The most terrible thing in the life of any person is the loss of people close to him, their death. They always leave unexpectedly, and it is impossible to be prepared for this. It is especially difficult when such grief as the death of a father or husband falls upon a family. Then the woman is left alone with the children.
There are no people who can just let go of someone from their loved ones, family members or friends. Death is always human suffering, tears and psychological experiences in the form of depression and other things. If adults can still, after a while, accept the loss, then this is not easy for children. This article will discuss how to survive the death of a father to a child, how to help him with this.
It can't be! I don't believe it
When the news of the sudden death of a father is reported to his relatives, the first thing they feel is a rejection of the current situation, it seems to them that this is just a dream, not a reality, that this could not happen to them.
Denial is a protective reaction of a person, so he may not experience any emotions, not cry, because he is not aware of what is happening. To himit will take some time to come to his senses and accept the departure of his father. If adults first of all deny the fact of what happened, then they do not always know what is going on in the soul of a child. Therefore, it is very important to help him not withdraw into himself, and not get psychological trauma that will haunt him throughout his life.
The death of a father for a child
If adults are told bad news directly, then not many people know how to explain to children that dad will never come home again, and most importantly, how to console them. More on this later. After the death of the father, the child may behave differently. It is not always possible to understand what he feels. Some children start crying, others ask a lot of questions, because they don’t know how dad will no longer be with him, it also happens that they don’t say anything, and all emotions are shown in behavior.
You can suspect something is wrong with sudden and unreasonable changes in the child's mood, if just now he was passionate about the game and seemed calm, then after a couple of minutes he bursts into tears. Children experience loss for a very long time, so their behavior is impossible to predict.
As soon as a child learns about the death of his father, it is very important not to leave him alone, to pay as much attention and care as possible. Young children must understand that, having lost their father, they still have their mother. It is she who will protect and love them. He must feel it all the time that there is one of his parents next to him.
Mother after the death of the father must show how much she loves her child,and that he should not be afraid of his tears at the loss. She will have to prepare for the fact that the children will begin to shower her with questions about the grief that has fallen. A woman will have to be patient and answer the child, even the most difficult, ridiculous and painful ones. Such curiosity is not associated with indifference, but rather helps the son or daughter understand what happened and accept it. Therefore, the conversation must take place without fail, and you should not leave or postpone it.
Aggression after death
If, after the death of his father, the son stopped listening to his mother, behaves badly, shows aggression, then she will have to be patient. But in no case do not scold him. You can try to talk to him calmly.
It is important to understand that, having learned about death, the child himself begins to be afraid of dying or being left without a second parent, hence his aggressive behavior manifests itself. Here it is very important to talk to him, find out his fears, and calm him down as gently as possible.
In the event that, in addition to aggression, there is also a deterioration in he alth or deviations in normal behavior during the day, for example, the child began to get tired quickly, stopped eating, abandoned his favorite toys, skipped school, then this is a serious reason to turn to child psychologist for advice. You shouldn't put off going to the doctor.
Sometimes a child may blame himself for the death of his father, because he once said something bad to him, like “I don’t love you” or “I wish I had a different father” or similar phrases. In addition, children can understand the departure of one of the parents as their punishment for not doingtheir requests, did not respond to comments, etc.
The child may feel guilty even because he cannot understand his own emotions. Therefore, it is necessary to talk with children about their experiences and try to explain to them what this means and why it happened. It is worth holding conversations immediately after the funeral and after a month or two to make sure that he is able to survive the absence of one parent.
What to do? How to help a child?
It is important to closely monitor your child, because for the next six months, a child after the death of his father may behave abnormally, because the experiences have passed into the pathological stage. This can be confirmed by the presence of symptoms that do not go away for a long time. You should be wary if the child does not express any emotions for a long time, or, on the contrary, demonstrates them too clearly. Another sign is the refusal to go to school, or good grades have changed to bad. The appearance of anger, tantrums, screams, fears and phobias is a good reason to go to a psychologist to treat the pathological stage of a child's suffering for the loss of his father.
If children do not want to talk about dad or cannot, lose interest in life, withdraw into themselves, do not even communicate with friends, then urgent medical help is needed.
The death of a father can drive a child into a long-term depression, he feels lonely, abandoned. Having experienced such a loss in childhood, in the future it may affect the lives of children, their professional activities and personality as a whole.
If the child perceived the father also asfriend, was proud of him, tried to imitate, then for him it would be a double blow and the loss of life guidelines, there was no one to equal.
Cause and day of dad's death
The cause of dad's death matters a lot. When nothing foreshadowed his loss, he was not sick, then this is the hardest thing for the family, because the blow of fate happened unexpectedly. If a man commits suicide, then his loved ones will blame themselves for everything and wonder why he did this to them.
A big imprint on the mind of a child leaves the fact that he witnessed death. The psyche suffers greatly from what he sees and one cannot do without a doctor, because he will constantly scroll this moment in his memory or see it in a dream, and wait for the day of his father's death with fear. How difficult it will be for a child to cope with the loss of a dad depends largely on his age, character, and whether he has previously lost relatives or not.
How does a child under the age of five deal with grief?
How does age affect the perception of the loss of a father? How a child will accept the loss depends on his age. How do kids, schoolchildren and teenagers experience grief? A child under 2 years old is not able to realize that there has been an irretrievable loss of one of the parents. But he may feel that his mother is in a bad mood, and other residents of the apartment do not smile at him as before. Feeling this, the baby often begins to cry, scream and eat poorly. Physically, this can manifest itself as bad stools and frequent urination.
A child at the age of 2 realizes that parents can be called if they are not around. The concept of death for him at this age is not conscious. But the fact that he calls dad, but he does not come, can give him great anxiety. Mom should surround the baby with love and care, as well as provide him with proper nutrition and good sleep, then it will be easier for him to cope with the loss.
Children between the ages of 3 and 5 already take the absence of their parents more seriously, so they need to very gently explain that dad will no longer be with him. There is a high probability that such a child may have fears and phobias, he will often cry, there may be complaints of a headache or in the tummy. It is very important to communicate with the baby as much as possible, remember with him the happy moments spent with dad, look at the photos.
How do children experience grief at 6-8 years old?
A child between the ages of 6 and 8 is a schoolchild who, in communication with peers, tells them about their parents. Therefore, it is important to help children be prepared for the questions, where is your dad? You need to teach him to answer briefly, with one phrase, “He died.” But how it happened is better not to tell others. The child may behave aggressively with peers and the teacher, so it is important to warn the teacher about what happened so that he looks after him.
Grief in a child 9 - 12 years old
Children from 9 to 12 years old want to be independent, do everything themselves. But the loss of their father instills in them a sense of helplessness. They havemany questions such as: “who will drive him to school?”, “who will go to football with him?” and the like. The obsession of the son may be that he is now the only man in the family and must take care of everyone. In this case, it is important to help him not to give up his toys and childhood, moving on to adulthood, but to stay carefree longer.
Teenager's grief
The most difficult age for a child is, of course, adolescence. At this time, they are already very emotional and going through a difficult period, and having lost their father, they are completely unsettled. The teenager begins to look for bad company, secretly smokes cigarettes and drinks alcohol, and even worse, tries drugs. At this age, children hide their emotions from others, and are most often silent. But inside they are very worried, sometimes reaching attempts to commit suicide. It is important for a teenager to give due attention, care and love, so that he knows that he can always find support in his mother.
Small conclusion
Regardless of the age of the child, only the remaining parent will determine how he survives the loss, and what his life will be like after the death of his father. The main thing is to surround children with care and love. You need to talk more often about their experiences, spend all your free time with them, and if you find any deviations in behavior or he alth, seek help from a doctor.
