Mourning distinct from melancholia: the resolution of bereavement

The premise that mourning has been satisfactorily completed when symptoms associated with the response to loss subside is rejected. The emphasis on the bereaved's behavioural functioning in adjustment to loss has tended to overshadow the recollected relationship to the deceased as a major dimension in the resolution of loss. Elaborating the two-track model of bereavement (Rubin, 1981), the author focuses upon the relationship to the representations of the deceased from the object relations point of view. The active relationship between representations of the deceased and the bereaved's self-representations define resolution of loss. Two cases are presented to illustrate the thesis.