Disabling reenactment imagery after violent dying.

Reenactment imagery that remains fixating after violent dying is associated with diminished psychological resilience. The nonresilient teller struggles to maintain an integrative orientation within the recounting. Reestablishing the resilient capacities of pacification (mastery of terror through self-calming), partition (mastery of intrusive thoughts through self-differentiation), and perspective (mastery of self-determination through self-transcendence) is an important preparatory goal with intervention. Without these resilient capacities, premature exposure increases the risk that patients will experience a dysfunctional merger with the possessive reenactment representation. A preliminary model of resilient "offenses" to be reinforced in the traumatized subject as a first stage of intervention is presented.

The narrative dynamics of grief after homicide.

The homicidal death of a loved one is horrific. Dying from homicide can be more sudden, frightening, and stigmatizing than natural dying and may be followed by a sub-type of prolonged grief complicated by vivid narrative reenactment of the dying, intense feelings of remorse, and nihilistic despair. After a literature review of grief after homicide, the author clarifies the salient narrative themes of homicidal dying and their specific effects on trauma and separation distress. A preliminary model is then developed and illustrated in a therapy case outlining a technique (imaginative exposure) to diminish the disabling fixation of reenactment imagery, remorse, and despair.