Page 580 - Encyclopedia of Nursing Research

WIDOWS AnD WIDOWeRS n 547

bereavement, (b) pre- and post-bereavement 24 Iranian widows with children sought to
experiences, (c) concepts and variables per- continue bonds with their husbands even
tinent to widowhood, and (d) health-related as they experienced overwhelming hope- W–Z
experiences of older widows. lessness and marked lifestyle changes
Of the eight qualitative cross-sectional (Khosravan, Salehi, Ahmadi, Sharif, &
studies including diverse subgroups of wid- Zamani, 2010). Doherty and Scannell-Desch
ows and widowers, the only one involving (2008) did a phenomenological study of wid-
widowed persons of both genders was done owhood during pregnancy with 10 women
in Korea, with five women and five men whose husbands had died in the 2001 ter-
whose spouses had died from cancer. There rorist attacks or while serving in the Armed
were gender differences in grief responses Forces in Iraq or Afghanistan. As in findings
and influences on grieving (Lee, Lee, Kim, & of the study with lesbian widows (Bent &
Kang, 2005). In the only study pertaining only Magilvy, 2006), positive and negative fac-
to widowers, Rushton (2007) interviewed 14 ets of support were presented. “navigating
middle-aged and older men and some of their pregnancy: flying solo while running on
adult children 2 to 15 years after the death of empty” and “re-creating home: a new nor-
the spouse/mother. Family communication mal” were two of the emergent themes.
problems associated with the loss were para- Steeves and Kahn (2005) used a longi-
mount pre- and post-bereavement. tudinal design and recruited widowed per-
Bent and Magilvy (2006) described sons of both genders. using a hermeneutic
experiences of six widowed lesbians, noting approach, they interviewed 10 older women
political, social, and familial matters that pos- and 5 older men before and after the spouse’s
itively and negatively affected participants’ death and compared findings by gender.
experiences and called for nursing inter- Their interpretation highlighted metaphors
ventions to preclude “complicated bereave- associated with grieving, grief work, home-
ment” (p. 456). Stigmatization and isolation related concerns, and getting on with one’s
also were features of life for 10 barren, life. Although all participants were rural,
older rural widows in nigeria (Fajemilehin, implications of rurality relative to findings
2003). harrison, Khan, and hsu (2005) and were not addressed.
Rodgers (2004) explored bereavement expe- In two descriptive phenomenological
riences with samples of 11 middle-aged and studies from the same project with 10 mid-
older African American widows. Rodgers life widows, Scannell-Desch (2005a, 2005b)
incorporated observations of nonverbal isolated two sets of concepts for study,
behaviors and gestures of participants and contrasting struggles with triumphs and
recommended that nurses allow African comparing “experiences of support and non-
American widows opportunities to tell their support” (p. 43). Similarly, Shih, Turale, Shih,
stories of bereavement. Otherwise, the find- and Tsai (2010) considered the influence of
ings of the two studies were similar with religiosity on the bereavement adjustments
regard to the importance of (a) being with of 20 older Taiwanese widows in a mixed-
the dying spouse, (b) feeling minimal guilt methods study, classifying participants’
about events associated with the death, (c) religious beliefs as extrinsic or intrinsic and
drawing support from various sources, and comparing problems and coping strategies
(d) retaining bonds with the spouse while of the two groups. In the only intervention
learning to let go. study retrieved for review, Korean middle-
Several authors explored bereavement aged women who took part in a bereavement
experiences with subgroups of younger wid- program (including the meditative practice
ows. As detailed in a grounded theory study, of Dan-jeon) had lower grief levels and fewer