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Helping Your Child Understand Death
[Week 12 of 52 Weeks to a Better Relationship With Your Child]
Do we need to teach children about death?
At what point should we teach our children about death? And how should we go about it? These are questions that cannot be avoided. From the time a child is old enough to squish a bug or hug a grandparent, death is destined to be part of their lives. It is not really a matter of IF we should talk to them about it, but what we will say.
Obviously, it is going to be hard to talk about death honestly if we have not grappled with the subject personally. If we try to pretend that death is not an unavoidable part of life, we will not be prepared to realistically talk to our children about it on any level. And our children need us to be able to offer insight. If we don’t, they will look for answers in other places.
Death helps us ask the right questions
Death makes us ask questions about the meaning of life. It makes us face whether or not we have any hope in living. It confronts us with our finite time on this earth and our inability to control the most predictable and universal outcome that humans share. If we cannot help our children understand and be prepared for death, whether theirs or someone else’s, we have missed an opportunity to touch the depth of their soul.
I suggest these strategies for helping your child understand death:
Don’t give them empty platitudes
Children usually know when they are being treated like they are stupid or being given thoughtless answers. By thoughtless, I don’t mean that you don’t care about your children. What I mean is answers that are without substance in meaning, that are given to avoid the discussion or that are sound nice without really answering questions.
Telling your children one-liners like “he will always be here with us” or “I will always watch over you” are vague. Without addressing real concerns, these answers are likely to leave children confused and unequipped to deal with real grief when it happens.
I know from personal experience with our children that even a 4 year old can be hit hard by grief. And even a 4 year old can benefit greatly from already having a basic understanding of life and death, hope and meaning. Without these things, it is hard to give the firm comfort that a child may well need.
Let them have pets
One of peculiar benefits of pets is that they have shorter life spans than people. A pet’s death can be a controlled emotional crisis that gives children insight into life. Even with minimal emotional attachment, such as in the death of a goldfish or anything that doesn’t obviously respo
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By Laura Blodgett[Week 12 of 52 Weeks to a Better Relationship With Your Child]
Do we need to teach children about death?
At what point should we teach our children about death? And how should we go about it? These are questions that cannot be avoided. From the time a child is old enough to squish a bug or hug a grandparent, death is destined to be part of their lives. It is not really a matter of IF we should talk to them about it, but what we will say.
Obviously, it is going to be hard to talk about death honestly if we have not grappled with the subject personally. If we try to pretend that death is not an unavoidable part of life, we will not be prepared to realistically talk to our children about it on any level. And our children need us to be able to offer insight. If we don’t, they will look for answers in other places.
Death helps us ask the right questions
Death makes us ask questions about the meaning of life. It makes us face whether or not we have any hope in living. It confronts us with our finite time on this earth and our inability to control the most predictable and universal outcome that humans share. If we cannot help our children understand and be prepared for death, whether theirs or someone else’s, we have missed an opportunity to touch the depth of their soul.
I suggest these strategies for helping your child understand death:
Don’t give them empty platitudes
Children usually know when they are being treated like they are stupid or being given thoughtless answers. By thoughtless, I don’t mean that you don’t care about your children. What I mean is answers that are without substance in meaning, that are given to avoid the discussion or that are sound nice without really answering questions.
Telling your children one-liners like “he will always be here with us” or “I will always watch over you” are vague. Without addressing real concerns, these answers are likely to leave children confused and unequipped to deal with real grief when it happens.
I know from personal experience with our children that even a 4 year old can be hit hard by grief. And even a 4 year old can benefit greatly from already having a basic understanding of life and death, hope and meaning. Without these things, it is hard to give the firm comfort that a child may well need.
Let them have pets
One of peculiar benefits of pets is that they have shorter life spans than people. A pet’s death can be a controlled emotional crisis that gives children insight into life. Even with minimal emotional attachment, such as in the death of a goldfish or anything that doesn’t obviously respo