Children's Grief Awareness Month

November is Children’s Grief Awareness Month. While it seems like every month is some type of awareness month, this one is close to my heart because I have parented children who are grieving, and I have seen the fruits of allowing them to grieve in their own, personal way.  I love this quote from Dr. Alan Wolfelt,

“The bereaved child must be allowed and encouraged to embrace the wide range of thoughts and feelings that result from the death. Caring adults often want to protect a child by avoiding talk about the death, but children need to know that it is okay to experience and express their feelings of grief. In addition, children need the security of being nurtured and knowing that their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs will continue to be met despite major changes.”

As a mom, my most guttural instinct is to try and protect my children. I only want good things for them. I don’t love watching my children feel pain or struggle. I want to protect them from all the things… but the reality is I can’t… and I shouldn’t. I could go a hundred different directions with this, but I’m going to focus on grief. What a surprise. I cannot protect them from the emotions and thoughts that come with grief. I can model and allow them the gift of mourning; their grief being processed outwardly.

My three children have experienced significant deaths in the first years of their hopefully long lives. Three of the four prominent adults who were present in their everyday lives as children have died. There is no way I could protect them from any of the pain that came with each death. After the death of their dad, I learned very quickly they were watching me, trying to understand this whole grief thing. Children model what they see. If all I showed them was a “strong face” they would reciprocate with their own version of a mask of strength. When I cried, or needed time to write, or needed to engage in ritual mourning, and I shared that with them, it gave them permission to do the same. Their grief and mourning were unique, they didn’t need exactly what I did to authentically mourn, but they needed permission to find their way.

Loving, supportive adults who give permission to young people to grieve and mourn, allowing integration of the reality of life after a death into the child or teen’s personal mosaic, are lifelines of hope and healing. This means not trying to fix it. This means letting the child feel the feelings and think the thoughts of grief AND express them in their unique way in authentic mourning.

Children and adolescents need to know supportive and loving adults will remain present, even when their grief and mourning have seemingly ugly sides. When the grief on the inside pushes its way to the outside, this is mourning. Grief needs to get out, or it stays stuck and wreaks havoc. Model letting that grief out. Allow for unique processing and love them through it by walking with them.