Why does grief have actuality as a diagnosis?

Fra spørsmål om legitimiteten av sorgpatologisering til kritikk av diagnosens samfunnsfunksjon

Abstract

The introduction of a diagnosis for pathological grief has been controversial. The medical consideration of grief experiences (i.e. medicaliza- tion) is clinically acceptable, but risks undermining the many dimensions of grief. Critics of the ‘grief diagnosis’ sees the medicalization as inappropriate, and as a lesser way of approaching experiences of loss. In this article we argue that the controversy should not revolve around the actual diagnosis for pathological grief reactions or its content. Rather, the focus should be directed towards what actualizes this clinical view in the first place. In other words, what movements and mindsets in contemporary society has driven our considerations on grief as something in which a diagnosis is possible and expedient. The article thus focuses on psychiatric diagnoses’ functionality in societies with great investment in individual health and well- being, and examines the grieving phenomenon under these conditions. With the diagnosis, a medicalized frame of reference is established for phenomena which is phenomenologically defined. Since the political platform for handling suffering accentuates the relevance of psychological well-being, it is only qua the diagnosis that grief can be handled with a certain legitimacy. From a treatment perspective, the introduction of a definitive diagnosis for pathological grief signifies a progression, where the clinical utility of the diagnosis is grounded in a problematic role. This nuance shows how the controversy on grief primarily is about prior conditions for grief diagnostics, namely the di- agnostic functionality in therapeutic cultures.