Vicki Jay and David Kessler on the loss of a loved one

Usual custom, if you want. As you come on, say hello and let me know where you're from. Hey, Vicki. Good to see you here.

Thank you, David. I'm excited to be here tonight.

Good, good. Well, we're gonna be getting some information out of you.

Okay.

Much needed information in the world. So when you come on, say hello, I'm actually going to look down and see if I can find us on the phone, too. Always a good indication if I can find us. Other people can because sometimes I can't find us. All right. And when you're ready, just say hello up there. We are good people are beginning to join. Welcome, welcome, everyone.

Tonight we're going to be talking about children and grief. Children and grief is a challenging, challenging topic for everyone.

Hey, Kenny from Puerto Rico. Lovely to see you here. Karen from Pennsylvania, Jennifer from Alaska. We're just from all over tonight. I can see. All right, there's Shirley from Pennsylvania, Andrea from Colorado, Holly from Massachusetts. By the way, if you're new to the group, I just come on and do this because this group was set up because of COVID 19 and us being so disconnected. So just acknowledging each other online is at least a way of connecting. Hey, Vivian from New York. Marlene from Northwest Territories, Canada. Regina, New York state. Pamela from Washington state. Ivy from New York. Jessica, New Jersey. Hey, Tracy from Robbins, Georgia. Welcome. I'll just give everyone a few moments here to come on to find their way. Let me just see how we're doing here. Want to make sure everyone gets in. Who wants to come in? All right, very good. People are still joining. All right, let's see. Jacqueline from California. Carla from Byron, Georgia. Betsy from Tallahassee. Marjorie from New York state. Carol, Georgia. Tracy Robbins, Georgia. Very good, Very good. Hey, Diane Gray. Wonderful to see you.

So lots of people coming on. I'm so excited for those of you who have never been on here. By the way, if you're brand new, you don't have to say hello. It's just something some people do. I think some of us are engagers. Some of us sit back and watch, just like in, you know, in real life. I'm someone who sits in the front row of every class, and there's plenty of people who sit in the back and watch. So any way you want to engage is just fine with us. We're all different in life, and we're certainly different in grief. So this group was set up, as I mentioned, because of COVID 19 and just the idea that so many people were alone and heartbroken and shut out from their grief groups because of the stay at home orders that I just thought we have to find a way to connect. So that's how this group started. I come on 1pm every day, Pacific time, 4pm Eastern. I talk about some concept in grief or on how to deal with the pain people are feeling and the loss. And people are here who have been struggling for years, people who lost a parent three months ago before COVID 19 and there was someone on who had a loved one die this morning. So whatever your loss is, you are welcome here. And so we come together at that 1pm daytime hour and then we come on in the evening with wonderful people like Vicki who are volunteering her time to help teach us, share their experience, share their acknowledge their knowledge. Because I believe it's so important in grief and that there's many, many voices. There's no one way to grieve. There's no one voice in grief. So I love the evening sessions because you get something different. And I'll tell you, you might not even have children and you're on here. It doesn't mean you won't get something that's not going to help you. Even when, like we had Melissa Rivers on who talked about her mother, Joan Rivers, dying or her father dying from death by suicide, she still had just amazing nuggets about grief. We're going to have Diane Gellins on tomorrow night who's going to be talking about death by suicide and her son died by suicide. Wonderful people who are showing up. These are all recorded. If you've missed any of them, you can go back and see the others. People like Diane Gray, who's on did a wonderful session with us. We have great people coming up who are volunteering because you matter, because your loss matters, because your grief matters. Catherine Schwarzenegger Pratt's going to be doing a session on forgiveness. Will Reeves is going to be talking about the death of his parents, Christopher Reeves and Dana Reeves. These people are showing up because they want you to know as the world's discussing reopening your loss, your loved one is not forgotten. So we're all here because someone we love has died, maybe more than one person. So one of our traditions is just to take a moment.

In silence, just to send them our love, that they, they matter. They live in our heart and to just still send them love. So join me, if you would, in that.

Thank you so much for doing that. I really appreciate it. All right, let's see who's here. Vicki. All right. Tito's from Atlanta. Deborah's LA Vicky and hold your questions just towards the end. I'll tell you when to do questions. Clarissa from ab, which could be is that Albany? Is that Alberta, Pennsylvania? Hey, Robin from New York, Lindsay from Massachusetts, Sandy from Maryland, Beth Chicago. Welcome. Welcome everyone. Where's our person from Midland, Texas? Where she at?

VICKI J. Welcome. I would love I know you are the CEO of an incredible organization. I would love for you to tell us how you got involved in this world. Tell us about your work, Tell us about your work organization. And I know it's not really your organization, but it is the one that you're heading up and talk to us about that. And then I'm sure we're going to have some questions about grief and children and all that good stuff. So welcome.

Vicki thank you, David, so much. And I send thoughts to each one of you who have faced the death of somebody close to you, somebody important in your life. I do have a special love of children, and so that's probably what brought me to this conversation tonight. I started my professional career in the classroom as a teacher and an administrator. But what I found in the classroom is that many, many times kids were not able to really function well in the classroom because of other things going on in their lives. And most of that had to do with loss, changes, and many, many times more times than I'd like to count death of a loved one. So in my local community, Midland, Texas, as David acknowledged, I was able to partner with the hospice and we started a children's bereavement program specifically for kids who were facing loss and change. The program started with all kinds of losses, divorce and all kinds of things that bring kids through some changes. And then throughout the rest of my career, that was I I don't even want to tell you how many years ago, but I've been doing this about well over 25 years. And when I started the center, I was looking for some help and what are best practices? How do we meet the needs of these kids? Nobody really wants to put kids and grief in the same sentence, David. It's just not comfortable for us. And so I found the nagc, the national alliance of Grieving Children became a part of the organization that now I am honored to lead as a national organization whose sole purpose is to make sure that no child grieves alone and that we have all the tools we need to support kids when they've had a loss or change. So tonight it's really about parenting or grandparenting or caregiving to.

You know, a child, a teen, someone who has lost a loved one more than it is for kids to actually be on the call tonight. So I just want to see if I can help your group. David, I admire what you're doing. I think coming together is something that is so important to all of us and I think we've even realized lately how important that is.

Absolutely. Well, thank you. Let me go to a few questions that came in ahead of time. All right. And I'll just come to these questions here and we'll start with them. All right, let me see.

All right. My dad, my husband. Sorry, this is Jen's question. I don't know if Jen's on with us. Some people put these in because they know they're not going to be able to join us. Jen says my husband passed away March 12th. Which Jen, in grief time is like a minute ago. We have a four year old whose grief seems to be manifesting as anger and clinginess. Any tips on how to best navigate his grief while still disciplining bad behavior such as hitting, which he never did before? I feel like he's sort of regressing to a two year old. Tantrums and sometimes I know it's his grief, but I need help establishing new boundaries with him while still making him feel safe to express himself.

Thank you, Jen, for your question. There. There's a lot in that question and it sounds like she's already got a pretty good handle on parts of it. What I would say is that, you know, we have to love him through it. We can't take it away from him, we can't protect him from it, but. But we need to love him through it. One of the things that kids really need after they've had a loss is they have this innate need to return to routine and scheduling and normalcy. And that includes boundaries and it includes knowing that someone loves me enough to care, that I'm staying safe, that I'm behaving, that I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. So many times as a parent or caregiver, it's easy to relax a little bit and say, oh, I know he's hurting so I'm going let him get by with this this time. Because after all, somebody just died in his life. When in reality the best thing to do is to say I love you. I understand, I feel your emotion that you're showing, but here's the appropriate way to do it. So many times, David, when we try to stop a child's emotions, it's because we're uncomfortable with it. It's because we don't like them to see that fit of anger. And actually the healthiest angry person is a two year old who throws himself on the floor and kicks and screams and then it's gone, it's released for the minute. So as long as they're not doing harm to themselves or harm to others, then let them find an appropriate way to show that emotion. But then also let them know that there are boundaries and the rules didn't go out the window just because somebody died. I hope that makes sense and is helpful to Jim.

Perfect sense, you know, I, I, I, I, I remember someone, I knew, their teenager, when they heard that the grandpa had died, stuck their fist through the wall. They hit the fist, you know, through the wall. And my first reaction was, I'm so glad it hit the wall. And the parents were like, why? And I said, well, I don't ever want anyone to break things, but I'm always glad when anger goes out instead of in.

That's exactly right.

And let's find ways to help them channel that anger so you can keep your walls in place. But, you know, I'm always glad when anger goes out. All right, here's another one. Katrina says, how do we help children grieve in the time of COVID My dad passed suddenly at the beginning of all this. I have a five year old and a two year old who saw him one day and gone the next. I assume they think it's related to Covid since our world has turned upside down. I don't think there are grief counselors available for new kid clients right now. But my two year old asks for Bumpy. I guess that's grandpa. And my five year old plugs her ears when we talk about him.

So that it is a hard time right now for us to do any work because Covid has got us so unusual in our normal tools. But I will tell you, some of the things that I would tell you whether it was Covid or not are still true. And that is to make sure you're involving them and including them. I think sometimes there's two things that's apparent that are natural behaviors. And one is to love and the other is to protect. And many times we try to protect our kids from hurting and from being a part of and knowing. And in reality we're taking away their opportunity to be connected to that person in that situation and to express their questions and their emotions. And what I also know is what we don't let them do now, if we take away that work now they'll just have to do it later in their life. So it's really important that you find a way to include them. And for those little ones, a two year old and a five year old, the best thing is just to ask them questions rather than have the big tell all and try to explain everything because they're, I don't know about y', all, but there are no answers right now. We don't, we can't explain everything but to just do check ins with them. And the best time to do that is at night when they put their little head on the pillow and they're finally kind of trying to process their whole day and say, tell me something, what are you excited about today? What are you worried about? What are you thinking about? What are you hoping for? And you'll find whatever's kind of inside their head, in their heart and that'll rise to the top and it'll give you a chance to talk about.

Whoever it was that is no longer here and say, you know, let's talk about him. Because every time you have a chance to interact with the child on the subject of someone who died, you're creating an opportunity for them to express themselves and ask questions. And they need to know that it's safe to ask questions. The one thing kids have, David, that we don't have in the degree they do is imagination. And so when they don't have answers, they start filling in with their imagination. So they're hearing all this Covid stuff come in on the news and they're hearing people talk about all these changes and grandpa was here and now he's not here. And so I'm going to take my five year old mind and I'm going to say A, please, B must equal Z. And Z is a lot scarier than reality. So don't be afraid to answer honestly. Talk to them with real words and in small snippets, just so they just at their level does that.

It's a very different conversation because I think as a parent I want to give them paragraphs. Yeah. Your son must be sitting there because you're getting darker.

I'm still right here in la, you're right.

So yeah, if you've got a light. There you go. Oh my goodness. Come in. There you go.

Sorry.

It's all right. It's good. So, and that's what we're doing, we're turning on the lights for kids. Right. So you know, I think as a parent and I experienced this with my own kids when they were young this idea that, like, I want to give them a paragraph, I want to give them a long talk, and it's best to just give them a little information, then wait for questions. And the other thing I heard, I just want to check this out with you, since you're the special in this area. Parents, we get into pain and we stay into pain and we're there. Kids hit pain and then they bounce right out and they go play. And parents are like, wait a minute. They're playing like nothing's gone wrong. And I often say that's just how kids do that. Young kids do it. They can't stay in the pain like we can for hours. Make sense?

Absolutely. You know, that is so obvious at funerals and ceremonies when afterwards all the adults are gathering and sharing stories and some tears and whatever, and kids are usually outside playing. And it's not that they're not hurting or grieving. It's because they can only do it in little bits and pieces.

And we don't always recognize them as grievers because they don't wear it like we do. They don't show it in the same ways we do. The other thing, David, that happens, and I think it happens with all of us, but it's a good reminder about kids, too, is they do it in spasms. So then they're just okay. And then all of a sudden they lose it. And you're thinking, wait a minute, I thought you were okay. And now you're falling apart. What changed? And it may not be anything. It just is what happened at that moment that that child needed to have a moment. And it doesn't mean you're doing anything right or wrong. It just means that's where that child is right then.

And here's another question. This is from Tracy. My daughter passed away March of 2019 from cystic fibrosis. I'm grandma raising her son, who is now nine years old. He is pretty closed and doesn't talk about the loss. Talks about his mom, but not about the death. He doesn't have an active dad. How do I know he's okay?

You know, just because a child isn't talking doesn't mean that they're not processing things internally and they're not having feelings and thoughts many, many times. It just means we have to work a little bit harder to find a way to find a tool for them to use or a coping mechanism starting. Staying tuned in to make sure that they're finding appropriate coping tools is very, very important. What I would say is that if you Pose the questions. If you offer opportunities to talk and share when they need it, they'll usually come to you. But if they just know that you're present with them, that's the gift that you have to give right now. Teens don't talk like we do. They don't talk about anything like we do, much less during this period of their life. That's not who they are.

I always want to say teenagers do not want to talk to their parents about grief or sex.

No. Or anything else in between sometimes. So we have to. We have to just be patient with them.

Holly says, I lost my dear, Sweet mother on March 3rd, and. And my niece, 18, and nephew, 15, lost their beloved nanny. They live right down the street from me. But with COVID 19, I can't go see them. What advice do you offer to support them?

You know, grief is really about doing the work, and we all have a need to do. I think that's often exemplified after, when someone dies and you hear the news, a neighbor down the street, for instance. David, you do something very rarely do. You just hang up the phone and go about your business. You order flowers, you go see them, you take food. In Texas, we take food all the time. And we take food to a deceased family not because they need it. It's really driven more by our need to do than their need to receive. And kids are the same way. They have a need to do something. So in Covid, it's putting some restrictions on us as to what we can do. We can't physically go visit necessari, but it doesn't mean we can't do so. Giving them opportunities to write, to create, to draw, to send messages, to call, anything where they can use some creative juices and do something, even if it can't be delivered until a later time. So that they are actively involved in the grief work. I saw something on the chat, David, about somebody working a puzzle. And so many times we don't sit and have these face to face discussions with kids. We have parallel discussions. And so it's not about, hey, listen and talk serious right now. It's while we're working on this puzzle, let's have a little side chat back and forth. And that really is a way to let them go. So while you're doing those creative service projects, doing something for somebody else, then it allows you to have some of that sidebar conversation also.

And I'll tell you something just I've learned as a parent, not what I do. You know, my kids grew up saying, don't Be a therapist, so. But I. I learned.

With my kids not to interrogate and, you know, to not go, tell me about your day. Tell me about this, tell me about that. The 20 questions. And I have learned to do that in grief, that after my younger son died, even now with his brother who's now 25, if I was to call him up and say, and now we can't, you know, visit, but we can FaceTime and all that. If I call up and say, have you been thinking about David? Is it hard without your breath? If I do that, I'm getting nowhere. But just like you say, if we're just doing something together or chatting in general, and I just happen to maybe say, wow, I really thought about David a lot today, period. Leave it. And then just go on. I'm so surprised. And even go on to something else, how later on in the conversation, he'll go, yeah, you know, I thought about David the other day, but I know if I was to ever say to him, are you thinking about your brother? You know, he would be like, well, of course. So it is that hard thing about. Go ahead. Sorry.

Well, and I think you're. You're parallel. You're mentoring to them, too. This is how I'm doing my grief. And it's showing them that I periodically think about him, too. But I don't have to sit and talk about him all the time. He's just in my heart and my head. When you ask a teen interrogation question that you said, in my world, I got the. There were no syllables. It was just this guttural sound that would come out. But I think that's why it's important, too. It's how you ask questions and how you make statements. Even if you were to say, are you sad about your dad? The messages received, oh, should I be sad about my dad? Or, oh, my gosh, why are I.

Sad about my dad?

Aren't I sad? Should I be sad? And if you just say, hey, tell me kind of how you're feeling today. What are you excited about? What are you worried about? Is anything? And do that double dipness. We call them double dip questions, where you ask a positive and a negative, they don't have to respond to either, but you'll find, kind of later, they'll say, you know, I've been thinking about it. I am a little blah, blah, blah. And it gives them that window to walk into that door.

I remember a family member years ago, his mom had died, and I think he was 16. And I said to.

Him, after his mom died. I said, do you know what I do? And he said, yes, you're, you know, you write books on grief. And I said, do you.

Do you have any questions? And he goes, no. And I said, you know, it's okay if you're sad. And he goes, yeah. He said, is it okay if I'm still happy? And I went, absolutely. You know, I think sometimes kids just need a little information. That puzzle question you answered, Andrea said, we lost our dad yesterday on the COVID floor. And being in isolation with a teen and preteen is hard. I was thinking about getting puzzles. You pretty much said, great idea. It's so hard to get them to talk, but maybe when they're sitting around doing a puzzle. Any other suggestions you have? I think any activity, you could be cleaning the house. Not that they're going to be happy with that one.

Well, and you can make the activity as superficial or as deep as you want if you wanted to. On that puzzle, you could say, hey, let's write a memory or a word that describes or something on the back of each piece as we put it in. And then you have this lifetime kind of remembrance of that person and you're actually doing some pretty deep, deeper grief work. Or you can just sit side by side in silence and work together and every once in a while just throw out a comment, an opportunity to have a conversation.

I just think it's so important to do things kids, their natural tool is not dialogue, like for you and I, their natural tool.

Sit down and have a very serious conversation face to face. And there's a lot of adults that can't do face to face.

That's not their natural tool. Their natural tool is activity and energy and movement and all those things. And so that's what we need to capitalize. And even with the teens, it's the same way. You know, letting a teen beat the heck out of a drum is a wonderful way to kind of cope with all that inside stuff.

Never easy questions on here. Jasmine says, how do you substitute appropriate coping tools for a five year old to replace physically beating his mom up after losing his dad, dad and grandpa six months ago?

My first thought is, I'm sorry that you're having to experience that. But I also want to tell you a caveat that I learned a long time ago and I think it's so helpful and that is that often we strike out at those that are closest to us, those that feel safe and that we know are going to love us back unconditionally. There is such a Fear with kids, once they've had a loss, that they're going to lose somebody else, that another change is going to happen, and they start grasping. And it shows up in not so positive ways many times. And so, as crazy as this sounds, what I'd like her to hear from me is it's actually a compliment to your relationship that they feel safe enough to be ugly towards you. Now, that said, doesn't mean that's appropriate behavior at all. And so I would just give an example. We had a parent who. We had a child who had the filthiest mouth a teen you've ever heard. Those words should not fall on anybody's ears. And yet that was that child's way of expressing themselves. And as a teen, he thought it was cool to just fill the world with Phil. Obviously, that's not appropriate. And so the person that was working with him said, you know, I can tell you're full of all these emotions, but we can't hear them. So what I want you to do is write them on a piece of paper. And so gave him a piece of paper, and he started scritch scratching. And you could tell he was really angry. And she said, you feel better? And he's like. She said, okay, now what I want you to do is take that piece of paper and tear it in a million pieces so that no two letters are next to each other and nobody can read those words. So he ripped them a few times. Does you feel better? And the mother came in six months later and said, it snows in my house every day. And I thank God for it because we had taken a negative behavior and turned it into a positive outlet. So that's what I would do. If, you know, fear is really anger, and anger is really energy. And so we have to find ways for kids to take that energy and do something with it. So if hitting you is not appropriate, obviously, then find another way to expel that energy. It could be throwing rocks at the back fence. It could be beating the drum. It could be getting in the shower and screaming at the top of your lungs. But recognize that it is a true feeling that you cannot take away. You cannot take that away from them. You have to help them find an appropriate way to express it.

And last night we had Paul Denniston on who does grief yoga. So he showed lots of ways to get anger out. And you know what I wouldn't say to your kids, let's do grief yoga. I would just go, oh, I'm angry. And do one of his exercises, let them see you doing one of them? Tracy says, I lost my 19 year old son to suicide six months ago. My 13 year old daughter went from being a straight A student to refusing to go to school. And unable to focus and concentrate even with online schooling, she refuses to speak when I take her to a counselor and her psychiatrist. How do I help her? I'm lost as to what to do because I can't make her speak or do schoolwork. She's no longer interested in cheer or gymnastics either and wants to stay in bed all day. I do make her get up, but I don't know what else to do to get her to open up and start processing the loss of her brother and the events of that dreadful day. Oh my gosh, Tracy, our heart goes out to you. No easy questions are these.

They are not. And you know, just because she's not responding doesn't mean she's not grieving. She's grieving in her own way and we can't take that away. We can't make her do it like we want it done or show us like we need to be shown. I would hope that we can say that all the loss of interest is a temporary situation. It doesn't mean she's given it up forever. And what she needs more than anything is to be loved through it. So not to get angry with her, not to lose faith that she's, you know, not ever going to talk to you again and find any way you can to just give her multiple opportunities to express herself. So, you know, I know you don't want to talk about it and that's okay, that's fine. I want you to know if you ever do, I'm here. But in the meantime, here's a journal, here's something you can do, or here's some music that has helped me or you know, I've been reading this book and maybe you'll find it helpful and just try every single avenue that you think she's old enough to be using some of the same tools you might be using and so share those with her. Obviously, counselor, don't give up on that eventually. And the counselor will help you also with some additional information. I hope that's helpful.

And by the way, I did a three part, three week free suicide class that you can find@griefsuicide.com and I would suggest you watch it because it may help you to help her. So thank you. My goodness, my heart just goes out to you. Jennifer says my son died by suicide and his daughter is seven and she does not really Know how he died. We explain he got really sick and they couldn't save him. She will sometimes out of the blue, ask questions. So this is the question of do we tell the child if it's suicide? I have feelings on it, but Vicki.

Well, I have feelings too. And what I will tell you is I am not you, I'm not in your situation. So you know, how I would handle it might be different. But what I will tell you is I firmly believe that everything you say to the child needs to be true. You can't fill in with things that aren't true. But you don't have to tell them all the truth at one time. So you explain it at their level and you follow their lead. They're the experts right now. And so when you give her a little bit of. It's kind of like David made a reference while ago about sex. It's kind of like the sex. We don't explain sex all at once. We only answer the question that that 5 year old, 7 year old, 10 year old, 14 year old has at their level. And so I do believe that kids absorb a lot more than we think they do. They hear from everybody else and they need to hear the truth from you first. It is very hard to build a trusting relationship, but it doesn't take much to break it. So when you tell them you need to, what you say needs to be truth and there needs to be an open door for more truth as she grows and begins to understand and process. David, I'd be interested in your response.

So my response, after years of seeing loving parents wanting to protect them from the truth, what I've seen happen pretty consistently is eventually. And everyone thinks, oh no, we've got it locked down, no one's saying anything. And what happens is children overhear something.

They absolutely do. I'm not sure if David left us or if I left.

But they absolutely hear more than we think they do. And I would go back to the same, finishing his sentence. The same thing is when we don't help them understand the details, they start filling in with their imagination and it's often much worse. And so if, if they hear it, they need to hear the truth from you. David, come back. I'm sorry.

Sure, I'm back. I would just say that, you know, what happens is, you know, they end up hearing it from someone else and then you're having to deal with mommy, daddy, you lied to me. And that's what we don't want. So, and I'm a big believer. Look at 7 years old. There's not a lot you can say. It's starting pretty close to what you say. You know, I might say something like, people die from illnesses. They can be in our body, they can be in our brain. And that may be it for now. And then at some point, your child's going to go, what kind of illness is there? And then at that point, you know, that's when you may begin how, you know, our mind can be ill, that, you know, there's illnesses in our brain. There are things like brain tumors. There's things like addiction, there's things like mental illness. And, you know, but obviously you're doing that age appropriately as they're ready.

The other thing, David, is I just don't think we can protect our kids from the reality. There's so much on TV that they see. They know so much more than we do, than we think they do. And we just. The more honest you can be, the sooner the better.

Right, Right. I agree. All right, let's look at another question.

Nikki says my boy is 8 and 6 years old. Lost their dad March 12th. Oh, my gosh, Nikki. That's just happened. Should I try to organize it so they can talk to a therapist or someone knowing it's online or on the phone? We do talk sometimes, usually before bed. So I guess. And, you know, there's wonderful counselors who are available through telehealth. I guess one of the questions is, how do we know when to bring someone in? If the kids are talking, how do we know?

So, you know, right now we're a little bit more limited in going.

Into places. And I do believe counseling has a lot to do with relationships and developing those relationships. I also think that there's a lot of value in peer support and especially for our kids and our teens to know. I'm not the only one that's so important to them. We crave to be with our peers, and they do, too. So getting them to be involved with a peer group at this time is a wonderful way to kind of gracefully get into deeper work later on. But my heart breaks for you that it's all happening at such a strange time in our world.

And Deborah says, can you speak about the grief of teens losing a parent? When teens choose not to say goodbye or loving words during hospice, I'm still hurt by it and wish we could process what they were saying. Feeling a family is just the two of us now. My daughter and I talk deeply often. You know.

It'S so challenging because I think as parents, we want. We learn and are taught to give our loved ones choices, to give our children choices. But I used to say, when I worked in hospice, and people would ask me, they would say, oh, you know, I'm. I'm giving my teenager a choice about whether they came in. And I would say to them, do they have a choice about school? And they would go, no, of course not. And I said, do you know what the right thing is? And they would go, well, I want them to come in, but it should be their choice. I went, you know what? This is such a big thing. It's hard for the teenage mind to grasp all of this. I might just tell, you know, like, my two kids, literally, when my stepmom was in the nursing home, they were like, we don't want to visit the nursing home. And I would go, me either, but we're going.

So, you know, Deborah, I would just say, it's so hard to know we're not you. It's hard to know what the right decisions are. But in general, what can she do now? And what would you advise other people? And now in Covid, you can't even see the folks if you tried. But anyway, well.

And, you know, I agree with you, David, but maybe it's too late. Maybe that opportunity has passed or is unavailable. And so. But it's never too late to say goodbye. And so, you know, writing letters and doing whatever kind of ceremonial or ritual thing that that child or that family can do, whether it's on anniversaries or birthdays or holidays or whatever, helping the child have multiple opportunities, even if they miss the one opportunity you felt like they may have had, doesn't mean that they don't have more in the future that may look a little different, but can still serve the same purpose. So I would just look for other ways to bring closure to that. And not that there is closure, but to bring an opportunity to say my goodbye.

And, you know, one of the things. Can't do it now. Right now, you know, we're all stuck in the virtual world, but there may come a time when you could say, let's take a trip in Grandpa's honor. Let's make this trip our goodbye to Grandpa. Or let's. It could just be a day. Let's go take this day in honor of Grandpa. Let's listen to all his favorite things. Let's watch his favorite. You know, there's things you can do that can be a ritual of a goodbye. Now still.

Absolutely.

Andrea says, I have an autistic son. And when we. And we Keep bubble wrap so when he's angry, he can pop it. I like that.

That's great for all of us, not just an autistic child.

All right, let's see. You guys are saying very sweet things and supporting one another.

Let me just see.

Melissa says, my dad's suicide was completely shocking. I'm worried my kids will lose trust in adults.

And, you know, that's a real, real feeling that may be there. And again, we need to help them understand that, that decision, what, what you can help explain about whatever caught, you know, what was behind the suicide. And then make sure you're not one of those other adults that, you know, in any way breaks promises. And, you know, one of the things we want to do to kids a lot is to protect them and to take hurt and pain away. And we say things without thinking, like, I promise this. I. You know, and sometimes we're not in control of the future. I promise you, I'll never die. I'm not going to leave you. We can't say that because we're not in charge. So just be mindful of your words, making sure you're not setting yourself up or the kids up for other failures.

I remember my kids were, I think, 4 and 5. They were really young and I can remember, I think it happened. They were in the bathtub and I forgot who had died, whether it was my. Someone had died. And they turned to me and they said, are you going to die someday? And I said, I am and so are you. And let me tell you everything I'm doing. You know how you hate broccoli? I'm eating that broccoli. So I eat a long time. I'm going, you know, and I listed all the things I'm doing to stay healthy and live as long as I can. But just like you said, I couldn't make a promise I'm not going to, you know, be able to keep because we're all going to die someday. That's the reality.

Holly says my mother died of cancer March 25th. Oh, my goodness, Holly. So sorry. And she was close to my 11 year old twins. We haven't been able to have a funeral because of COVID so the boys have no chance to mourn her. They refuse to talk about her, and they won't talk to a therapist on FaceTime. How can I get through to them? So these are 11 year old twins. No chance to sort of have that funeral right now.

You know, what I would say is you don't have the opportunity right now to have the official Funeral, whatever that is in your world. But you could put the kids, the twins, in charge of a memorial at your house while you're all there together and let them use their creative juices and find ways they want to remember and celebrate that life that was so important to them. I did that once for a family where a young child had been run over by a car in the driveway. And it was the two year old who spoke up, who opened the door for the rest of the family to talk and remember. And she said, well, Steven liked to throw my Barbie in the potty. And it just opened up for everybody. And all of a sudden everybody's telling Steven's stories. And so sometimes we think we have to do things official and whatever, but if we follow the leads of kids, they can do some marvelous things for us and for themselves. So I would encourage you to explore something at home with them.

It could be something like, let's do a dinner.

Is there something we should watch after it in honor and what kind of food? And just sort of create at least a dinner in their honor. I think sometimes as parents, we want to fix it. We want to get them on the phone with the therapist. Here's the therapist. Talk to them so you'll quit being you. And it comes out for kids that they're doing it wrong. As a parent, it is so hard. I mean, I can remember it was eye opening to me years ago when I worked in a hospital system. We had a father who was dying and the mother was not telling the son, who was probably 9 or 10 years old. And I said, can I please tell your son? She goes, no, you cannot tell him. And I said, what if he knows? No, he doesn't know. We've all kept it. I said, would you allow me some time with your son if I promise not to tell? She goes, could my aunt, could my sister be there? The aunt? And I went, absolutely. And so I sat down with the child who was 9 or 10, and I said, can you tell me what's going on? And right out of his mouth, he said, dad's dying. And I said, is there anything I can help you with? And he said, yes. Mom is the only one who doesn't know. Can you tell her?

I mean, to my point, they know so much more, you know, than we do. They absolutely do.

All right, let's see.

Some other things. People are loving the bubble wrap idea. When a parent is diminishing physically.

When a parent is diminishing physically, dying in your house next to the kitchen. I think it's totally understand for a 14 year old to avoid seeing it and hearing everything involved with it. It was scary and awful and he was suffering from end stage Parkinson's patients and speech issues and all my attention went to him, which my daughter resented. I could not make her see him the day he died, but he was with. But she was willing to watch his body being carried out when I couldn't. It's not like visiting a nursing home. Wow.

A lot, isn't it?

Oh, what a heavy load that you have carried. Caring for someone in that situation and then having other family to support at the same time. You know, I have so much respect. Parenting is hard, period. And then you add any of this other level of stuff on there and it, it is really difficult. But again, you know, she did have some visual contact and she made decisions and you know, it's never too late is the message I want to say to all of you. Just because they didn't take advantage of the moment you thought was most appropriate, there's still many more moments you can create. Many more times you can talk and remember and celebrate and honor that person without, you know, focusing on what didn't happen, but what can happen.

And you know, it's interesting, I was talking earlier in the group about practical verse and how we all have different styles of grieving. And I said, you know, I couldn't physically deal with the coroner when my son died. I wasn't present and all that. But the person who seems to have no feelings in the world around grief or loss or anything was the person who stepped up and knew how to do that. And in the same way your daughter wasn't the person who was sort of there in the day to day, but wow, she stepped up and witnessed the body being removed.

Moment for her to step up. You know, let's make this, let's see, maybe our last question, I think, Let me see. My son died by suicide four and a half years ago. My daughter is having a really hard time with it and is just now dealing with her grief. I'm wondering when I need to seek out help, as in medication for depression.

You know, that really is a clinical question where you need some help in deciding. And so if you think there's any chance that she's. To that point, I would recommend that you seek, you know, clinical help and get a counselor to help you navigate that. Usually we can tell when people are very different from what they used to be. So when you see changes in behavior and academic performance, it's time to start thinking about getting some outside help and then they'll help you assess that situation. But it's not on you to make that hard decision.

And you know, there is a difference between situational depression and clinical depression. There's no timeline in grief. But, you know, if this was first week or first year, I might say really think about, you know, is it situational depression? But given you're four and a half years out, you know, it is really a good idea to have a professional do that evaluation. And it's hard as the parent to do it, you know, clinically. Just not skilled.

Absolutely.

All right. Tracy says our 14 year old killed himself three months ago. Oh, Tracy, goodness. My 15 year old and his best friend has held it all in to protect it us. What can I do to help him grieve so he isn't holding it in?

You know, that's our natural instinct to protect each other. And so just giving him permission to say, you know what, I know this hurts you too in your own way, and just let it kind of release him of that responsibility.

Many times you'll see kids step into roles that they didn't have before because they become the protector. And many times what we need to do as the adults in their life is just to kind of release them from that responsibility. It doesn't mean that they will automatically quit feeling that way, but at least you've given them permission and it will diminish a bit.

And I'll tell you, the other thing that I had to learn as a parent who became bereaved and had one son die and dealt with the other, is that, you know, we really want to help that other child grieve. And one of the things that was just so eye opening for me and I didn't realize it was doing, doing it myself, is I would turn to my son and I would say, how are you doing? And I'd break down and I'd realize, oh my gosh, I'm in so much grief, I can't really be there for his grief. And I think we think as a parent, we should be the parent, we should be the grief counselor. And we're dealing with our own grief. And so it is really hard. And the other thing that I have heard kids over the years say, I don't like to see my parents crying anytime, not even in grief. So to realize it's not going to be us, it might be their peers, it might be other people who support them as parents. We want everything to be us. Would you agree with that?

Absolutely. But I also Think that when grief affects the family, it affects the whole family, but everybody differently at different times in different ways. So it's really hard to be, you know, responsible for each other and try to care for each other when you're all at different places at different, different times. And so I always advise that people seek out some neutral situation, some neutral person. So that might be a peer, it might be another relative, but another confidant, a coach, a teacher, somebody that is not involved in the situation, who isn't just barely holding it together, who can just be the listening ears for our kids and our teens.

I'm going to go to Angela's question. It'll be our last one. Angela says my 18 year old going on, my 18 year old going on 12 with Asperger's took their life seven weeks ago. I had no clue. I was in shock when I found them. Angela says I'm struggling with living. So Angela, let me tell you a few things. First of all, your life is really important and you matter and it has to be really hard to see that when you're seven weeks out. So there's something we called yearning. And yearning is when someone we love dies, we miss them so much, we almost want to be with them. It doesn't mean we're actually going to harm ourselves.

So we do struggle with do I keep living? And that is part of yearning. Now if you're having self harming thoughts, Angela, there's a few things I want you to do right away. I want you to realize how important you are. There's the suicide prevention lifeline. I would love you to give them a call right away. The other thing is if you're oriented towards Facebook groups, and you probably are because you're here, if you are struggling with grief, we're your group. If you are struggling to not harm yourself, there are groups out there on Facebook that are dedicated to that, to making sure you don't harm yourself. And we'd rather you get to one of those groups because we want to make sure you are taking care of yourself and keeping yourself safe. Anything you would add to that, Vicki?

Just that echo everything you said. And just to reiterate, you are not alone at all. There is help. There are people that have been where you've been there, people waiting to help you. So.

That lifeline is 800-273-8255 and you can call them. There's also online chats you can have with them because some people would rather text than call. So just know they're available 24 hours a day. So I would invite you, I would actually urge you, if you are having self harming thoughts, to get help right away for that. So it's a lot, isn't it, Vicki? It's a lot.

It is a lot. You know, David, there's a couple of things I'd just like to cover that'd be great and that really is that.

You and your children are grieving separately.

Together. So in reality their grief journey isn't like yours and you can't make it like yours and you can't take it away, but you can just support them and love them through it and give them multiple opportunities to talk about it, to celebrate the lives, to honor, give up, keep trying another way, another day, another, another conversation, another meal, whatever it is, until you feel like that they too have a way of expressing or sharing their thoughts and that their grief is really not on you. Because if you try to do it for them, you're really taking away something that's really important to them. Our grief is part of our life. It leaves a mark on our heart for the rest of life. It develops who we are and what we do with ourselves. If we don't allow people to grieve now, I promise you it'll come out later in some other form or fashion. So we want to, you know, just support each other through it now and.

Just know that you are very, very special to these kids. Otherwise you wouldn't be on this call. So I just want to thank you for your interest in doing the best you can for those kids that you love and care about.

And you know, Vicki, you and I were talking earlier, before we started, and I think this is important for parents to hear. I got into this work because my mother died when I was 13. There was a mass shooting. I mean, it was just a horrific, you know, thing to deal with. There's things, there's places I was willing to go at 13. There's also work, grief work I had to do in my 20s. There's grief work I had to do in my, in my 30s. I still have stuff coming up sometimes about my mother. You know, there was the milestone when I hit the age she was when she died. So no one could have made me do all that grief work with the best grief group and everything. I mean, we want to give kids support and counselors and all that resilience isn't enough. We need to give them support. But let's not have the misperception that we can turn all their grief work in early so that they don't have it for the rest of their life. I love how you say it is their journey and we have to honor their journey.

And there is support to them as well. You know, you mentioned the online support. The national alliance for Grieving Children has a website and there's a state map in every state you can click on and find grief support for kids. There's free downloadable resources and connections to others that have free downloadable resources. So you're not alone in this part of it.

I was just going to ask you for resources. Would you give us that website once more?

Absolutely. It's.

Www.Childrengrieve.Org or you can just Google the National alliance for Grieving Children. And there's free downloadables on there. There's actually a Covid talking about loss and change. There's a holiday toolkit, all free resources. And then there is a map to connect with other places, wherever you might be.

Yep, I'm looking at it right now. National alliance for Grieving Children. And the website is children grieve.org childrengrieve.org Vicki, thank you so, so much.

Thank you.

You're just amazing. Your work is amazing. You know, you're impacting generations. So thank you so much for what you're doing.

Well, thank you. And again, my heart goes out to all the people on the call today.

Thank you. So as you tune in and see us, just know I'm here every day at 1pm Pacific Time. I hope that you will check out our daily events. If you're new, we have a different guest speaker every night. Lots of questions on children. There's going to be other speakers on children. So just know it's not like this is your only chance to ask those questions. We've had many speakers on death by suicide. Many speakers are coming up about children. So just know lots of time to do your topics. We have wonderful people who are coming on to guests. I have been talking to Susie Orman, who's going to come on and help you with suggestions about finances. Tomorrow night is Diane Gillen, who's going to talk about death by suicide. Catherine Schwarzenegger is going to talk about forgiveness. Catherine Schwarzenegger Pratt is going to be talking about forgiveness. Will Reeve is going to be talking about the death of his father, amazing Superman, Christopher Reeve and his mother, Dana Reeve. So lots of people are showing up because you matter, because we care. Because as the world reopens, we're not forgetting about you. So thank you all so much. I will see you at 1pM Tomorrow and I'll look forward to it. Thanks again to Vicky for being here. I appreciate it, everyone. See you tomorrow.