Early in my career in paediatric palliative care I had the privilege of attending the International Summer Institute at the Dougy Centre in Portland USA. The amazing organisation is a grief support service for children and young people who have experienced grief as a result of the death of a loved one.
The institute was probably one of the most profound training opportunities I’ve experienced in my three decade career. The key learning I came away with, central to the philosophy of the Dougy Centre, (which I already knew but needed to be reminded of) is that children intuitively know what they need to do to process grief, what they need is safe space and time to do this work. Over the more than two decades I have the privilege of working with families who experience the profound impacts of death I have found this to be true time and time again.
The way the Dougy Centre facilitates the creation of safety and space is truly beautiful - set in a sizeable homely facility the children come together in a weekly welcome circle where they share their experiences of grief - and then then play for the duration of their session. The house includes a sand play tray, a splash room covered in plastic where paint can be thrown, a cubby house, puppets and a dolls house, a soft walled room for jumping about, a craft space … the program is open ended and children attend for as long as they feel they need to and there are groups for different kinds of loss and different developmental stages. You can check out their amazing work here For resources from the Dougy Centre see this link https://www.dougy.org
Socially I believe we make three fundamental errors when it comes to kids and grief
Children are too little to grieve or understand grief. However in the words of Dr Alan Wolfet - “any child old enough to love is old enough to mourn”. What I have found to be true is that children and young people continue to reprocess their grief as they come to new developmental milestones with new capacities to conceptualise their experience.
Kids need specialist help with their grief. Because kids tend to be more embodied than adults they process their grief physically and psychologically - they often move through huge waves of feelings and emotions and respond to these - even though at times this can feel enormous. However this is normal and healthy grief processing. Feelings are in our bodies not our minds and they need to be processed out of our bodies. Most kids don’t need significant counselling or support - they need to feel seen and understood in their experience.
We need to protect kids from grief as they can’t manage it. Disembodiment occurs when our reality is denied. For example a child says “Are you sad mummy?” And in an attempt to protect the child the mum say “No darling I am fine.” meaning the child is left questioning their intuition. Striking a balance of letting children and young people see your emotions and being able to convey that you are still okay to care for them can be difficult - and might be a space where seeking support for yourself can be helpful.
In a society which pathologizes grief that isn’t calm and contained, it can be hard to facilitate spaces where it is safe for kids to process death in their lives. We are often afraid of talking to adults about their losses, let alone children and young people. But in my experience children and young people are open to these conversations and are when given space and time able to integrate death into their lives in a way we as adults can struggle to do.
If you are supporting a child or young person who has or is going to experience the death of a loved one here’s some things that might help:
Be open and honest about your own experience of grief.
Create a place where that person can be remembered - it might be a butterfly garden, a special shelf in the house with photos and other memory items
Where possible create something special for the child or young person eg. a pillow or toy from the persons clothing, a locket with a photo, a toy with their recorded heartbeat
Remind kids that their feelings are their feelings and that it is okay for them to express them
Read books about feelings and about death and dying - there are some amazing picture books available (I’ll post a list in the comings weeks)
If you’d like to talk about your child or young persons experience of grief please contact me www.theholdingspacecounselling.com.au
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