How To Talk To Children About Death And Grief

Today we're going to discuss how to talk to children about death and grief. People call me all the time to ask me, betsy, this person is sick and is dying. And I don't know how to tell the kids or betsy, you know, someone in my family died, and I don't know how to share the information with my children. So I felt compelled to share some guidelines that will help you in that conversation with the little ones. But before we get to those guidelines, I would like to share that death is a natural part of life. It's the one thing we know for sure that we will experience at some point. And for some reason, our society, our culture, has taught us that it's a taboo to talk about. You know, it's a bad thing, it's negative. Death is neutral. We give it the meaning, right? And naturally, because we're attached to this physical version of our loved ones, we're going to grieve and we're going to hurt for the most part, when we experience loss. But we can transform, transform that grief and that pain into peace and joy eventually. So death in the end is neutral, but we attribute it a positive interpretation when we feel that. But at the beginning, it's usually a negative one. So understanding that death is neutral and it's a natural stage of life and it's not a taboo, we can then start a conversation with our kids, understanding that there's an opportunity for us to teach them about this experience of living and dying so they don't have to be haunted by anxieties and fears that are oftentimes associated with the idea of death and the end. In my family, we know death very closely because of the loss of my daughter. And I feel that we are in many ways blessed because of it. Nobody in my family is scared of death. We embrace death not as an end, but rather a beginning, because we're people of faith and we believe in heaven. So having the conversation about death with your children is a beautiful opportunity to. To reframe and change the perspective that it may have in their lives. You get to do it better for them than it was done with you. And you can also reframe it for your own life in the process. So let me share some guidelines that I tell that I did with my own kids and I always share with the people who come to me for support. Number one, you always want to speak the truth. Don't lie to your kids. And when I say, say the truth, I'm not suggesting that you give them all the details and, you know, like the cruel reality that may traumatize them even more. I'm just saying don't lie. Don't try to sugarcoat it so much that you fall into lying. So if somebody is about to pass away, say, you know, they're close to their. To dying. Just be truthful. Tell them the truth in a way that they can understand it. When I came back home from the hospital after leaving, my daughter, my oldest, came to me chichi. And she was like, mommy, when is Foffy coming from the hospital? And she was 4 years old. And what I told her was, well, my husband and I together told her was, my love Fofi's not coming home from the hospital. Fofi went to heaven with God, and she's not coming back. And she was confused, right? She had never understood this sense of permanence. We had never gone through this before. And she was like, but not even in five days? And my husband was like, no, not even in five days. Not even in 13 days. No, not even 37 in 27 days. And in her little mind, she was like, okay, so what you mean is like a whole bunch of days, right? Like, not forever. And at that point, we had to say, no, my love Fofi is never coming home again. She's never going to be here in our house again. And that was the way that she was able to understand that. I didn't say she died because she probably didn't even know at the time what death was. I said I needed to convey that she was leaving and not coming back. And that was my way of truthfully explaining to her what had happened in a way that she could understand it. The second thing you want to keep in mind is let your kids guide you. Sometimes they're so anxious and nervous ourselves that we want to give them all the information, and we assume that they're going to think and they're going to interpret and they're gonna feel a certain way. And in the end, that's ours, that's not theirs. So if we give them information, like, mamita, my love, you know, fofi's not coming home. And then I wait for guidance, and I pause and I create a space for silence so that she can. She can give me some feedback as to what she's understanding and what I need to give her more of, I am letting her guide me. So when you ask, when you tell your child this is happening with a family member or, you know, like, when you share the news, you pause and you let them speak. And if they Don't. If they don't say anything, then you can ask questions. How do you feel about that? What are your thoughts? Do you have any questions? So you let them guide you. Give them as much as they need to know and as little as possible, meaning don't volunteer extra information. And this applies to people who want to talk to their kids about divorce. For example, if you're going to get a divorce with dad, like, it's the same as grief and loss, right? It's the death of your family as you knew it. Give them as much information as they're guiding you to receive, because your kids are going to let you know how much they're ready for. So that's number two. Number three is use the opportunity to build faith and hope and instill the values that you would love to give your children. In my case, faith and hope are strong values in that I want to instill in my children. So I used the opportunity to talk about God and heaven and get them excited for that beautiful place that their sister is now in. And I also wanted them to believe in heaven in a way that I, as an adult, had to learn myself to believe. So I told them. I told her, you know, she's in heaven and she's happy there, and she gets to, you know, see all the princesses and have the most amazing experiences and there's no pain there. And I depicted heaven as the place I want to believe it was at the time. Right. I now believe that wholeheartedly. And I added that whenever she missed her, she could be assured that Fofi lived in her heart because God was in her heart and Fofi is with God. So she also lives in her heart. And whenever she misses it, she can just go to herself, to her heart and talk to her and feel her and have a connection, a spiritual connection with her. So using the opportunity to build faith and hope, as opposed to fear and suffering is a beautiful and important step of communicating with your children. Number four, you want to validate their feelings. You don't want to just be like, she's with God and she's okay and she's in heaven and everything is perfect in heaven. And we're using that to build hope and faith and love. But she still feels she misses her sister. That was her best friend in the world. So what I did to validate her feelings was to hold her, to mirror her pain with my own pain by expressing it with my face and my body so that she would know that it's okay to feel the way she's feeling, and it's valid and it makes sense. So in a way, I gave her permission to feel. And part of the validation is also, don't hide your emotions all the time. You get to be a responsible adult by not having, like, a catharsis every day so that then your kid feels that they have to protect you and take care of you because you're so fragile. I'm not saying that. Right. Like, we do get to protect them from that and hide the strong emotions whenever possible. But if a tear comes out, if a moment presents itself, don't say you have something in your eye. Don't blame it on allergies. Just, you know, why are you crying? Oh, because I'm thinking about Fofi and I miss her so much. And I have to say, there were so many beautiful moments with my oldest daughter. I remember at some point, like, laying in bed and I was holding her, and she was, you know, she said, mom, like, I miss Fofi. And I told her, I miss her, too. And we both allowed ourselves to have a moment and embrace each other and give each other permission to be human and to grieve and to process our pain together. And it was a very beautiful, special moment that to this day, I keep as a memory. And lastly, you get to follow up and follow through. When you have this conversation with your child, don't pretend that they'll think about everything and that they'll have all the questions readily available. They may need some time to process. So after you have this conversation about death, grief, divorce, make sure you follow up and you ask, hey, how are you doing? How's your heart these days? Do you have any questions about what we talked about last week or yesterday or whenever it was? You know, just know that I'm here, and you can always come to me if you have any questions or if something comes to your mind that you don't know about. So make sure that you follow up and that you give them the space to be able to continue that conversation in a healthy manner. And I will share that when you follow these five steps right, when you. When you go through the process of telling the truth, you know, you build trust with your child. They know that you're going to tell them about difficult situations in the future, and they are at more peace because they know. They trust that you will speak with truth. When you go through the process of letting them guide you, you minimize mistakes because they're the ones who are telling you how much they're ready for. So that's your guide. You don't need a therapist for that. Your kid is the best guide in that regard. When you use the experience for faith, you have blessings in the process. I remember one time telling my daughter it was the anniversary of her birthday and we had a mass, and I told her my chichi, like, hey, like, if you see mommy sad or crying today, it's because I miss her so much. And she said, but, Mommy, why do you miss her if she's in your heart? And she put my hand in my heart for me to feel my daughter. And I remember at that moment being like, how beautiful that I got to build that faith in this little girl. And now she's teaching me how to have faith in the thing that I taught her. So in building faith, you build it for her for your child, but you also build it for yourself. And then when you validate and when you follow up, you succeed. You succeed. So don't be afraid of having this conversation with your child and know that instead of being a dreaded convo, it's actually a beautiful gift and opportunity to speak about something that's inevitable. If you need extra support on your grieving process, please feel free to join us at hurt the number2hope.com.