Talking about death is very difficult for many people. It becomes especially difficult when you have to tell small children that grandma is so ill that she will die soon. How do you tell that mom or dad, a brother or sister, will soon never be there again? Parents often don’t know how to approach a conversation about death, because they want to protect their children from the coming grief. But children appear to be able to handle more than parents think and ultimately benefit more from telling the truth than beating around the bush. In the sad situation in which the entire family usually finds itself, it is advisable to call in a confidant from the family. This can pay attention to the children who will soon be confronted with the death of their brother or sister and/or the period afterwards.
How should you deal with your child if a family member dies?
No one hopes it will happen, but many families still have to deal with it. Someone in the family becomes seriously ill and will not get better.
Talk about the illness and dying
The truth is often ignored
Talking about an incurable disease and dying is a difficult issue for many people. The difficulty becomes even greater when the conversation has to be had with small children. The most difficult thing is telling about the impending death of father or mother, brother or sister. This often does not happen or the truth is ignored. The idea behind this is to protect the young child from emotions.
Be open about grief surrounding the death of someone in your family
Children can handle much more emotionally than adults think
Protecting children is understandable from the point of view of adults who in this situation find it difficult to put themselves in the place of a child’s experience. Grief surrounding the death of someone from your family is a very intense emotion that both adults and children feel. But protecting children from this emotion is not the solution. Openness about the sadness surrounding the loss ultimately helps more. Children can handle much more emotionally than adults think.
Of course they also experience intense sadness, but the expression of this is completely different from that of an adult. At one moment it is terribly sad, at the next moment it gives me a cheerful mood.
Avoid secrets about the sad situation
The child runs away with his own imagination
Children have trouble with secrets. Children hear many of the conversations between adults during the illness, death, cremation/burial and the time afterwards. If your child is not kept informed, he or she will run away with his or her own imagination. A fantasy in which it makes situations or events much worse than reality, how terribly sad it is. This makes processing and dealing with emotions more difficult.
Make sure your child doesn’t hold back any emotions
They must be given sufficient opportunities to express their grief.
A parent or parents are experiencing intense grief. The child too, but may come into conflict with himself if there are insufficient opportunities to express the sadness.
For example:
- It does not want to be sad, because it does not want to burden father/mother.
- It wants attention now, because it used to go to the deceased family member.
Let someone you know be their confidante
This can help process the children’s emotions
To prevent the above and to manage emotions properly, it is wise to have someone you know act as a confidant for the children. This could be an uncle/aunt, neighbor or good friend of the family. They can help the sad parent(s) process the children’s emotions, so that they do not end up in a conflict situation with themselves.
Sadness is not taken away
It must have a place
No matter what you do, the pain of loss will not be taken away. It must be given a place and that is a story that can or will be different in every family. Both for adults and children.