Aim: To assess memory characteristics of parents in regards to the trauma caused by the disappearance and postmortem identification of their sons, ten years after the sons were reported missing. ----- Study design: Qualitative analysis of the content of memory. ----- Sample size: Testimonies were taken from 13 mothers and 7 fathers, out of which 6 mothers and 3 fathers have identified their sons postmortem. Mothers' median age was 65 (53-77), and fathers' 67 (60-75). ----- Place of study: The interviews were held in 4 villages situated NE and SW from Osijek: Laslovo, Ernestinovo, Bilje i Darda; out of which, in the beginning of 1991, 21 persons have been reported missing. Sons' median age, at the time of their disappearance was 31 (18-41). In the ten years after the disappearance, 6 out of 21 were identified postmortem, while the remaining 15 are still listed as missing. ----- Methods: Interviews were recorded and translated verbatim adding the interviewers comments and descriptions of the observed behavior. Interviewees were asked to recall their most traumatic event, which was then analyzed according to the protocol for the traumatic memory. The interviews were ended when the topic was thoroughly exhausted, or when the interviewees' thoughts started to repeat. Theoretical starting point was Bowlby's theory of mourning. Analyzing the contents of the memories, descriptions that were similar or the same were grouped into topics. These topics represent units of memory's content, and initially 173 different ones were coded. Evaluation Forms for the testimonies consisted of those 173 topics, followed by an evaluation scale. The pilot testing consisted of 62 topics, with a confidence interval of 0,05 and sampling error of 0,03. For two evaluators Krippendorff's alpha coefficient was insufficient and they were excluded from the study, while the remaining 3 evaluators continued their analysis on all 173 topics. The process of stratification of the coded topics consisted of 3 phases: For Phase 1 Krippendorff's alpha coefficient was set to 0,30 which yielded 80 out of 173 topics. In Phase 2 Krippendorff's alpha coefficient was set to 0,40 yielding 53 topics. Finally in Phase 3 Krippendorff's alpha coefficient was set to 0,50 yielding 30 topics. These 30 topics were present in the testimonies of 11 mothers and 6 fathers with Krippendorff's alpha coefficient 0,60 – 0,82. ----- Final results' measures: From the parental memories of the trauma caused by the disappearance of their sons it was possible to construct 10 sensorial and emotional episodes: 1. Fear that something so foreign and alien, as DNA-analysis is, could determine the faith of the missing son; 2. The missing person is a – 'scapegoat'; 3. Picking of a 'memorial candle' for 128 the missing; 4. Belief in the supernatural – 'perhaps a miracle will still happen'; 5. Tiredness brought on by the search for the missing - 'burying the dead so that the living could live'; 6. The content of dreams directs daily behavior – 'dream as an active reality check'; 7. Preserved objects belonging to the missing son (clothes, etc.) are proof that the he is alive; 8. Confession – 'the sacrament of repent and acceptance'; 9. Hope – 'subconscious expression of belief in ones surroundings'; 10. Flash-back episodes – 'sensory delusions and body manifestations, decompensation'. ----- Final results: A post-traumatic dissociative reaction is highest during the recollection of an anticipated or actual postmortem identification of the missing son by DNA-analysis in cases when visual identification is not possible (fragmented body parts: pieces of bone, dental parts, etc.) The ways fathers describe events relating to the missing son are statistically very different from the way mothers do so. Mothers' narrative testimony depicts them trying to conclude the story of their son's disappearance based upon very scarce information they posses. Another trait of the mothers' narratives about their missing sons that have been identified postmortem, is the lack of mentioning the way the sons died. The fathers, on the other hand, depict the traumatic event by switching the observer and the acting roles for themselves, with a stereotypical narration in which societies attitudes towards the war, toward the victim and toward other individuals is expressed. Two attitudes dominate the fathers' testimonies: 'the missing son is dead' and 'the wish to find and bury the missing son'. ----- Conclusions: Testimonies regarding the missing sons can be viewed as consisting of 10 seperate stories, each accompanied by its emotional and sensorial image. Emotional reaction brought on by the disappearance and the postmortem identification of their sons by DNAanalysis seems to be captured within a symbolic context (verbal system) and linked to these specific images and emotional episodes. This enables the mourning parents to tell their story in an episodic form. Flashbulb memories, therefore, become the center points of a disappearance narrative, and are then easily linked to other episodes wither thematically similar or emotionally similar. This ontological narrative about the missing son who was identified postmortem, enables not only a social approach, what has so far been the traditional approach, but also an individual approach to a narration as a limited way of self presentation.