Donald lost his child due to cancer and has stopped living due to this loss. Let’s see how Donald might use FW 2.0 to help him live again.
Features of the Person/The Situation/The Thoughts of the Person:
Donald has lost a child due to cancer. Although it has been several years since the child died, the grief feels just as intense and debilitating as it did from the beginning. Donald has some motivation to change because he recognizes that the grief has gone on too long, and, most importantly, it seems to keep him from having healthy relationships with his living children.
What seems to be the short-term goal that FW 2.0 can help:
Donald can explore the different Sad feelings using FW 2.0. Also, Sad feelings are likely to drive more sadness in a feedback loop. Donald has different Sad feelings as he is failing as a father to his other children, which he recognizes explicitly as inadequate feelings. The main goal for Donald in consulting FW 2.0 is to help identify feelings that can facilitate reestablishing a relationship with his other children and recognizing that Joyful feelings would likely lead to reconnecting with them.
How to use the FW 2.0 in this case:
Donald works on reconnecting with his living children by bridging Peaceful feelings, such as being loving to his living children and focusing on the behavior likely to elicit Joyful feelings by spending with them. To that end, Donald takes his children to an activity that was fun in the past but that he had avoided as it reminds him of Sad memories. Donald found that his children enjoyed the activity, and he even found himself experiencing Joyful feelings at times, alternating with Sad feelings at his loss.
Note about this case:
Sad feelings and grief are not bad experiences, and they take different forms. However, when grief goes on so long that it interferes with a person’s ability to live a life that they find purposeful and meaningful or stops them from loving, grief changes to a kind of despair. In the example above, a father is likely always to feel some grief at the loss of the child, but he should not be overwhelmed by it to the point where living children are neglected and that relationship is cut off.
