Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Story Speaks For Itself: A Thematic Information Analysis Of An Intended Phenomenological Study Of The Lived Experiences Of Spouses And Parents Bereaved By The Death Of Special Forces Members Killed In Combat, Marion A. Smyth

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The Australian Special Forces (SF) members have faced considerable adversity with combat deployments to Afghanistan as an elite operational unit of the Australian Defence Force (ADF). There have been 40 combat deaths since 2001 and despite the significant research available on bereavement and violent death, to date there is a gap in the literature to guide the provision of bereavement support for spouses and parents of those SF members killed in action. Contemporary qualitative research into combat related bereavement has found a number of themes which gave meaning to bereavement outcomes found in the non-SF context and recommended that future …