
Every path in life is shaped by big and small farewells. We can easily cope with some losses. We quickly get used to the changed life situation that the loss has brought with it. Other losses are harder to deal with, it takes time to find your way again. The death of a loved one is a very drastic and painful experience of loss. Children often react to these in ways that we adults do not expect. Because children’s grief is expressed differently than ours, it is often not recognized as such. It is therefore important to be aware of some basic aspects of child grief.
Children show their grief more through their behavior than through verbal expressions.
Children use pictures and play to show how they feel. They do not yet have the same skills as adults to deal with grief. These prerequisites include the ability to think abstractly, the feeling for time and its flow and the ability to express yourself in a complex language.
Grief has many different faces
Children often show grief reactions that can be incomprehensible and confusing for caregivers, sometimes even triggering anger and anger. Therefore factual knowledge about grief reactions and grief processes is helpful. Because instead of punishment and rejection, children absolutely need support and understanding in this situation.
Children experience many different, intense, and often contradicting feelings. Feelings
that grieving children experience include pain, despair, love, fear, panic, longing, or gratitude. Your feelings range from cheerfulness, sometimes silliness, to anger, aggression, and deep sadness. Strong separation fears, insecurity or the inability to enter into new relationships, as well as difficulties with self-control can also occur. Children can lose the motivation to drive their own development, appear listless, uninvolved and lose their self-esteem. You can react with strong feelings such as crying, screaming, abandonment, and loneliness.
Sometimes the transition between feelings is unexpectedly quick and very abrupt. Adults believe that if the child goes from crying to play, the child is not grieving at all. However, it is precisely this that is a typical feature of grief in children. Prolonged grief reactions would overwhelm the child at this point. Statements like: »Well, if you can play again so quickly now, the sadness can’t have been so great« or: »But you just did a pretty good job there«, should therefore be avoided.
Of course, it is possible that the grief process actually ends quickly. Other reactions to loss may include stomach pain, freezing, sweating, nausea, constipation, diarrhea, trouble falling asleep, waking up at night, or motor restlessness. Children can also show reactions such as: existential worries, gnashing their teeth, biting their nails, agitation, insecurity, helplessness, overexcitement, relief, disappointment, fear of death, feelings of guilt, shame, self-reproach or exhaustion. Intense dreams are also one of the characteristic reactions to loss or change processes. They can therefore provide important information about the child’s grief work. Sometimes the loss or departure can lead the child to try to avoid certain situations or places, because these are related to the loss (e.g. no longer want to go to kindergarten because the teacher is not there). Losses can also cause listlessness to want to play with other children. Children may express a desire to give up hobbies. You react with abnormalities or a great deal of adaptation in the daycare center or school. It is quite possible that they feel responsible for relatives after the separation of their parents or during other grief processes (serious illness of a caregiver, the death of a parent, grandparent or sibling): They then take on tasks that do not suit them and / or put aside their own grief out of consideration for caregivers so as not to burden them additionally. because the teacher is not there). Losses can also cause listlessness to want to play with other children. Children may express a desire to give up hobbies. You react with abnormalities or a great deal of adaptation in the daycare center or school. It is quite possible that they feel responsible for relatives after the separation of their parents or during other grief processes (serious illness of a caregiver, the death of a parent, grandparent or sibling): They then take on tasks that do not suit them and / or put aside their own grief out of consideration for caregivers so as not to burden them additionally. because the teacher is not there). Losses can also cause listlessness to want to play with other children. Children may express a desire to give up hobbies. You react with abnormalities or a great deal of adaptation in the daycare center or school. It is quite possible that they feel responsible for relatives after the separation of their parents or during other grief processes (serious illness of a caregiver, the death of a parent, grandparent or sibling): They then take on tasks that do not suit them and / or put aside their own grief out of consideration for caregivers so as not to burden them additionally. Wanting to give up hobbies. You react with abnormalities or a great deal of adaptation in the daycare center or school. It is quite possible that they feel responsible for relatives after the separation of their parents or during other grief processes (serious illness of a caregiver, the death of a parent, grandparent or sibling): They then take on tasks that do not suit them and / or put aside their own grief out of consideration for caregivers so as not to burden them additionally. Wanting to give up hobbies. You react with abnormalities or a great deal of adaptation in the daycare center or school. It is quite possible that they feel responsible for relatives after the separation of their parents or during other grief processes (serious illness of a caregiver, the death of a parent, grandparent or sibling): They then take on tasks that do not suit them and / or put aside their own grief out of consideration for caregivers so as not to burden them additionally.
Setbacks in development
Children can react to losses with regression in development. Out of the need for security, they want to feel younger than they actually are again. As a result, they may wet again, begin to speak in baby language, or be unable to color or cut out as well as before. They want to sleep in their parents’ bed again, with the light or the door open, they also seek closer proximity to caregivers during the day, they find it harder to separate from them, they need consolation and physical contact and at the same time often seem uncomfortable or cry faster than usual. In addition, they can quickly become irritable and rejecting, even though they long for closeness and affection at the same time. All of these are signals to the social environment that children want support and help.
All of the possible grief reactions listed above make it difficult for caregivers to understand what needs children currently have and how they can best be supported. Often we have our own worries and stresses and overlook the very subtle signals that children send us. That too is part of life. Not everything is always perfect, we are not always optimally resilient and attentive. Even so, we can be very loving and caring parents. Children will feel this and that is the most important and greatest source of strength that we can give to children even in situations of loss.
If the described reactions persist over a longer period of time, you should ensure that physical causes can be ruled out from a technical point of view. Therefore, get advice and support from your pediatrician.
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