Citation

Petty MS. Health (London) 2000; 4(3): 288-308.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2000, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/136345930000400303

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Participants in a self-help group for suicide 'survivors' - that is, people who have lost loved ones to suicide death - seek to recover and produce narratives of their experience. Based on a micro-study drawn from the author's personal journals and an analysis of the national organization's printed materials, this article explores how a particular view of the 'self' functions in a group where stories of tragedy are told. An interpretive analysis of the self-help process, as experienced in an SOS (Survivors of Suicide) group, suggests that the group's methods of moving toward mutual understanding and recovery rely on a construction of the 'self' having experienced this particular loss. Descriptions of the group's structure and of social interactions are drawn from observations made by the author who was a participant in the group.

Language: en

Keywords

Psychiatry and suicide; Self-help and suicide; Survivors of Suicide