance.

There was a perceived need among Arun, Maheen, and Mona to provide companionship to their parents and fill the gap left by their deceased parents in their living parents’ lives. This led to a deepening of the parent–child bond, with the relationships taking different forms in all cases.

For Arun, this gave him the opportunity to expose his mother to ideas that were new to her and would make her more accepting of his lifestyle, revealing a new overtly bi-directional influence that exists in their relationship. His family also witnessed a change in the direction of a stronger family identity and greater cohesiveness among himself, his brother, and his mother, such that the family was viewed as the in-group, a positive change that allows them to be indifferent to societal judgement. Following the loss, Arun also came closer to his brother, and he appears to view himself as a protective figure for him, possibly arising out of his recognition of his brother’s pain over losing his father.

Mona, too, reveals alterations in her relationships with her father and grandmother. Being mutual pillars in misery, Mona and her father came closer together as a result of their shared experiences of dealing with her mother’s illness and death. Cafferky et al. (2018), in their research on reflecting on parental terminal illness (PTI) and death during adolescence, found that a strengthened relationship with the living, healthy parent marked by more effective communication, is associated with PTI in the family. Similarly, Mona revealed that the open and relaxed relationship she has with her father is much like any other friendship. Also unique to Mona’s experience which is contrary to the other participants is an increased dependence on her family. With regards to this, Mona said,

“I’ve become a lot more dependent on home. So, like… in like a, in maybe 6 months after my mom died, when your mom dies you kind of get slightly paranoid about everyone’s death. it’s like okay this is something that can actually happen…”

This dependence seems to have arisen out of a realization of the transient nature of life, and once death became a reality for her, it acted as the lens through which she viewed illness and also contributed to an increased fear of losing her father – her primary source of support and all that she is familiar with.

Alan’s experience in terms of his familial relationships was also distinct, such that his initial days post the death of his mother led to some distance in his relationship with his siblings, arising out of their preference to deal with the loss individually. Over time, there were minor changes in the relationships within his family, with the members coming together to reduce the void that was created. However, the loss of the link among the family members and the loss of his confidante still remains pronounced.

Besides the children taking on the role of their parents, another change observed by all the participants was attempted by the living parents to fill the role of the deceased parent in different ways. For instance, Maheen’s mother played the role of the protector; Arun’s mother adopted her father’s traits and tried to be more permissive; for Mona and Alan, this was in the form of frequent displays of concern made by the parents, a behaviour previously undertaken by their mothers.

Some secondary losses within the context of the family, as experienced by the participants, include a loss of structure in her life, reported by Mona, and the loss of a protective figure resulting in greater vulnerability, felt by Maheen.

Relationship Beyond the Family

The effects of the loss were not restricted to changing familial relationships but also overflowed into the relationships the participants had with people outside their family, including extended family and friends.

Maheen, Arun, and Alan reported altered social perceptions, with Alan and Maheen being faced with the societal pressure for marriage. When asked about any noticeable changes in others’ perceptions of his family, Alan revealed,

“Whenever, whoever, whosoever meets us, they always mention one thing, “let your son marry”. Because, they always say there should be one lady at home.”

For both Alan and Maheen, this pressure is coming from the belief that someone is needed to fill the role of the deceased parent. In Maheen’s case too, there is a perceived need to find a male head of the family to make major decisions. This unsolicited advice from outsiders in matters of her life is seen as an interference that she is visibly dissatisfied with. Arun’s family was also subjected to social judgement arising out of their social circle’s tendency to view his family through the lens of his father’s death, reinforcing the notion that family structure often serves as a cue for stereotyping (Bryan et al., 1986). One such instance was when his mother cut her hair short and people judged her for the same, possibly looking down on her for engaging in fashion despite having lost her husband.

With regards to friendships, Maheen coped with the loss through an expansion in her social circle, resulting in friendships she now values a lot. This is suggestive of her attempts to fill the gap created in her life, as well as to distract herself from the pain. Another predecessor for Maheen to seek new friendships was the salience of the loss in her older friendships, evident in her friends’ changed behaviour of being overly conscious around her, which motivated her to create a reality independent of the loss. Talking about the need to form new friendships, Maheen said,

“At that point in time my focus was solely on being with people who don’t really know me, who don’t know that I’ve lost somebody so they wouldn’t constantly be asking “why are you sad” or I wouldn’t constantly be feeling guilty if I was happy.”

Arun, on the other hand, experienced contrasting changes in his relationships. The loss was accompanied by the end of a friendship he held dear to him because of his friend’s inability to provide support in times of trial, an experience common among bereaved. Besides that, he also witnessed a strengthening of the existing relationships he had, arising out of his social circle acting as sources of unconditional support, as revealed by him,

“There’s a friend of mine I’ve known since childhood but we were not in talking terms. But then as I told you, we shifted. So, we were good friends and then our friendship also got strengthened. People were very supportive.”

In the light of Mona’s life circumstances around the time of the loss, her concerns in her friendships were unique to her. What occupied centerstage in her experience in the context of her social circle were her issues with femininity, wherein her mother’s death led her to feel the absence of a critical feminine influence and look to her new friends as sources of feminine guidance. The need for identification and attachment with the mother who acts as a guide for female development has been substantiated by existing research (Douglass, 2005; Miller, 1986), thereby resonating with Mona’s apprehensions about the same.

Mona particularly valued her friendships with others’ coming from single-parent households, consistent with Worden’s (1996) finding that friendships with other children who are bereaved are especially helpful and understanding compared to those with non-bereaved children.

Theme 3: Coping in the Context of the Other

The journey of coping with losing a parent was not dealt within a bubble independent of others. Rather, coping with parental loss took place within webs of relations within the family, outside the family, and influenced by social expectations of grief. The presence of other people significantly impacted the participants’ experience of coping with loss, with their influence being salient in the early days and having lasting impacts in the present.

Coping Within the Family

The participants’ experiences differed in terms of whether their family’s coping was a collective process or took place at an individual level for each member. In Alan’s family, grief was regarded as each individuals’ experience and they initially coped with the loss by isolating themselves from each other. However, the stark visibility of his mother’s absence brought them closer together in order to cope with the emptiness in the family. Yet, they continue to avoid conversations about the loss in deliberate attempts to avoid a relapse into grief. Responding to how his family reacted to the loss, Alan revealed,

“Actually, we’ve never sat and talked about it… came to a conclusion that loss happened, after that a week or month, then back to normal life. We still didn’t talk about that after that”

Akin to Alan’s family, though there was an interdependence in the family’s emotional state in the initial days, Maheen and her siblings also experienced their grief as individuals, and she was relatively unaware of how her siblings were dealing with the grief. Nevertheless, she was proud of her siblings’ ability to bounce back such that her brother successfully managed the organization of the death rituals and her sister could clear her exams, things that provided the both of them with distractions. While their coping was relatively disconnected from Maheen’s, her mother’s coping was inseparable from her own experience. Her devotion of attention to her mother created a circle of coping such that protecting her mother acted as a guard against Maheen’s own pain. With Maheen and her mother experiencing guilt associated with the moments leading to her father’s death, her mother became a symbol of her own emotions and this allowed her to view her emotions from another’s perspective and realize the irrationality of it. When asked how she dealt with her own guilt, Maheen stated,

“I think once I started pacifying my mom with regard to her feelings of guilt, it made me also feel fine. I mean it had to happen one way or the other.”

Unlike Maheen and Alan, Mona and Arun saw their grief as a collective experience within the family. For Mona and her father, coping with the loss was an interdependent process, as she looked to her father for guidance and derived strength from him, while simultaneously viewing herself as a distraction from grief for her father. She found comfort in sharing her feelings about the loss with him, an openness that acts as an effective aid in coping (Thompson et al., 2011). Her father’s approach to coping was problem-focused and perhaps seeing him remain strong in the face of the loss encouraged her to do the same.

Throughout his interview, Arun talked about his experience of the loss in the context of his family, suggesting the importance of family in grieving (Thompson et al., 2011). There was an occasional incongruence in the approaches to coping him and his mother adopted, evident in Arun’s retelling of his delayed grief reaction,

“I came out of the examination hall, I left the paper empty and I came inside the car and I started crying, I cried a lot that day I remember. […] We were like, you know our mother told us nothing should be bothering you, so yeah.”

His mother emphasized problem-focused coping and reinforced her son’s strong exterior. The reciprocal support within the family, and their reliance on faith which brought them closer together was significant in helping them deal with the loss, a process which took place naturally with time.

Role of Social Support

The support the participants received from their social circle, be it extended family, colleagues, or friends, facilitated their process of coping with the loss for they were able to share their grief with others around them. People beyond the immediate family extended their help in the initial days, aiding the family in organizing the death rituals, offering emotional support, and sharing responsibilities with the bereaved. Existing research provides contrasting views on the role of social support in facilitating the process of grieving, with some emphasizing the importance of the same in coping with emotional and instrumental needs of the bereaved (e.g. Dopp & Cain, 2012; Sandler, 2001), and others claiming it does not necessarily aid coping (e.g. Stroebe et al., 2005).

Alan and Arun found sources of support in their religious groups. Arun’s immersion in church activities led him to spending more time with people belonging to his church, who acted as his mainstays of strength in loss and offered instrumental support as well. Arun also witnessed unconditional support from unexpected sources, such as his childhood friend, and him and his family found this reaction overwhelming, as explained by him,

“Humko kuch karne ka mauka hi nahi mila (we didn’t get a chance to do anything), they all took the responsibilities in a very good manner, from bringing the body from mortuary to our place and taking it to the graveyard, everything they did. People were very supportive”

Though overt offers of help aren’t made anymore, the presence of a supportive family also allows Alan to deal with the void. Thus, while he continues to feel his mother’s absence in his life, having extended family around prevents him from feeling lonely.

Extended family also had a role to play in Maheen’s early experiences. They served as a temporary distraction from the loss and eased the environment in the days immediately after the loss. As reported by Alan, Maheen too noticed declines in offers of support over time and attributed this to people being empathic of her family’s desire to avoid the topic of the loss. In response to how people reacted to the news of her father’s passing, Maheen said,

“Of course, everybody was nice about it and initially people tried to keep checking in... They tried to drop by and give company but I think overtime again life moves on right and everybody gets busy. Plus, I think people also understand that’s not something I really want to talk about so they also start avoiding the subject.”

Maheen also coped by forming new relationships to fill the vacuum created by the loss, while her former friendships also remained constant sources of support. Contrary to Mona’s expectations, her friends' behaviours towards her were unchanged and they acted as her contact with reality. When asked about her immediate experience, Mona said,

“I just really appreciate that nobody made a big deal, nobody treated me like I was weird, they just kind of said what’s up asshole and just kind of went with everything and that was really kind of fun.”

The unexpected and constant support Mona received over a long span of time led her to understand human lives as overlapping, based on her realization that people were genuinely concerned about her and her family, something she was quite surprised to discover. Thus, the support she received also helped her make meaning out of her experience.

Societal Influences on Coping

Ideas prevalent in society and propagated by media act as a major influence on human behaviour, and this is also the case when it comes to people’s response to death. The social context has strong influences on how people mourn and cope with grief, with perceived support, family, and cultural prescriptions regarding grief playing significant roles in the choices made about coping (Bhana, 2007). Through the interviews, it became evident how socialization also impacted the participants’ relationship with grief.

Especially prominent in the accounts of Maheen, Mona, and Arun were social notions of appropriate grief reactions. Visible in Maheen and Mona’s interviews was the internalization of these societal expectations and models which resulted in feelings of guilt for not matching these ideals. The desire to escape from this guilt that she felt most intensely in her interactions with her friends led Maheen to form new relationships marked with some degree of anonymity, creating a space where she was able to feel and express positive emotions without social repercussions. This internalized guilt may have created difficulties in Maheen’s acceptance of her moving on with her life, prevalent in some of the existential questions she was faced with.

Mona’s guilt sprung from the dissonance she noticed between her reaction and the models of grief she had observed in media. Mona revealed how she addressed her feelings of guilt, saying,

“I mean in TV everyone just cried for several days and then the plot went on but I was like that is not how I feel, there was no type of template on ‘hi, this is how you react to losing your parent’ and um eventually when I realized that like you know, however I react there’s no wrong way to react, I shouldn’t feel obligated to cry all the time.”

Socialization through media created scripts for bereavement, leading to the expectation that people who are grieving should be incapable of carrying on with their lives but rather ruminate over the loss for a long period of time. This belief majorly contributed to Mona’s feelings and convinced her that positive emotions were unacceptable. Perhaps Mona believed her reaction may be a reflection of how she felt about her mother and her inability to identify with her only reference point for grief led her to question her feelings for her mother. Literature related to the grief work hypothesis (e.g. Raphael, 1984) has suggested that those who aren’t severely affected by grief are emotionally distant, indicating a superficial or conflicted relationship with the deceased. However, Bonanno (2019) has contested this, arguing its corollary that perhaps resilient people are especially healthy, which suggests an extraordinarily healthy relationship with the lost loved one.

Alan and Arun, on the other hand, faced the societal pressures attached to their roles of being the eldest son. Alan expressed that he was denied the chance to recognize and acknowledge his emotions because the responsibilities of caring for his family became his immediate duty. This burden of responsibility was also handed over to Arun, who expressed the following about the pressures of his role,

“I remember being the eldest I was not supposed to cry. Obviously, I will cry but the society thinks that you know you should be the one to take care of our family... ”

According to Arun, society frequently discounts self-care in the bereaved. He seemed to foster some anger towards the sources of this pressure placed on him, wherein he felt the need to match up to unrealistic standards of being the guardian for his family, when he himself was overwhelmed with grief.

Another challenge Alan and Arun were confronted with was fitting into the social construction of masculinity. This influenced them into hiding the pain they experienced, and in Arun’s experience, preventing the overt expression of grief. Such conditions led him to restrict his grief reactions solely to the private sphere of his life, and appear strong on the face of it, congruent with Work’s (2013) findings that men actively choose when and where to express their grief. Throughout the interview, Alan kept emphasizing that ‘everything is normal’ which can be attributed to two reasons – his gender which has socialized him into hiding the unpleasant emotions he experiences and focusing on the positive aids him in this, or his birth order which places pressure on him to ensure that his family is functioning adequately. Creighton et al. (2013) discovered in their study that bereaved young men embodied one of three masculine identities including ‘the adventurer’, ‘the father figure’, and ‘the lamplighter’. In the present study too, Alan and Arun are seen to assume the identity of the father figure wherein they consider themselves responsible for their family, as well as that of the lamplighter, such that they hope to be role models for others, evidenced in Arun’s desire to help others who are grieving.

An obvious gender difference in appropriate grief reactions in presented by Maheen who revealed society is especially approving of women’s emotional reactions, forcing women to face their emotions, contrary to the accounts of Alan and Arun.

Strengths and Limitations of the Present Study

The present research focusing on the experiences of parental loss amongst emerging adults had some identifiable strengths and limitations. The qualitative methodology allowed an in-depth understanding of lived experiences of young people coping with loss. The interview setting gave the participants the opportunity to share their experiences of the same, something most of them claimed never having done in the past to such an extent. The conversation and introspection they engaged in led some of the participants to question their ideas of emotionality and they reconsidered opening up about the loss with others. The analytical method of IPA facilitated the goal of a detailed exploration of emerging adults’ unique experiences of loss and how they make sense of the same.

Though the researcher attempted to give consideration to religious backgrounds, the inability to carry out the remaining interviews resulted in the absence of narratives of people belonging to some religious groups. Only an urban context was explored in the present study, leaving aside the experiences of people belonging to other backgrounds.

Implications of the Study

The predominance of quantitative work in the field of death studies indicates the lack of in-depth explorations of lived experiences of grief, a gap in research the present study contributed towards filling. Further, this study also addressed the demographic of emerging adults whose experiences of parental loss have previously been overlooked. The participants in the present study revealed how experiencing the loss in the phase of emerging adulthood had distinct consequences such as a shift in priorities with a realization of the need to focus on matters of life besides one’s academics and career; a recognition of one’s dependence on the family and the importance of being independent in this phase of life; and how one’s own personal growth in this age allowed for the loss to act as a learning experience.

The current study revealed discrepancies between how participants experienced and recalled the changes in their lives following their parent’s death, indicating possible attempts at denying change or the difficulty in recalling what their life was like before and after the loss. It is also worth noting how the relationship between the surviving parent and the child altered, with companionship, dependence, and assuming new roles in the family marking the new relational dynamic. This study situated parental loss and grief in the Indian social context and identified the ways in which social beliefs and norms influence experiences of coping with loss. Participants shed light on how strongly media and gender roles influence how they grieve and how they understand their grief. Grief is seen to be experienced individually and often in isolation, however, social support and collective grieving among family members also shaped participants’ experiences of the loss.

Findings revealed an innate resilience in young individuals to cope with grief, with the continuity of life and one’s responsibilities within and beyond the family playing a significant role in coping. The findings of the present study offer some areas for future research to address, particularly since parental loss during emerging and young adulthood is yet to be fully explored. An investigation of religious differences in coping within the diverse Indian context may benefit research in the field of death studies. Research can also focus on how models provided by the media influence ideas about loss and the process of coping. Further, future research can gain from understanding how the loss of a parent leads to the manifestation of grief within the family and how it is dealt with by different members in the context of the family. Gender differences in coping with parental death in emerging adulthood can also be explored.

Conclusion

The present study aimed to explore the experiences of young adults dealing with the loss of a parent, with a focus on understanding their experiences of coping with the loss, the impact of the loss on the relationships in their lives, and how they made meaning of the loss. It was a qualitative inquiry through the data collection method of interviews and the analytical method of interpretative phenomenological analysis. The analysis revealed four superordinate themes, namely, early days following the loss, changing relational realities, and coping in the context of the other.

The similarities and particularities present in the participants’ accounts of dealing with parental loss were highlighted. Coping with the loss was found to be a process that was often embedded within various relationships, with familial and social support having favourable consequences for the same, in line with previous findings about the importance of support in dealing with grief (e.g. Bhana, 2007; Thompson et al., 2011). Though not a deliberate process, participants appeared to have made meaning of the loss, to accommodate life without the deceased. The study offers potential for future research in an area where there is limited existing literature.