Palliative fellows & residents from across Canada "meet" via teleconference every two months to hear presentations on topics of shared interest. In yesterday's session on Grief and Bereavement, we learned that kids grieve in chunks. The speaker likened this to puddle-jumping.
"For adults grief is like wading through this enormous river, whereas for children it's puddle jumping, but when they're in that puddle, it's no different to the river". There were two messages in this statement:
- In between the puddles, it is play as usual. Kids experience grief differently from adults, not consistently and not all the time.
- Children re-grieve the same loss as they age but not in the same way because the ability to think and process 'looks' different at age 4yr when compared to age 6 or 8 or 10yr.
Rather than
protecting children,
preparing them in an age-appropriate way to deal with loss & sad feelings empowers them. It is a legacy in the form of a "
set of coping skills".
Children want to know:
- Did I cause it?
- Can I catch it?
- Who is going to take care of me?
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Rather than 
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