How Parents Can Help. Parents can best facilitate much of the recovery work involving a crisis.

Transcription

1 How Parents Can Help Parents can best facilitate much of the recovery work involving a crisis. The school may meet with parents in small groups and provide information on what to look for and how they can help their children. Some parents may need individual help before they are ready to help their children. The school may provide opportunities for parents to discuss in-groups, their own responses and worries. **See attached docs that may be reproduced to give/send to parents. Crisis and Children Support for Children, Adolescents and their Families: Common Behaviors of Grieving Children Strategies for Helping Adolescents Provide a Safe Environment Five Stages of Grieving Common Reactions Associated with Childhood Bereavement and How Adults Can Facilitate the Work of Mourning Developmental Stages of Understanding Death

2 Crisis and Children When people experience a crisis, family routines often are disrupted, and parents often face additional tasks and demands on their time. A crisis can affect the members of a family or of an entire community. Often, it is hard for young children to understand what has happened during times of crisis. Some children may have completely views of the situation and may need your continued guidance and understanding through the experience. How you help your own children work through their difficult times may have a lasting effect. Children can experience the same intense feelings that adults feel about a crisis. This is a normal reaction. Some children may show their feelings in a direct and immediate fashion, while others will wait until a later time. Most children will be confused by any sudden interruptions to their routines. Crisis situations are difficult for both children and adults. Each child in a family may react differently to crisis. Following a crisis, some children may: Become more active and restless. Become upset easily---crying and whining. Become afraid of loud noises, rain, storm, etc. Feel afraid at night or when alone. Behave as they did when younger. They may start sucking their thumb, wetting the bed, wanting to be held, Have symptoms of illness such as nausea, vomiting, and headaches, not wanting to eat. Be angry, they may hit, throw, kick to show their anger, often with little provocation. Be quiet or withdrawn, not wanting to talk about the experience. Refuse to go to school or childcare arrangements. The child may not want to be out of your sight. Be afraid that the crisis may recur, especially if conditions recur, e.g., rain after flood or aftershocks after earthquake. They may ask frequently, Will it come again? Not show any outward signs until weeks or months later. Ways Parents Can Help Their Children: Talking with your children, providing simple accurate information to questions. Allow them to tell their stories about what happened. Talking with your children about your own feelings. Listening to what your children say and how they say it. Repeating your children s words, recognizing fear, anxiety, insecurity is very helpful. For instance: You are afraid that or, Your wonder if the storm will come again today. This type of statement helps both you and the children clarify feelings. Reassuring your child, We are together. We care about you. We will take care of you. Responding to repeated questions. You may need to repeat information and reassurance often. Holding the child. Providing comfort. Touching is important for children during this period. Spending extra time putting your child to bed. Talk and offer assurance. Leave night light on if necessary. Observing your child at play. Listen to what is said and how the child plays. Frequently, children express feelings or fear or anger while playing with dolls, trucks or friends. Providing play experiences to relieve tension. Work with play dough, paint, play in water, and give them something safe like a pillow, ball or balloon.

3 Support for Children, Adolescents and their Families: Common Behaviors of Grieving Children REGRESSIVE BEHAVIOR Behaviors that a child has outgrown such as bed wetting or separation anxiety reappear. The PERFECT CHILD In contrast to the regressive child, this child takes on responsibilities beyond his years. INCREASED IRRITABILITY A child may begin lashing out physically or verbally at seemingly trivial incidents. BODY DISTRESS Physical complaints may increase such as stomach aches, headaches, sleeplessness, and listlessness. DIFFICULTY CONCENTRATING A child may have trouble completing tasks or had difficulty in school. REFUSAL TO TALK A child may have a tough time talking about the loved one who has died. It may be helpful for the adult to give the child time and a safe place for emotions to surface,

4 Strategies for Helping Adolescents Provide a Safe Environment Like adults, if they don t feel safe, they cannot do the necessary grief work. You can help through structure, discipline, and education. STRUCTURE and maintaining routines provide a subtle, daily sense of continuity at a time of constant change and adjustment. REASONABLE AND CARING DISCIPLINE REASSURES children and adolescents that someone is in control and will save them from serious harm. EDUCATIONS about normal grief reaction helps teens know they are not going crazy and can trust the way their body, mind, and emotions are responding. If they pull back from discussions, provide books or movies that illustrate normal grieving. ENCOURAGE THEM TO EXPRESS WHAT THE GRIEF EXPERIENCE IS LIKE Recognize and affirm that his or her experience is likely to be different from everyone else s in the family. Share your feelings. TELL STORIES ABOUT THE PERSON WHO DIES Provide them with a photo of him or her with the person. Support him or her in visiting the grave sites if that is meaningful to him. Make sure he has a memento of the person who had died something by which to stay connected. ENCOURAGE THE CHILD OR TEEN TO PARTICIPATE IN AGE- APPROPRIATE NORMAL LIFE, as he/she feels able. Grieving takes enormous energy, so the child or teen may need to slow down a bit while they work on grieving. However, it s important for them to know that you don t expect them to take on an adult role now that someone important has died. Let the child or teen know that you care, accept and support him/her just as he/she is now, with all the normal living and loving and learning he or she still has yet to do. HELPING THE GRIEVING ADOLESCENT Grieving families often feel a need to pull together for support. Since adolescence is increasingly a time for breaking away and relying on peer support, these conflicting needs can place parents and teens at odds with one another. Grieving teens feel different from their peers when they ve experienced death. In an attempt to fit in, they may try to ignore their own grief reactions. Eventually, they will surface either in healthy or unhealthy ways. Please Note: It is important to take seriously any prolonged depression or thoughts of suicide. If they persist, seek professional help for the child as soon as possible.

5 FIVE STAGES OF GRIEVING Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross 1. Denial The belief that there must be a mistake, the death cannot be real. This is reinforced by the attitude of our death denying culture. Statements: It can t be true This can t be happening to me. 2. Anger Once denial has subsided anger may be felt. The anger may be directed at any number of people (God, the deceased, doctors, family), things or events. Statements: How dare you leave me! It s your fault. You didn t do all you could have. 3. Bargaining Bargaining is an effort to stave off death, an attempt to make a trade off. Statements: If only I hadn t asked you to stop at the store, you d still be alive. I promise I ll, if you don t die. 4. Depression The physical and emotional experiences of death can take their toll and lead to a feeling of depression and hopelessness. Symptoms: Change in eating and/or sleeping habits. Withdrawal, Crying. Ambivalence, agitation, mood swings. 5. Acceptance This is a contemplative phase. Once the business of the other stages is dealt with, the individual can recall good memories about the deceased and talk about him or her without crying. Not all individuals experience all these stages of grieving. There is not set order. Stages may be passed through several times. The stages are meant to be indicators of how individuals may deal with their grief. No two people grieve in the same way. Adapted by Barry L. Turner, Crisis Consultant.

6 Common Reactions Associated with Childhood Bereavement and How Adults Can Facilitate the Work of Mourning Grief Reaction Shock and Numbness. This often serves as a cushion against the full impact of a tragedy as children may not be able to intellectually or emotionally process the information about the death. Some youngsters may laugh Inappropriately upon hearing the news. Denial. Blatant denial that the event took place is not an unusual reaction, especially among younger children. Sadness. Children may appear sad and tearful. This is a normal response to loss. Anger. Anger may be expressed at the deceased Or at the event: Why did this happen to me? Anger might also be displaced onto adults in the environment: How could they let this happen? Anxiety. If a parent has died, a young child may experience fears of abandonment, expressed by worries about who will take care of them now. There also may be worries about the death of the remaining parent. If a peer or sibling dies, there scheduled meal may be fear about their own safety, that the Death Ghost will snatch them away, too. There anxieties may be manifest in regressive behavior, e.g., bedwetting, thumb sucking, fear of the dark. Older children may develop a foreshortened sense of their own future, and this anxiety may be exhibited in risk-taking behaviors and drug and alcohol abuse. Adult Response Provide an atmosphere which encourages the open expression of all initial reactions to the event, even the unusual ones such as laughing as a way of reacting to fear. Communicate all the facts in a clear, concise way and avoid a power struggle about the truth. Children often accept tragic facts in a gradual way, and over time, they ask repetitive questions about the event as a way to understand and gradually accept what happened. Don t get unduly concerned if denial seems to wax and wane; for children, who have immature egos, approaching and avoiding the truth is one of the ways they come to terms with painful realities. Encourage them to talk about these feeling and validate them as appropriate. Initiate conversations about the deceased. This ventilation can be facilitated through the use of artwork, collages and the use of journals for older children. Accept the anger and allow children to express it. It may be helpful to encourage physical activities like athletic sports as a way to release the tension generated by angry feelings. Reassure children that arrangements have made for their caretaking within the extended family system, even though it is very unlikely that something will happen to the remaining parent. Encourage children to resume routine activities such as and bed times, school attendance, and play rituals as soon as possible, since both the structure and the routine of the familiar will bring a sense of order and control to the chaos they are experiencing. Also encourage their taking part in rituals for the deceased, which will provide them with mutual sharing and support of others.

7 Grief Reaction Shame. Unlike most adults, children do not want to be seen as grieving, something that makes them different from their peers. Guilt. As a result of magical thinking, young children may worry that they were the cause of the tragedy: Did my bad behavior make this happen? ; If I had loved my brother more, he d still be alive today! Older children may worry about negative encounters they had with the deceased prior to the death. There may also be guilt related to the fact that the child does not feel he/she is as sad as the rest of the family about the loss. Adult Response Encourage normal peer activities as soon as possible can help children see that, despite their loss, they can still be the same with their friends. Recreational activities also provide them with relief from their grief and sadness, which is also very healthy. Actually, friends and peer group activities are the best medicine for younger children. Help children see that the causative factors were not related to their behavior; that no matter what we think or feel, we don t have power over another person s death. Reiterate that every relationship includes negative as well as positive feelings but again, our feelings cannot cause another s death. Also clearly give permission to children to go on enjoying life and living. Because their expression of sadness and loss may be different from yours does not mean there grieving is any less meaningful. Physical Problems. Frequent illnesses and somatic complaints are common reactions in children during the process of grieving. Create an atmosphere where children have permission to verbalize their physical concerns. For example, tolerate frequent visits to the school nurse if necessary. It may also be helpful to point out how we use our bodies sometimes to express feelings that are difficult to put into words. Academic Performance Problems. Confusion, difficulty in concentration, memory lapses, and preoccupation with thoughts of the deceased are common and these may interfere with academic work. Provide additional help or tutoring for children of all ages. Older children may benefit from temporary reduction of their academic load.

8 Developmental Stages of Understanding Death This is a general guideline in reference to the differences between ages and stages of how children perceive and understand death. Of course, maturity and differences in cognitive development will mean that some children are in a stage ahead or behind their chronological age. Remember that this is just a guideline! UNDER 3 (preverbal) -no language to attach to thoughts/experience---greatest need is for immediate bonding to new support. AGES 3 6 (magical thinking) -may believe s/he caused the death by magic -associate death w/concurrent events/places. (G ma died in hospital, so everyone who goes into the hospital will die there.) -experience grief in heavy but brief spurts. -denies death as final process (Mom will come back for my birthday). -often forgets person has died. -fears loss and abandonment by remaining parent. -usually have few fears about pain/distress for the deceased. -may not be open to reason or fact about cause of death at this age they often determine facts for themselves. -see death as caused by external forces (retaliation, strife). AGES 6 9 (concrete reasoning) -tend to personify death (death dropper, angel of death). -superstitious, lots of ghost stories (chants, oaths). -associate death w/non-movement (the dead can t talk, move, walk). -begin to explore concepts of death relative to family ( Some day my mom will die. ) -may experience sadness in anticipation of deaths which are not rationally imminent. -believe it will happen to others, not themselves. -are moving away from magical thinking toward grasping concepts of finality and irreversibility. -around 6, may have fascination w/death, killing. -around 8, may have morbid fascination w/death rituals, also dreams of death and resurrection. -materials facts around death may seem funny. AGES 9 12 (abstract thinking) -more realistic sense of death often pervasive fear of it. -feel death is sudden and unpredictable, fear of painful death, poisoning, falling. -begin to realize universality of dealt inanimate suspension. -fascination with the physiology want to view body, ask intrusive or insensitive questions. ADOLESCENCE -grow increasingly closer to adult views experiences. -can begin too philosophical in viewing death. -may idealize the deceased, especially if a friend, sibling or parent. -may experience conflict of needing to be growing independent (appropriate for developmental stage) while needing family support during crisis/grief. -greatest fears are of separation and non-existence.