Reply to How do you explain death to your 3 year old?

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[quote=Anonymous]I explained to DD that all living things die and that is a part of life. And that they after things die they live on in our hearts and memories and we can remember them. It upset her and she cried about mommy and daddy dying one day and I said that most people don’t die until they are old and have lived a long life so she didn’t need to worry about that, and that even if mommy dies she would always be with you forever in your heart and that mommy’s love is forever and forever. And that it’s sad when people the and animals and things we love die and it’s okay to feel sad. Then I got copies of the book the InVisible String and Badger’s parting gift and we read them and talked about what was in the stories. She asked me what happens after we die and I explained how people’s bodies don’t work anymore and what made them special is gone (their soul) so their bodies are buried in cemeteries and then we can go there and bring flowers and remember them and talk about happy memories and visit their graves. She asked again what happened (I think not understanding the soul piece) so I told her different people believe different things and some people believe your soul, or the special things that make you you, goes to a special place called heaven.

This is a hard topic because you have to balance between being matter of fact with kids while also not stoking fears. But the reality is that death is a part of life and it’s better to get kids aware of the reality when they start asking questions instead of obfuscating the truth. My own parents hid death from me and refused to take me to funerals of family members and even a young friend who died when I was old enough to go. I get that they were trying to shield me but It ended up giving me a pretty big fear of death because it was not treated as a normal part of living but something we couldn’t talk about or experience and was left to the realm of adults. So I’m trying to normalize it more with our kids and after a few weeks of fascination our DD has moved on and stopped talking and asking questions about it. [/quote]

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