Realizing Death

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So I decided to wait to post something after Thanksgiving, simply because enjoying family time with loved ones is better than being stuck behind a computer.

But this Thanksgiving, I received some really bad news, two people that weren't related to me by blood, but were still considered family, had passed away. I will be honest, it still hurts, because they were so close to my family, yet I strangely find comfort that they passed with no pain, and they were at peace.

Being able to mourn the loss was hard in itself, but trying to tell my 6 year old daughter, Akina, who was in as many tears as I was....was devastating. Akina was in the body wrenching tears like myself, and I, being a mother of two, never really had to deal with death but a couple of other times.

In a way, it was easier to tell her that my mother in laws dog was sick, and had to be put down. Simply because she had been around Peanut, (the dog), since before she was born. Peanut had cancer and was very sick, so the family opted to have him put down, because he was suffering and could not eat due to the mass that was the size of a tangerine in his mouth.

At first, I shied away from giving too much details, but it was brought to my attention that instead of just saying Peanut was sick, I had to explain to a devastated Akina, that Peanut was sick and had to go be an angel. Akina didn't know the two people that I knew that passed away, yet she is sharing my pain, my tears, and is asking why they had to go to heaven. Again, I wandered how to explain to her, why they were no longer with us.

As I calmed down long enough to have a steady voice, I explained to her that God wanted them to be angels that day, and they went to be angels with God. Now trying to explain that to her, brought even more question from her lips, "why" and "how" were the questions that were asked.

Like I said, I had dealt with death a few other times, my paternal grandfather passed away in February of 1992, my paternal grandmothers' brother in law passed away when I was a young girl, I remember the funeral, and crying, but also not knowing why, or what really was going on. My paternal grandmothers' brother passed away a few years ago, but I don't remember it hurting as much, simply because I didn't know him that well. Then within the last few years, a lot of the people that I grew up knowing at my grandmothers church where I pretty much grew up in, have passed away, and yes it is sad, but again, it didn't hurt as bad as much as these two people. At first, the more I talked about it that way, I thought, is it normal to be like that, where you pick and choose who to mourn based on how long or how much you have known them?

Death affects us all in different ways, whether it be directly or indirectly. We are born, we live our lives in tragedy, chaos, happiness, and love. Then we grow older every year, and finally we die. Like the Lion King movie (1994 version), taught us, it is the circle of life.

The website https://hellogiggles.com/lifestyle/20-life-lessons-learned-lion-king-20th-birthday/ explains 20 of the life lessons we have learned from the lion king, from unexpected loss to betrayal. Number 16, on the list "the loss of a parent is earth shattering regardless of your age." Now granite one of the people that passed wasn't a parent, he was more like a stand in grandfather to me. But the section goes on to explain that nothing can prepare you to deal with this kind of tragedy. I 100% agree. Nothing can prepare us for the death of a loved one, regardless if they are blood related or not.

I also read on the website https://www.babycenter.com/0_how-to-talk-to-your-kindergartner-about-death_67095.bc on how to explain to your kindergartner, or in my case my first grader, about death. Honestly, it helped a lot in the following days after she learned Peanut had passed and the two other people had passed. The article explains that children are aware of death from an early age, that they hear about it in fairy tales and see it in movies and shows, and may have experienced in within the family or a pet. It also states that the child may regress, become clingy, and suddenly losses interest in going to school. That is because they are trying to process why us, adults are so sad, and that the world is different that what they thought it was. The article also goes on to say that not all children are like that, and that they don't process the grief all at once. The main theme of the article explains how to talk to your child about death, and how to let them fully grasp it.

The moral of this post is that life is never easy, and when it affects your child the same way as you, the adult, it is never easy to talk about some subjects that you know more about. Many of us parents tend to know how to dodge or sugar coat things because of the fact they are too little to understand something like death. It is never easy, but with the help of loved ones, and support from other mom and dads, it can be easy to gracefully and cautiously help your child understand things they are not old enough to understand.