Was mum U for telling DS(7) that her young neighbour went to heaven.

[dontsaveusername]

They have a photo taken about 9 years ago of her NdN who was around 39 at the time, with her two young boys. All round about my age and my boys. DS brought the photo to DM and asked if it was me, as we recently showed him of photos of himself as a baby and he didn't recognise me.

DM said no, it was the lady next door and she went to Heaven. DS looked very sad and asked if she had died. DM and I were mortified and blundered around saying it was a long time ago and the boys were grown ups now. For info. NDN died of cancer and her boys were still quite young. DM feels awful and I am annoyed with her. We are worried he is silently worried I might die. Should I say something or just let it go. He is like an elephant and never forgets anything. Am I just worrying over nothing.

I think it is a good age to be able to talk about serious issues - whilst it is rare to die so young in Britain and hopefully your family all have long healthy lives ahead of you, introducing mortality before its personally relevant is a good thing. During his schooling there is unfortunately a likelihood that someone he knows will be bereaved and it will help his understanding, perhaps help him to be a good friend to that child.

A friend of mine died when her children were this age. At the funeral I wondered what the children thought when they were told that their mother was up in heaven looking down at them. I wouldn't have found that reassuring, the idea that she was somewhere else, not able to talk to them and not planning to come back. But children will hear this kind of talk; you can't protect them from that entirely any more than you can protect them from death. The main thing is that you are open with them, can keep up the conversation and that they do feel able to come to you with their worries. I felt better knowing that these particular children's dad had a very good relationship with them and would talk to them about what they had heard.

See I think this is really confusing.

I suspect you find many things confusing.

They might assume once a person gets ‘old’ (which in a kids mind is probably 30s lol) then they die

My children know what 'very old' means. They know humans usually live 80 years or so, and that grandad was 90 when he died, which is very old for a person. They also know animals tend to live much shorter lives, like our dog who was very old at 15, but 15 for a person is very young. It actually opened up a great conversation about different animals, so everything is a learning opportunity.

Or if you say their life ends, they might ask where they’ve gone, or ask to get a better doctor etc

I did clarify after that posts that we do and always have used the word 'died' about deceased relatives. That died means there is no coming back or doctors that can make you better, like with my parent.

It’s a big philosophical question and frankly even we don’t haveallthe answers.

Death itself isn't philosophical. What you believe happens after may be, but death itself is absolute. Whatever you believe, your loved ones are gone and not coming back to this world.

I think the cycle of life stuff etc is nice, as they say on Avatar ‘all energy is borrowed and eventually we have to give it back’

Nice is good, but again it's not covering the immediate truth of death. It's a fact that people are made of energy, and that cannot be extinguished. That doesn't mean we are still us when our brains pack in after death, we don't go live on a cloud mansion with beautiful angels and watch our relatives live out their lives for eternity. I used to hate that thought as a child, still creeps me out now even though I'm 100% atheist in my views.

I should add it's really important to answer children's questions honestly - it means there's no need to sit them down for "big talks" if you introduce concepts in normal life. My parents were matter of fact about things with me and I in turn with my (now adult) children

@BrumBoo

See I think this is really confusing.

I suspect you find many things confusing.

They might assume once a person gets ‘old’ (which in a kids mind is probably 30s lol) then they die

My children know what 'very old' means. They know humans usually live 80 years or so, and that grandad was 90 when he died, which is very old for a person. They also know animals tend to live much shorter lives, like our dog who was very old at 15, but 15 for a person is very young. It actually opened up a great conversation about different animals, so everything is a learning opportunity.

Or if you say their life ends, they might ask where they’ve gone, or ask to get a better doctor etc

I did clarify after that posts that we do and always have used the word 'died' about deceased relatives. That died means there is no coming back or doctors that can make you better, like with my parent.

It’s a big philosophical question and frankly even we don’t haveallthe answers.

Death itself isn't philosophical. What you believe happens after may be, but death itself is absolute. Whatever you believe, your loved ones are gone and not coming back to this world.

I think the cycle of life stuff etc is nice, as they say on Avatar ‘all energy is borrowed and eventually we have to give it back’

Nice is good, but again it's not covering the immediate truth of death. It's a fact that people are made of energy, and that cannot be extinguished. That doesn't mean we are still us when our brains pack in after death, we don't go live on a cloud mansion with beautiful angels and watch our relatives live out their lives for eternity. I used to hate that thought as a child, still creeps me out now even though I'm 100% atheist in my views.

I suspect you find many things confusing.

😂

Essentially until a child can understand the meaning of unconscious nothingness, forever, nothing you say will be entirely accurate.

It’s not something to obsess over, if they ask when the dead person is coming back you just say ‘they’re not’.

Maybe not the best suggestion, but as others said people have been teaching about death forever and I grew up being told about the deaths of family members and people my family knew. I do similar with my children - both when it comes up and on Días de Muertos when I make a concentrated effort to bring out the rituals around discuss our dead and use books and videos and records as a way to discuss things. We also have a playlist of songs about death including ones that were played at funerals we've been to, we've watched videos on the processes in death and how different cultures view and acknowledge death, and we've discussed dead animals we've come across which they usually want to bury.

Sometimes those deaths we discuss are the fluffy 'old ill person who fell asleep and then just stopped breathing' type. Some aren't - I was raised with the story of I think it was my mother's cousin who jumped out of a boat to save a dog in a lake, and due to his intoxication and the plantlife, he drowned. The dog walked out of the lake just fine. Also, the person she knew who died in a bar fight because he had alcohol on his jacket and it was set on fire. I don't think either of those deaths were like falling asleep. I talk to my children about the friend I had who died as a teenager in childbirth and we discuss my spouse's cousin who died as a young child when hit by a car. I think it's important to discuss the deaths of people who matter to us, even when their deaths seem pointless and painful. That's reality.

We discuss the reality of death with age appropriate language from an early age. I don't think the broken body message would help my children, especially living with 3 adults who have a disability and one of them having a visible condition. My DS1 had a best friend when he was younger who died because of his medical condition, and we've also had people in our community who've dropped dead who seemed perfectly healthy prior to death. We talk about death as it comes up and set times to work through our feelings on it down to our thoughts on funeral plans. It's not the nicest topic, but it doesn't have to be a scary topic.

I also think YABU not explaining at the time what actually happened to your NDN it was an ideal time to broach the subject of death. The question from your son may have taken your DM by surprise but it was up to you to broach the subject, as difficult and unpleasant as it is, otherwise children’s minds can work overtime imagining all sorts of scenarios.
This happened to me when I was 9 years old and my brother was killed in a tragic accident, my mother hugged me and said that he’d had an accident but failed to say that he had been killed. It wasn’t until about a week later that I realised that he had died when people were talking about the funeral arrangements etc. In the meantime I had been imagining all sorts of things and feel that it would have been better to know the truth initially. Presumably my mother had been trying to shield me but inadvertently made it worse.

Children are very matter of fact about death. MIL died 2 years ago when DD was 5, we told her that granny had got sick and died. We talked about how it was ok to be sad and to cry but that it was also important to talk about granny too. DD got upset at first but within a very short space of time she got her head around it and was very to the point in telling people that her granny was dead! Every now and then she’ll say she misses granny or that she feels sad so we talk about some of the fun things we did with granny when she was alive and that helps her.

She and DS (who was 2 at the time) both came to the funeral, there was never any question that they wouldn’t be there.

Just thank your lucky stars op that you have not had to explain to a 5 year old that his 3 year old sister died. Worst day and conversation of my life.

My friend had a much loved employee kill himself.He was well known to the children and she was very upset.Her daughter who would have been a similar age queried about what would happen if his parents died. Don't worry she told her, all families die at the same time and they all go to heaven together. A tragic death of a parent occurred at the primary school later and you can imagine the confusion.Look on the photo incident as an opportunity.

@Phillipa12

Just thank your lucky stars op that you have not had to explain to a 5 year old that his 3 year old sister died. Worst day and conversation of my life.

I think I have a deep rooted fear of dying and leaving my children, which is why I don't have a problem with older relatives dying (apart from my mum) but feel awful if a young mum dies
^
OP this is a perfectly normal fear and you shouldn't label yourself as neurotic for it. Surely every mother of young children worries about this.

I’m sorry OP but young people die. People of all ages die. Everybody dies. Nobody is immortal. Pets die. People die. You aren’t doing your son any favours by being mortified and fearful. It’s time to do some reading and grow as a person so you can parent your child through these kind of tricky topics.

You’re much more likely to traumatise him by being weird about death. He’ll get much more fixated on things if they are big uncomfortable secret topics that nobody talks about.

You have to be honest with kids about death, no point hiding it etc. My mum died last year and my son knew she was very ill and asked if she was going to get better and could my 'mummy magic' help her, I tried to keep things simple by explaining the truth about the situation to him, he was 6 at the time. He talks about nanny being in heaven with her friends and reckons she's happy there but misses us a lot. He's not frightened or scared about death. It was never a conversation I wanted to have with him so young but he surprised me and was very mature in his approach and questions he had and I answered them all as carefully and thoughtfully as I could.

Im surprised you've got to age 7 without discussing death, has your child never watched a Disney film?

My sons were 7 and 11 when my husband died.
We talk openly and honestly about it, death is part of life.
There is such an unhealthy stigma concerning death, which is very hurtful to the bereaved. My sons have said they don't feel they can talk about their dad's death to their friends, because it makes their friends feel awkward.

DM and I were mortified and blundered around saying it was a long time ago

I’m an atheist and the biggest blunder that was made, wasn’t saying NDN went to heaven but the mortification and blundering from two adults. Talk to your son! People die, it’s natural.

This is a teaching moment, the more awkward the conversation for you, the more beneficial it will be for him. This will not be last difficult conversation you will have with your son, the sooner you get used to talking to him about important topics the easier it will be for both of you, get used to it.