6 year old always talking about dying and killing......

[cheatedon]

My oldest DS has just turned 6, he is a great kid, he's friendly, shy, polite, finds it quite difficult to express his feelings and tends to build up to the odd explosion! Anyway, he has always been a bit fascinated with death, always has seemed very aware of 'life' from an early age (about 2). He would say things like "granny will die first because shes the oldest, then you, then I'll get old and die too". I have always been quite matter of fact about it, saying things like, "yes, most people die when they are very old, I believe they go and live in Heaven" etc, he says he will go to heaven. Anyway really not given it too much attention, thought it was a phase, and it does seem to come and go. But recently it has come up again. He seems to talk about dying, "I'm going to kill you" and "you want me to die" over minor things like not allowing chocolate before tea sort of thing .
I am getting a bit stuck on how to approach it now. I have tried calmly saying "it isn't nice to say those things to people" and a period of sending him to time out if he says it, and completely ignoring it. I have also tried to talk to him about what worries him about death and then suggest he "puts in a box marked 'something i don't need to worry about for a long long time' " and then if he feels the box is opening to talk to us about it.
He has never experienced a death in his life. I have recently separated from my husband but we are living in the same house at the moment, there are no arguments and things are pretty settled until my x moves out....I want to know how I can help him or if anyone has any experience of this, especially important at the moment as we have an impending life change with the separation. How worried should I be?
Thank you for reading~sorry it's long!

My DD (8) has always worried about dying; more specifically us dying before her. She's a worrier though.
DS (5) on the other hand is really intrigued by the whole 'death' thing and quite frequently tells me "I'm going to kill you", "you want to kill me" and "we're all going to die one day aren't we mummy?". The times when he tells me he's going to kill me, freaks me out a bit but I'm sure it's a phase and won't last long. Plus, the tv programmes they watch (Ben 10, Power Rangers-well I don't him watch Power Rangers) and other stuff such as Horrid Henry etc, sometimes mentions killing/dying etc so your DS has probbaly picked it up from there or the playground, realised it upsets you a bit and does it more. Just carry on kind of ignoring it mostly and I bet it'll stop.

Thanks lucie, just have been ignoring it really...glad to know he's not the only one!! My friends just go and haven't had any experience of it from their kids. It's just a (very long) phase he hasn't seemed to got out of!! I guess the saving grace is that the rest of the time he is happy, socialable and acts appropriately. Just a bit diturbing when he says he thinks I hate him and want to kill him,or he wants to kill me or usually his little brother . I am worried he is having these thoughts at all....He does have a vivid imagination, so maybe he's just testing my reactions. Just get stuck on whether to say "enough is enough" or let it go iyswim. Thoughts like these in an adult would warrant investigation for depression/mental illness etc...????
Am I just doing a drama queen thing...

I've no advice but I'm glad my ds is not the only one. He's 5 and often says he is going to kill me if things don't go his way. I asked him how he intends to kill me and he said he was going to chop me with an axe

Ohhhhh axe chopping....my ds hasn't thought of that particular way of killing me, usually I am shot in the head or my neck is cut.... nice one....
I'm really sure Ben 10 doesn't advocate killing, so really not sure where picks up these lovely sources of information on "how to kill your Mummy".....maybe I should google it
I am a nice Mummy too, don't do smacking etc....Blimey I am actually trying to justify why he shouldn't kill me...

Anyway he is home from schooll running around shouting "you are going to die" mainly to his brother and "I'm going to die" for the last couple of hours....yawn

calm

cheatdon - No, I didn't mean Ben 10 advocates killing - however, my DS translate the whole meaning of the programme to killing the baddies, like "Four Arms is going to kill you" etc - he role plays all the ben characters etc.
My DS says he's going to strangle me to kill me. I did say to DH last week that I wondered if a child this young saying these things warranted concern but he said don't be daft.

I think kids are naturally curious about death as it's such an abstract concept for them to understand. He's probably just trying to process the idea.

Thank you, I know you what you mean about Ben 10 lucie...I just meant I didn't think it gave ideas about how to kill~ thats all, but I know what you mean! They do mention killing a lot.
Thanks cornsilk, I think he is just curious, but just goes on and on about it all the time, and he is an anxious child.
I will just have to wait and see I guess. Thanks for all the replies, I'm glad I'm not the only one!!

Hello!
I know many years went by already. My son is now 6 years old and I’m going through exactly the same. I don’t know what to do or who to talk about this. How did everything end it up? Thanks!!

This is a zombie thread but my 7 year old DS has been doing this for a year to the point where it now just totally washes over me. All the “that’s not very nice DS” talk makes not a jot of difference. I usually just either ignore it or go with it depending on the circumstances eg “oh that’s interesting DS” or occasionally “ooh, how are you going to kill me” as per me of the PPs and usually get an answer of “chop your head off with a knife” or “nice karate chop in the tummy” or some such lovely response that makes me think, well I didn’t expect this when I decided to become a mum!

It does seem to be tailing off a bit, thank goodness. I think it’s a phase, I think it comes from the playground and/or minecraft where you can bash zombies with an axe, and I really don’t think any of this results in these little boys turning into serial killers. It’s just bloody annoying at times.

That said I was a bit concerned with the “my life is terrible, I want to kill myself, go and get a knife” talk which tends to occur when tragedy strikes I.e. he has not been allowed extra iPad time or some such, and I did talk to a child psychologist about it. She said:

• child is likely to be expressing a feeling - eg it’s not that they want to die, because they have no idea what that means - it’s that they don’t like the way this moment feels and they want it to end. And not they want you do die, obviously, but they are angry at you in that moment and don’t know how else to express. (Or they just think it’s funny and do more of it based on your reaction!).

• there are times to ignore, and times to tell him to stop it, and times to gently explore what’s behind it. No one size fits all solution for every occasion. Don’t blame yourself for not knowing what to do every time, it is something that most parents don’t exactly expect to hear from their kid.

• trust your instinct - Is he generally a happy boy? School ok? Reasonably well-adjusted? Does it come up at specific times (DS tends to do this when very tired). Or is there an undercurrent is something that isn’t right / isn’t making him happy?

• try to go for connection rather than correction wherever possible (judging each moment separately, exploring what’s going on, have a curious attitude rather than “don’t do that”). That said you can’t be a saint and sometimes it is absolutely fine to say “oh just knock it off DS, that’s enough” bearing in mind that this may just encourage more of it!

Oh my goodness, I found this thread when Googling a similar question and I have got to say, the humor really cheered me up. My husband and I were absolutely rolling laughing at the “Usually I get shot in the head or my neck is cut… nice.” For such a dark topic we really enjoyed the humor.