Children also grieve

 This boy had been excluded from a family funeral a short while before and clearly felt a real need to see what went on at these two important milestones in life.
In another case, a five- year old boy was not allowed to be at his grandfather’s funeral and ever since, whenever he hears an announcement of a funeral at church, he begs his mother to take him — to anyone’s funeral.
Questions about attending funerals
Many of us have worried about whether our children should attend the funeral service of someone they loved. Are they too young? Will it be traumatic for them?
There are no set answers, but I have come to believe that even a very young child can benefit significantly by sharing in at least some of the rituals around death if we have prepared them for what to expect and have been open to their questions.
Funerals provide a structure for the early days of grieving. They provide a time for sharing grief, and they bring a sense of closure and finality that, sooner or later, we all have to accept.  Funerals are a time for venting emotions and bringing relief, and I believe children need that relief, too.
Letting our children view an open casket may be a particular source of worry for us, but even here, it can turn out that the reality of a dead body is less frightening than a child’s fantasies about it. 
Children may startle us by wanting to see “what dead looks like.” They may even want to touch the body to see “what dead feels like”. They might want to know what is inside the hearse.
Though parents are the best judges of how their children should participate in a funeral, we all need to consider that at least some participation may be healthy for them.
Our own unique way of communicating
Each of us has a different way of expressing our thoughts and feelings with our children, different words and actions that seem to suit us. There are times, too, when we all feel inadequate.
There are no easy answers, especially when it comes to talking about death even for professionals. It can be difficult to know much about what our children are feeling. That is especially true for the younger ones who are not very verbal or the quiet, thoughtful ones who may not be so willing to share their troubles openly. 
And it is easy to misread children’s often seemingly callous responses to a death in the family. Each child in the family is different and will cope with grief in his or her own unique way as do adults.
Why talking helps
It’s natural to want to protect our children from the pain and sadness, even to the point of not wanting to tell them about a death in the family. “Our child is only two”, parents often explain. “He/she really wouldn’t understand what it is all about”.
Though the decision not to tell a child is understandable, we do have to ask whether it is really in the child’s best interest. Children are especially sensitive to the vibes in their home. They sense when something is wrong.
At a time of sadness in the family, there are so many facial cues, so many disrupted schedules, new people coming and going, lots of conversations to overhear, and a general atmosphere that clearly states something important is going on. 
Even if a young child is sent off to stay with a friend or ne-ighbor, the chances are that he/she will know that this sudden visit is because something important has happened at home.
Feeling excluded can be much harder for children than feeling sad. Being excluded can make children feel rejected and all alone, just when they need to be close to the people they love. It can also result in children misinterpreting what is going on.
Anxiety builds when children aren’t sure of what is happening. When there are unanswered questions (or even unspoken ones), children will make up their own explanations. Often, these fantasies are scarier than reality.
For example, children, as they struggle to understand the finality of death, may worry that a dead person will need food and have no way to get it.
It may well be, then, that one of the best  kinds of “protection” we can give children is to provide them with simple and clear answers to their questions and lots of opportunities for them to let us know what questions they have. It is actually because young children don’t understand what death is all about that they especially need us to talk about it with them.
Children are curious
Most children want to know what death is like.  They may know that when something is dead, it doesn’t move. But they may ask if you can see when you are dead, if you can get hungry or feel cold.
These questions may catch us off guard, but they are all part of death. It is not unusual for a child to ask the same kinds of questions again and again before the answers become real. 
This can be especially true when a child is trying to understand the finality of death. Asking the same question again and again allows children to test the answer and gradually understand.
The words we use
While the way we deal with death and talk about it is generally more important than the words we use, remember that children tend to take what we say literally. If a parent has tried to explain death by saying, “it is like sleep”, then it is not surprising that a child may assume that someone can wake up from being dead, just as they know people can wake up from being asleep.
Or if, instead of using the word “died” we say that someone has gone to sleep forever,” children may begin worrying that they may never wake up one morning.
Our words can be confusing or upsetting in other ways. What are they supposed to understand when they hear someone has “lost” a father or a daughter? Most of these terms make sense to adults but need breaking down for our children to understand.
Finding comfort
Adults and children alike can find comfort and even pleasure in memories. Times spent remembering with our children, times spent sharing the laughter and tears that those memories may bring, can be times of special closeness.
And memories reaffirm for a child — and for us — that the people we loved go on living in our minds, and that they will always be an important part of who we are now and who we grow up to be.
Next week we look at how we can help our children cope with grief.

– Philip Mataranyika is the CEO of Nyaradzo Funeral Assurance Company.
He can be contacted at mavmat67@hotmail.com