Gestalt therapy with the dying patient: integrative work using clay, poetry therapy, and creative media

This is a report on death therapy with a 36-year-old cancer patient. Gestalt therapy and creative media (clay, poetry, and colors) were used to facilitate an integration of life and to give the person a sense of balance with life. The author tries to communicate his thoughts and feelings as they were during the course of the therapy, to show that counseling the dying means walking along a stretch of the path together. The companion-therapist cannot avoid his own perplexity and confusion by simply falling back on his professional role. Once he has become involved in an interpersonal relationship, he does not treat the patient as some kind of object. With the aid of transcripts taken from tape recordings, the integrating effect of using gestalt dialogue, and fantasy work becomes evident.