Tough Topics: Talking to Kids about Death

Little Feet Community

How do we talk to kids about death? Unfortunately death is inevitable and when a pet or a grandparent dies your child will have questions. To answer these questions Patty O’Connor spoke to David J Schonfeld, MD, FAAP. Schonfeld established and directs the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement, located at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles For over 30 years, Dr. Schonfeld has provided consultation and training to schools on supporting students and staff at times of crisis and loss in the aftermath of numerous school crisis events and disasters within the United States and abroad. Schonfeld is also a Professor of Clinical Pediatrics at Keck School of Medicine.

Key Takeaways:

Don’t wait for the “right” moment to discuss death with a child. Do discuss death when an opportunity presents itself organically. If/when the moment presents itself (a pet dies or a child raises a question related to mortality), talk about it then.

Do use words like “death” or “dead”. Don’t confuse children by saying that the dead person or creature is “sleeping.”

When talking about death with kids:

• Use repetitive language
• Use short sentence structure

Four KEY concepts that kids need to understand:

1. Finality. Death is irreversible.
2. Bodies stop. All life functions stop. (This way, a child won’t worry about the dead person being hungry or cold in the coffin.)
3. Causality. Children need to understand why people die, which ties into the 4th concept:
4. Inevitability - all living things must die.

Above all:

Know this: It’s okay to tell kids if you don’t have all the answers and it's okay to get emotional when talking about death.