Reply to 7 year old attending a funeral ok?

Forum Index » Elementary School-Aged Kids

Reply to "7 year old attending a funeral ok?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]OP, I am glad that this thread is giving you usable ideas.

I will add that as a child, I was not taken to funerals--even of relatives who had died expected deaths of very old age, which in our family tend to be dramatically less emotive events (in fact, while obviously people are sad, the predominant reaction on display is typically a very rational "this person was suffering greatly and we are glad for them that they no longer are").

The reason I was not taken to funerals was because when my mother was a child, she was taken to the funeral of a beloved grandparent and was extremely upset to find that it functioned as a kind of family reunion. She found it bizarre that people were standing around talking normally with a dead body (of someone she really loved!) in a box on display in the room.

Obviously a viewing is not a part of every funeral or every culture, but it really bothered her, and she fully expected that it would really bother me.

I have been to tens and tens of funerals. The first was actually for a teacher who died of a heart attack in our school when I was about 13--so it was an event I attended together with peers. Despite the death being unexpected, untimely and the loss of someone extremely important to us in a very day-to-day way, it was a dramatically more tolerable and comforting event than anything my relatives have ever put together.

I didn't miss anything about how to grieve or acknowledge death by not being taken to funerals of relatives as a child. I don't think there's a clear right or wrong answer here except what works for you as the adults. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics