We adults always think our child is too young to understand death. We always try to protect our child against the reality of death. In fact, children understand the reality of death much better than adults. They have different evaluations about death and life according to age groups.
In order to help children in this regard and to understand them, we adults need to deal with this issue ourselves and know that children perceive death differently in every age group.
The first five years
Children’s thoughts about death start very early. These thoughts have a profound effect on the child’s development, socialization and development of religious feelings.
In the early ages, the child has knowledge about the concepts of living and non-living. He observes the death of plants and living things and tries to combine them with concepts such as sleep, separation, abandonment of habit (such as pacifier), and imperative need. Jean Piaget, the father of the famous child development, made a series of researches to understand what children associate with the concepts of life. He analyzed the results in four phases. In the first stage (between the 3rd and 6th years), the events considered as all living things are somehow active and necessary concepts. For example, a candle is alive when it burns and gives light. In the second stage (6th-8th years), life and vitality are defined only through movements. For example, the sea is not always choppy, so it is not always lively. In the third period (8th-12th years), the child evaluates it as a living thing that takes action on its own. In the fourth period, the child evaluates only plants, animals and people as living things.
For many children under the age of 5, death does not mean eternity. They view death as a journey back or a sleep re-started. For children, going to work can be equivalent to death. Seeing death and separation as equivalent often leads to feelings of unbearable pain and sadness. For young children, death is felt emotionally as separation from an important person. They have an extreme fear of being abandoned by their parents. This fear of losing starts at age 1 and continues until age 8. After a death in the family or in the environment, they show excessive fondness for their parents and do not want to be alone. They are afraid that something will happen to their family when they are separated.
The concept of time is very limited in children of this age. He cannot accept that death is eternal and accepts it as a temporary situation. At the beginning of the age of four, children begin to perceive death more or less. They realize that death is something different, but it does not have an emotional dimension. Killing ants or grasshoppers and playing dead games are common in this age group.
After 5 years of age
Realistic perception of death begins with primary school age. In this developmental age, the child tries to reconcile death with his feelings. That is, they can feel the situation and share their grief. However, he thinks that they are not affected by it. The concept that death can occur at any age has not yet been developed. They personify death. Like devil and angel figures. Social environment and religious belief also show their effect on this issue.
A 5-year-old child cannot accept that it did not exist before and will not exist in the future. Children of this age only have the concept of ‘now’.
At the age of 6, children become interested in what happens after death. On the one hand, he has definite thoughts for the afterlife (like he will be put in a coffin when he dies, the dead cannot breathe). But there is not much emotion reconciliation with these thoughts. They accept and know the existence of other causes of death other than old age, such as accident and illness. In this group of children, they express their death wish against their parents or siblings as a result of anger.
From the age of seven, the concept of time becomes richer and more diverse. Events and the time relationship of events are perceived better. The concepts related to death, coffin, grave, funeral ceremony begin to attract a lot of attention. 8-year-old children now accept that everyone, including themselves, will die one day. From the age of 9, death is accepted as a natural event. He accepts that death is valid for every living thing. When your pulse and heart stop, you die! make such observations.
The understanding of death in children belonging to the middle and lower classes from the socioeconomic trend is different. They perceive death as a result of violence, accident and suicide.
The understanding of death in adolescence
Emotional inner settings differ in each adolescent with their self-structure and psychological structure. Efforts to search for one’s own identity question the meaning of life and the concepts of eternity. Self-identification problems are often linked to fear and insecurity.
These feelings are exacerbated by hormonal-physical development and increased sexuality. As a result, suicidal fantasies arise.
Children and youth with terminal illness have a different understanding of death than their healthy peers. Adolescents generally do not like to talk about death.
Grieving in children and adolescents
For children and adolescents as well as adults, the process of grieving for the deceased is the most difficult function in terms of spirituality. Grief is an innate response of soul and body to separation and loss. Grief is not just about death. Almost every day we have to say goodbye to something. For example, weaning a breastfed child, finishing school, changing a job, moving, transitioning from youth to old age, or adult children leaving home. All these events need to be digested and accepted. This can only be achieved by mourning.
Grieving styles vary from person to person. It manifests itself in the form of shouting, calling, groaning, violence, irritability, feelings of guilt, stubbornness and hopelessness. The important thing here is to live these emotions with awareness. During the mourning period, our body shows some reactions. Body aches, headaches, fatigue, loss of appetite and sleep disturbances may accompany this process.
More difficult times await children in the grieving process: They have less ability to verbally express their feelings and cognitively understand death. Children lose the person they love at the same time, and they are deprived of the attention of their families for a long time. Few parents are able to respond to their children’s fears, questions, and feelings of guilt during grieving. However, during the grieving period, children need a lot of attention. Thus, they can re-apply this mourning experience at some point in their lives.
It is very important to talk openly with children about the deceased’s cause of death. In doing so, it should always be emphasized that the cause of death has nothing to do with the child’s behavior.
In which cases support should be sought
*If the child who lost his/her mother or father is younger than 4 years old,
*In case of moving,
*If there is financial distress ,
*Sudden and unexpected deaths,
*Deaths after illness lasting longer than 6 months,
*Deaths that occur after losing their mother during birth or uterine, breast cancer, especially girls children,
* Boys who lost their father in adolescence,
Children are very affected when they lose a sibling. Because parents are in their mourning period, they cannot show the necessary attention to their other children.
When a person dies, the child should be able to share their pain and mourning with those around them. In this case, it is necessary to communicate with children rather than isolating them. They feel safer. The results of this mourning period may appear as positive or negative in the relationships they will establish in the future.
