Congenital loss: Loss of an immediate family member prior to or during one’s birth

Michal Mahat Shamir, Shani Pitcho-Prelorentzos, Ronit D. Leichtentritt

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

2 Scopus citations

Abstract

The loss of a family member is often conceptualized as a disruption in one’s life story. However, when a loss occurs prior to, or during, one’s birth, the bereaved life stories are not interrupted by the loss, but rather begin with loss. The paper offers a new conceptualization of these losses as “congenital losses” and captures the core aspects of this phenomenon. A qualitative phenomenological analysis of 34 in-depth semi-structured interviews with offspring and siblings whose family members died before/during their birth revealed four main challenges presented by congenital loss: incoherency and fragmentation; story-ownership; bond-establishment, and; identity challenges.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)914-925
Number of pages12
JournalDeath Studies
Volume47
Issue number8
DOIs
StatePublished - 2023
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Congenital loss: Loss of an immediate family member prior to or during one’s birth'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this