Re: 3 year old ?

[Marion Baumgarten]

R Beckman > wrote:

> I know im way off topic here,but looking for some advice.My sons mother
> died in a auto accident ,Feb of this year.He didnt have allot of contact
> with her ,and only stayed overnight with her one time in the last 8
> months that she was around.
> He is now asking about her everyday,and im not sure what to tell him.I
> have told him before that she had to go away ,but will always love
> him.Is it to early to expalin death?

No -it's not too eary to explain death- by saying "go away" you may give
him the idea that when people go away they never come back.

[Beeswing]

Marion Baumgarten wrote:
>
>No -it's not too eary to explain death- by saying "go away" you may give
>him the idea that when people go away they never come back.

Or that his mother left him voluntarily....

beeswing

[~Kat]

> I know im way off topic here,but looking for some advice.My sons mother
> died in a auto accident ,Feb of this year.He didnt have allot of contact
> with her ,and only stayed overnight with her one time in the last 8
> months that she was around.
> He is now asking about her everyday,and im not sure what to tell him.I
> have told him before that she had to go away ,but will always love
> him.Is it to early to expalin death?

I normally just lurk here but wanted delurk to respond to this post. (I
also know that I'm late in coming w/ this)

Depending on your religious beliefs this may or may not work for you. In
our family we don't do the heaven/hell/god thing so it works very well for
us and helps explain death to a young child using knowledge they already
have.

I think the best way I've heard death described to kids goes a little
something like this:

"Do you know how sometimes a toy breaks? Sometimes we can fix it, and
sometimes we can't. Well, the same thing happens to people. If a person's
body doesn't work properly, doctors can usually fix it, but sometimes a
person's body can't be fixed. When the body completely stops working, we
call it death."

>From there you can make it more specific to the situation explaining that
the deceased no longer feels pain or whatever.

Another good analogy is batteries. When they are new, they work great, but
as they get older they slow down and eventually die.

Best of luck,
~Kat