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Bereavement Article

What Parents Can Do To Help Their Grieving Children

By Elaine Tiller, Director of Bereavement Care, Montgomery Hospice

As a parent, you love your child and want to help them in every possible way you can. Thus when grief comes, we especially want to help our children. Part of parenting is that most of us want, more than anything, to protect our children from the really difficult, hard parts of life. And, of course, we can't always protect them-we can't protect them from death and grief. When death comes into our lives we must grieve. Grief is the natural and normal response to loss. Rather than trying to protect our children from grief, we need to face it with them and be there for them as they hurt with the pain of loss.

We can't take their pain away, but we can journey with them as they ask their questions, express their feelings and do their grief work. We can do this for our children only if we do this for ourselves. If we are running from our own grief-trying to hide the feelings of sadness and anger and frustration and longing--we won't be able to face these feelings in our children. Rather than running from our grief, parents can model facing our grief in healthy ways. Here are some things that parents can do to help their grieving children:

  1. WORK ON YOUR OWN GRIEF. Allow your own feelings and find your own ways to express these feelings. For example write them down, talk to a trusted counselor or friends, cry, yell in the car and other safe places, visit the cemetery and talk to the person that died. However you can do your grief work, do it! As you work on your own grief, you will be able to help your children in their grief-you won't have to push their grief away because you are not pushing your own grief away.

  2. LISTEN, LISTEN, LISTEN to your child-listen with your ears, your heart and your eyes. Listen to what they say, what they do, and how they act. Watch their play and play with them. Especially young children act out their grief and feelings in their play. Provide them with art supplies and ideas about drawing happy memories they had with their Dad or Mom who died or sad times with the person who died. Ask them to draw how they look when they are sad or mad and to draw what makes them mad. Anger is a very normal feeling in grief. We want to help our children express their anger in safe ways. Buy a good punching bag and hang it for your child to hit. Take a large white sock and stuff it with cotton and allow your child to decorate it with magic markers. This is a wackit sock and can be used to hit the floor, the bed, a tree or anything else to express their anger-just not to hit another person. Provide healthy ways for your child to express their anger and don't allow them to hurt themselves or you or anyone else.

  3. BE AVAILABLE when you are able. Take time from your busy schedule to sit on the floor and play games together. Talk about your memories of playing games with Dad and how you miss him now, but know he is watching over you as you play. Model that the deceased remains with us in our memories and stories-no one can ever take these away from us. Take time to listen to music or play basketball or other activities with teenagers and look for openings to talk and share memories and feelings. Only say things that you believe. Do not make things up that you think the child wants to hear-be honest in sharing your feelings of good memories and sad memories. We all have both.

  4. BUILD MEMORIES. Share your memories of your loved one and encourage your child to share their memories. Think of having a place in the home where anyone in the family can go and write down or draw a memory they are having. Buy a box and allow your child to decorate it to make a "My special Memories of Dad"-they can put in objects that remind them of Dad-his watch, his baseball, his picture, a crayon representing his favorite color, and many other treasures. Talk about what Dad's favorites were-what he loved. Or build a collage of Dad's life together-in doing this you will tell your child about what Dad was like when you met him-your child will build memories of Dad before your child was born.

  5. BE HONEST. Children have lots of questions about death, dying and being dead-both questions asked and unasked. Allow the questions, listen carefully and try to the best of your ability to answer the questions directly and honestly. If you don't know the answer, say so. Maybe you can come up with the answer through your talking and thinking together or say that you will do more research or thinking about the question.

  6. KEEP ROUTINES AND SCHEDULES. Kids and adults, when they are grieving, need to keep to routines and schedules that they are used to. After a few days or week or so, kids need to go back to school, just as we need to go back to work or back to our routines. Structure and routine, when we are grieving, keeps us grounded. They help us feel that even though our world has been turned upside down, there are still some things that remain the same.

    We may have problems concentrating at work or school and not do as well as normal, but that is okay, we can still go, attend, and do our best. Grief can be fatiguing for adults and children. It takes lots of energy to grieve, so allow for plenty of rest. Take breaks from your grief and do things that are fun or relaxing for you and encourage your child to do the same.

  7. HUG YOUR CHILD. Your child needs to know you love him and you need the hugs from your child.

  8. WATCH YOUR CHILD'S BEHAVIOR. If they are acting out more than before the death-showing problematic behaviors not previously seen and this continues, you may want to consult a professional counselor who works with children. Or, on the opposite side, maybe they've become the perfect child, the model child and they were not before-they are trying to take their Daddy's place, to be the man of the house. Again talk to them, find out what is going on, and if it continues, consult with a professional counselor.

  9. USE YOUR FRIENDS, NEIGHBORS, RELATIVES. They are your safety net. Many people want to help you and your child. Ask a special friend or neighbor to take your child out for pizza once per week. This will give you some free time and will give your child another adult who takes care of them. Consult with your child's teachers and counselor and with parents of your child's friends to see what they are seeing and to enlist their help in supporting you and your child. Reach out to involve the community in supporting you and your child.

Finally and possibly most important, tell your child about all of the persons that love and care for them. Remind them of this regularly, because when a child looses a parent they feel abandoned and unloved. Tell them who will take care of them if you should have to have surgery or get sick or have to go out of town on your job. Help them to know that you are not the only person that loves them and will take care of them.
© Copyright 2008 E.Tiller