SIX LOSSES ESSAY

Grief and losses is not just limited to the death of someone. Grief is a reaction to loss, and
grief can be felt even before the loss occured according to Kenneth Doka. Grief is more than
sorrow and emotional turmoil. Grief is a type of stress reaction, highly personal and
subjective response to a real, percieved, or anticipated loss. So, Everyone have different
types of losses that can trigger the grief response.

We can say that loss is an inevitable part of life. Dealing with a significant loss can be one of
the most difficult times in a person's life. The feeling of loss is very personal and different
for each person and only that person know what is significant to him/herself. According to
Mitchell and Anderson, there are six major types of loss that people experience in life.

Material loss is the loss of a physical object or of familiar surroundings to which one has an
important attachment. This loss can occur to everyone, when they lose things they had. For
example, if someone lose his house because of fire accident, or someone broke his new
smartphone. People who experience material loss has an irresistible urge to replace that
loss.

Relational Loss is the ending of opportunities to relate oneself to, talk with, share
experiences with, make love to, touch, settle issues with, fight with, and otherwise be in
emotional and /or physical presence of a particular other human being. This is one of
unavoidable loss in human life. Ending relationship with other people can be as simple as
moving out from old house to other city, so people will have to end their relationship with
their neighbors.

Systemic Loss is a loss where the environment in which we live, work or interact with
changes. Most people experience this kind of loss, when they embrace new stage of their
life such as moving out from family home to college, having a job oversea.

Powerful grief can be evoked when we lose some of the muscular or neurological functions
of the body; we call this functional loss. For example: losing sight, ability to walk, etc.

Intrapsychic loss is the experience of losing an emotionally important image of oneself,

losing the possibilities of “What might have been.” For example: A woman who’s infertile
can never had children of her own.

Role Loss is a loss of role in a person. Example: a single person who’s getting married lose
his/her role as single person.