When a family member is ill or dying

The funeral
Your most immediate question may be whether to take the children to the funeral home with you or whether they should just attend the service, Your answer will emerge out of your culture and family traditions, but don't exclude your children because you fear that they won't understand or that they will be too upset.

Experts are divided over whether children aged six to 12 should see a dead body. Some say viewing a body is traumatic for a child, others that children will not find it frightening with the right preparation. If you have an open casket and set visiting hours, give your child a choice. Many funeral homes have playrooms where children can stay. You should also ask your child whether she wants to attend the funeral service. Describe for her what will happen and what will be expected of her.

Psychologists who work with bereaved families encourage them to include their children in the activities surrounding visits to the funeral home and in the funeral service so that they will witness how adults grieve for and honour the dead. Before she makes a choice, let your daughter know what car she will ride in, how the service will be conducted, and who she will sit with. Explain that people cry or react in different, very personal ways, and it's OK either to cry or not.

Communicate
Take care of your own emotions by accepting some of the many offers of help from your family and friends at this time. Honour your child's wishes to go back to his normal routine if that's reassuring for him. If you're not ready to resume the daily rounds, you might enlist a neighbour to walk him to school.

Families with open patterns of communication seem to deal better with grief. Don't be afraid to let your child see you cry sometimes. Talk about Grandma and your good memories of her. Keep a picture of her in the living room. Don't be surprised if your child asks when Grandma will visit again. He may have absorbed the information that Grandma is dead, but he may not be mature enough to understand that this means the end of his relationship with her.

A child of six may not see death as final and may imagine the dead person living somewhere else. Children aged seven to 10 may realize that the dead person no longer exists in the familiar body, but may continue to converse with the person as if their relationship could continue. They may see the death as final, but may not think it was inevitable; they're more likely to press for reasons why medicine couldn't save the loved one.

Reassure your child
At this age, children may worry about their own death and may need reassurance that Uncle Harry's leukemia cannot spread to them. They may also ask gruesome questions about what happens to the body -- which is normal, so don't interpret the questions as an unhealthy preoccupation with death. The mature 11- or 12-year-old may have an understanding of death and is more likely than a younger child to think deeply about the afterlife.

Children who have experienced the death of someone very close, such as a sibling or parent, may continue to speak to that person in fantasy games, carrying on the relationship years after the death. They continue the work of grieving well into adulthood, with fresh bouts of sorrow as they reach each new stage of maturity.

Unfortunately, parents who have lost a child or a partner may be "absent" emotionally to the rest of their family because of their own grief. If one parent has died, it's difficult to re-establish familiar routines. The family may have to move and accept a reduced lifestyle with less money. Such children may need extra support. Grief counselling may be available through the school, a hospice, your religious organization, and through all mental health facilities. Groups such as Bereaved Families of Ontario also offer bereavement therapy for children.

Excerpted from Raising Great Kids: Ages 6 to 12 by Christine Langlois. Copyright 1999 by Telemedia Communications Inc. Excerpted, with permission by Ballantine Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.