‘The stranger inside’ : suicide-related grief and ‘othering’ among teenage daughters following the loss of a father to suicide

• Grief research highlights risks associated with parental suicide during childhood and adolescence: mental illness, social difficulties, repeated suicide attempts and actual suicide. This article aims to explore how these ‘risks’ are constituted, by investigating the relationship between suicide-related grief and ‘othering’ in four young women’s narratives on their experiences of losing a father to suicide during adolescence. Othering works through expressions of insecurity, avoidance and outright rejection from individuals in the women’s vicinity and even family members. However, what is noteworthy is that othering is also found to work from the inside; due to their father’s norm-breaking act, the women describe themselves as actually being ‘different’ or ‘strange.’ Moreover, attempts to ‘normalise, or ‘liberate’ oneself from the suicide involves attempts to understand its reasons. The preoccupation with ‘why questions,’ thereby primarily appears to be a question of self-formation. ‘The stranger inside’ is described as the strongest impediment to seeking social support.

Nyckelord

adolescent

bereavement

grief

narrative

parental suicide

stigma

othering

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ref (ämneskategori)

art (ämneskategori)