What do you tell your lo's about family members how have died?

[Medowflowers]

I dont mean how they died, I mean -

DS - Where is your daddy, mummy?
Me - Erm errerm
Oh

Erm

well.

My daddy is an angel

ds - an angel?
Me - Yes, am angel.( Thinking ffs, ????not the best answer - but didnt want to do the die/dead thing just yet.)

What does everyone else do?

dd asked about my grandfather when she was just 4.

dd: where is Mamie's daddy? Did he die?

me: yes, he did.

dd: why?

me: um, er, because he was quite old, and smoked a lot of cigarettes and didn't look after himself

dd: did he eat too much cake?

etc.

She kept asking, repeatedly, about people dying until I told her firmly one day that Mummy and Daddy didn't plan on dying for a very long time, and that did it. She was just feeling worried about people leaving her, more than about death itself, IYSWIM.

And where they went, or how they died, really wasn't her interest at that point...I am told that 4 yr olds go through a 'death interest' phase, but its not really to do with death so too much info isn't necessarily a good idea.

And of course, I learnt all that via MN