Dealing with death is never easy, no matter whether you’re a full-fledged adult, as most of us claim to be, or a kid. I just recently had to navigate the uncertain path of how to deal with death with my daughters. My grandmother passed away, and I quickly realized it was the first time that at least one of my daughters would really “get it.” Here are a few things I found helpful and a few things I probably screwed up.
- If you can, prepare them. My daughters happened to be staying with my parents when my grandmother fell and had to go to the hospital. So they went to the hospital, too. My parents were very open with them about what happened and we’d previously talked about the fact that Grandmother was old and not in the greatest health. The girls had seen Grandmother’s health get worse over the years of visits at the nursing home, so this was not a giant surprise to them. We, in general, try to keep a pretty open dialogue about most things with our kids, including the not-so-fun topic of death.
- Be straightforward and don’t be appalled at how matter-of-fact THEY are about death. Umm, because I was. I was struggling with the fact that I missed the opportunity to tell my grandmother goodbye because I was out of town at a work conference. So I was not necessarily looking forward to telling my daughters about their great-grandmother dying. I felt like I should be doing something more formal, but I ended up just sitting down with them on my bedroom floor and telling them that it was Grandmother’s time to go be with God, and she was now in heaven. I am certainly not trying to get preach-y here, and you should tell your kids whatever it is you believe about what happens when you die. I’m just saying what we did but, again, please obviously communicate whatever your own belief is. I was taken aback at their reactions. My 2-year-old jumped up and said, “It’s OK! She’ll be back!” to which my 5-year-old replied, “Well, uh, that’s not how it works”. I knew at that point that the 2-year-old was still out of the realm of really understanding but my 5-year-old was not. I had more extensive conversations with my older daughter and she had a LOT of questions. Like a lot. For example, “How does God get Grandmother through the roof to take her to heaven?” and “Is she playing with our animals who are up there?” and “Why do you keep crying if you say it’s not a bad thing?” I was not really prepared for some of these questions, nor do I claim to actually know the answers, but we talked about them all just the same.
- Take your kids to the funeral. This is very dependent on your kid, their temperament and a host of other factors. I found it valuable to take my daughters to my Grandmother’s funeral. For one, and I do not mean this to come off crass, they provide some comedic relief. Funerals can be heavy for everyone involved and having little ones around can crack through that grief. It’s nice to have someone to smile at, someone to talk to and someone to take your mind off things. Taking your kids to a funeral will also most likely trigger an entirely new set of questions, but I think it’s important to explain things like why we have funerals, what closure is, why everyone is crying and what the heck the coffin or urn is all about. The biggest point of contention with my kids is that my dad (their Pop Pop) cried. My dad is good ol’ boy through and through and it’s not often he sheds a tear. They were also very quick to point out to me who was crying, who was about to cry and who looked like they’d been crying. And then of course came the constant checking to see if I was crying. There was a lot of discussion about crying this day.
- Remember them. We say prayers every night before bed and my older daughter has been giving Grandmother a shout-out since her death, along with everyone else who has passed that she knows, including my parents’ dog Wilbur, our cat Dolce and a roly poly who met his (or her?) unfortunate ending in our home. But I think it does us all good to take time to look at pictures, share stories and not forget the memories we made.
For us, the bottom line is that death is a part of life, and kids are going to have to learn about it sooner or later. We are hoping that a lot of open communication and honesty will lead to good questions and conversation that will develop into solid coping skills. So take the time to tell them the truth, answer their questions and let them grieve in their own way, so you can all move forward as a family during this difficult time.
