When your child asks you about dying what do you say??

[Narketta]

I have known that this question would come at some point and have dreaded it.

I have never dealt with death well as I lost my brother to SID when I was 4 and I remember it like it was yesterday.

I remember being petrified of going to sleep incase I didn't wake up. And still to this day if I think about death i'm terrified.

So today my 4.9yr old DS has come home from school very withdrawn and tearful and when I asked him why he said that a little girl had told him that when you are a grandad you die.
He asked me if me and his dad are going to die:(.

I have told him that yes one day when we are very old we will but by then he will be a grown up with a family of his own, so he then says but I don't want to grow up mummy I want to live here with you and daddy and my sister and then he burst into tears and said how many more holidays will we have before you die mummy? I just gave him a big hug so that he couldn't see my tears and told him we would have loads of holidays and he wasn't to worry. :(

I put a film on and made some popcorn and he was ok for a bit but when I took him to bed he was asking questions again. I'm so worried that he lay in bed scared how I used to at the same age as him.

I know all children eventually have to deal with death but it's so horrible isn't it?

My DDs aren't old enough yet so I haven't had this problem yet but I did deal with losing a parent when I was a little older than your DS.

Your post made me cry, it would break my heart to hear my DD ask me those questions so it made me think about how I would answer them.

My instinct would be to try to be as honest as you can be with him in at a level he can understand. Do you believe in God? Maybe talk about heaven?? (not that that will help us when we need to explain it, we're atheists)
I think when I was a kid I appreciated being told the truth when I asked about things, nothing fanciful tales made up to spare my feelings (the kind where the dog didn't died, it went to live on a farm and is very happy...), but everything was done at my level.

I hope your DS feels ok tomorrow, death is a very big, scary part of life and as we both know, understanding it at your sons age is really hard.

Sorry to not be of an use, hopefully someone more experienced will be on to help.

One of my DSs went through this badly. He found it hard to sleep and I had to cuddle and comfort him a lot. He had to have story tapes and music on to distract him after lights out to get to sleep, so you have all my sympathy.

I was worried that something could happen to one of us unexpectedly (accidents and illness can happen after all) and then he would feel I had lied to him if I tried to comfort him by saying I would always be there. So, I told him that I could not absolutely promise, but the chance that Daddy and I would die soon was very, very, very small. I said, the most important thing was for him to think about how he felt when he was at Nursery or school. When he was there he could not see me but could still feel happy and know how much I loved him. I explained that people may die but the love goes on forever and they are still with you in your heart.

Years later and I now know that I was telling him the truth. My parents have been dead for years now but the love and support they gave me is just as much alive as when I just could not see them because they were at their house a few miles away.

I was lucky because I was brought up in a churchgoing family. Even though I was not sure of my own faith, I think tbh that was part of the reason why I started going to church again when DS1 and DS2 were little. When my mother died two years later I could tell them that she was with the angels in heaven. I had the comfort of knowing that she, at least, believed that was true.

It is hard for most people to deal with, let alone with a small child. Good luck and I hope he will be carefree again soon.

Pets are a great way to get children used to death. Small rodents such as hamsters only last a couple of years.

My 5 year old seems almost obsessed with this topic and asks me all the time, "Will you die? Will I die? Will my brother die?" The only response I can give which doesn't provoke near hysteria from him is, "No" I'm really torn - I don't want to lie to him but he gets so upset/stressed if I even hint that life doesn't go on for ever.

My son asks hes 5yrs. I think its one of those horrible things that you as a child become obsessed with at some point. It is upsetting to talk about. I have told my son that we dont know when its going to happen and to enjoy each day as much as you can have fun! I told him that hopefuly mummy will be old when she passes away. Its a hard subject Im waiting for the so how did the baby get in your belly!? But at least that one is funny!!

" yes boy, one day I / daddy will die, We don't know when it will be but most people live to be quite old before they die and that is a long time from now. "
" shall we go and get on with XY or Z. "
get this question quite a bit. boy is 4.6 .

Also get the what happens when you are dead question and they how do people die question, He seems to be fine with quite matter of fact answers about bodies not working any-more or being to broken to be mended...Occasionally asks why Jesus came alive again and if other people can come alive again... Also interested in why/ how we remember dead people. so lots of questions around remembrance day coming up I expect.

Try reading "Goodbye Mog" by Judith Kerr as an introduction. Read it with my 2.6 yr old as pet died and it is a useful reference point. Not too close for comfort but handles the idea in a really sensitive way. Then you can refer to adults (emphasising very very old age) with reference to story.

I have a 4yr old DS and he has asked the same sort of question - I handled it pretty much as you did, explained that everything that is alive will die one day, but that I and his dad won't die until we are very old. I am an atheist so wouldn't feel comfortable about discussing an afterlife.

I say that we all die, all life has a cycle, and what we can do is try our best not to die until it's our time.
Eating healthily, exercising, keeping clean, keeping safe etc.

It's very common for them to start coming out with these questions around age 4/5/6, and some of the books like Goodbye Mog or Badger's Parting Gifts can be helpful. Or you take the biology route and look at animals, plants, insects etc and explain life cycles.

It is OK to reassure them that most adults don't die until they are really old or very ill, but unfortunately many children do have to deal with the reality that younger people do die. My DCs lost their father when they were aged 8 and 3 (he was 41), and although losing a parent is (luckily) unusual these days, many children will have friends who lose parents, siblings, or other relatives while still at primary school. Early deaths are also all over the news when they get to the stage where they can read newspaper headlines or listen to TV and radio news.

So I think it's not a good idea to box yourself into a corner by saying that only really old people die, because they may very well come back to you a few days later and say, 'what about X?' Better just to say that most people live till they are old, and everyone does their best to stay healthy/be careful in dangerous places and so on.

Another good book is 'Waterbugs and Dragonflies - explaining death to young children' by Doris Stickney. It does have a christian ethos to it - so perhaps not for everyone.

The Lion King is a good film in terms of dealing with death and showing how life does move on.

I began with a dead rat in the garden...DDwas and fascinated with it...I told her that it had either gone to heaven or that it had left it's body behind and it's "spirit" or the part of it which mae it the speacial rat it was, had moved on and one to be a new kind of annimal!

No good if you're an Athist or don't believe in reincarnation...but I did feel that "heaven" is such a vague concept to a 5 year old even though her school is a Christian one...so I gave her a second option...one which makes life seem to go on.

She seems comfortable with it all now...she did mention that she had heard at school that old people die...and I told her they didnt mind because they were tired and anted to see their friend in heaven.

A great book dealng with death is Mogs Bad Thing

Just lovely and no grimness at all!