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S3/Ep 15: What Kids Need to Hear When Someone They Love Dies
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When death enters a family, most parents freeze — reaching for euphemisms, changing the subject, or shielding kids from grief entirely. But that silence does more harm than the conversation ever could.
Dr. Elreacy Dock is a thanatologist, death educator, and professor of thanatology trained by David Kessler. In this episode, she helps parents talk to children about death, dying, and grief in ways that are honest, age-appropriate, and ultimately healing — from what to say to a four-year-old versus a teenager, to whether kids should attend funerals, to how to grieve alongside your child while processing your own loss.
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Transcript
Introduction to Season Three
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to season three of the Guardians of Hope podcast. We are a community of parents, educators, health, legal, and tech experts dedicated to positively impacting children's lives. The thoughts and opinions of my guests are not my own. This is a platform for sharing. Welcome
Challenges in Discussing Death with Children
00:00:14
Speaker
everyone. Your parent has been diagnosed with a terminal illness or a beloved family member has died suddenly, and your child is watching, listening, asking questions that you don't know how to answer.
00:00:27
Speaker
Most parents freeze in this situation because we've taught we've been taught not to talk about death, especially with children. So we use euphemism like grandma went to sleep, we lost grandpa, we avoid the conversation entirely, or we shield kids from grief thinking we're protecting them.
00:00:46
Speaker
But what we're actually doing is leaving them confused, frightened, and unprepared for one of life's most inevitable experiences.
Welcoming Dr. El-Risi Dock
00:00:55
Speaker
Today, we're joined by Dr. El-Risi Dock, a thanatologist, death educator, and certified grief educator trained by David Kessler.
00:01:05
Speaker
As department chair and professor of thanatology at Capstone University and incoming president of the National Home Funeral Alliance, Dr. Dock has dedicated her career to breaking the cultural silence around death, dying, and bereavement.
00:01:23
Speaker
Dr. Dock, welcome. Thanks so much for joining. Thank you for having me, Cynthia. It's a pleasure to be here. Thanks. So why don't we learn more about your background? um How did you get into this line of work?
Dr. Dock's Journey to Thanatology
00:01:38
Speaker
So initially I was ah studying clinical psychology because I had the intention of becoming a grief counselor. And i always kind of felt like there was a missing piece to that educational process.
00:01:55
Speaker
um And so basically one year while I was an undergrad, I decided to study the sociology of death and dying because a lot of the early sociologists actually created many of the theories that we use in thanatology. um But in that experience, I learned about thanatology and i started looking at not only the micro level of how death, dying and bereavement impacts all of us, but also the the macro level as to how it is essentially you know permeating our society, how that influences our interactions, relationship dynamics, you name it.
00:02:35
Speaker
um and I was also at a point in my career where I was really interested in behavioral health. And so to me, I think that mental health, how we experience life, um our death adjacent experiences and our personal loss experiences really influence you know our day-to-day health outcomes ultimately. So I was looking for a way to sort of combine all of that.
00:03:05
Speaker
and got into thanatology and started noticing different research gaps and figuring out where I could contribute in those respective areas. Excellent. Well, i'm I'm glad to have you here, Doc. So um I have a lot of questions for you and I want to get right start, get
The Harm of Euphemisms in Explaining Death
00:03:22
Speaker
started right away. So thank you for sharing your experience with us. um My first question is that most parents want to protect their children from pain.
00:03:32
Speaker
So For example, when a grandparent passes away or death happens in the family, parents use euphemisms like so-and-so went to sleep or we lost them.
00:03:46
Speaker
um Sometimes they avoid the conversation entirely. Does this help or harm children? um And what can you tell us that children actually need from this experience um when death enters their lives?
00:04:02
Speaker
So that's a great question. um i would say that using euphemisms ultimately is more harmful than anything else. It's it's our way of trying to shield children from the potential pain associated with grief and loss, as you've mentioned. um But for a child, this is actually really confusing because when we say, you know, grandpa went to sleep, what we're communicating to them is that Sleep is dangerous.
00:04:31
Speaker
It's reversible. you like grandpa can still come back and wake up at any moment. And that is not. the reality, you know. um Similarly, you know, when we say, you know, we lost someone or we lost grandpa, a child's immediate reaction to that is going to be like, well, let's go find him, you know, where to And so it's really important to be honest with them, you know, within the context of what their developmental stages are at the time, um because it's not only validating their reality, but it's giving them
00:05:07
Speaker
the permission to feel whatever they're feeling at that time. Is it sadness? Is it confusion? Is it curiosity? um and it also teaches something very important, which I think is that the reality is of death is not so terrible that we cannot speak about it.
00:05:25
Speaker
um You know, so I would recommend being completely honest with them, you know, and and this is going to vary. But you what you could say is grandpa died, his body stopped working.
00:05:40
Speaker
um You know, he's not going to come back. And it's okay to feel whatever you're feeling. Yeah, that I think what you just said right there, his body stopped working, i think makes so much sense and resonates with a lot of children. But we're going to go into the ages and break down how to communicate.
Age-Appropriate Conversations About Death
00:06:01
Speaker
So, you know, for example, a four-year-old, 10-year-old and a teenager all understand death differently.
00:06:08
Speaker
What would help is if you could walk parents through the that ah developmentally appropriate ways to talk to children about death at different ages, like what language they should use, concepts, ah examples like that.
00:06:23
Speaker
Okay. so at four years old, children have pretty much what is known as magical thinking. um They have the perception that thoughts cause certain events to happen. So if they are mad at somebody or if they've said something that might have caused you know some sort of disagreement between them and the person from their perception, they blame themselves for things. um They believe, since they have magical thinking, that death is temporary, that you can reverse it, you can bring that person back.
00:06:58
Speaker
And so when you are explaining death to a four-year-old, you need to give very simplified biological facts. Don't use any euphemisms, don't over-explain. You know, you can turn back to that initial statement of grandpa's body isn't working anymore, he died,
00:07:17
Speaker
etc um The reason why you don't want to over explain is because a lot of times if you start over explaining and you provide too many details, they're either going to get confused or they're just going to keep having additional questions that are going to be too complicated to really answer for four-year-old.
00:07:39
Speaker
It's different though for a 10-year-old because with a 10-year-old, they are at a stage where they are developing what is, i would say, abstract to concrete thinking. So they understand that death can be final, that it can be very personal. um They understand that death is something that happens to everyone. um And with this understanding of that aspect of finality, it can cause them and anxiety. So now what's happening is when you are explaining that grandpa died, um now they're starting to worry like, okay, grandpa died. Does that mean mom and dad are going to die? Does that mean my friends can die? um and so at that point you really have to think about not only how to answer their questions but how to
00:08:27
Speaker
do it in a way that's not going to cause them further anxiety. um Sometimes what I find is that parents become really concerned or rather guardians, parents, caretakers, depending on circumstances, they become very concerned because children at this age become very interested in death. They have a curiosity about it because it's an unknown to them. They only know that it's final. They don't know what happens during or you know afterwards.
00:08:54
Speaker
and so a lot of those questions that you get become a little bit more difficult. And what I've found is that when you are talking with children at that age, you it's okay to explain to them that you don't know everything. um If they present you with a really difficult question and it's very complex and you don't know how to answer them at that age, you can say, you know what?
00:09:18
Speaker
I don't have the answer for that at the moment, but we can figure it out together. and that's when you can use some sort of educational, you know, ah reference.
00:09:28
Speaker
And then finally for teens, I would say that teens are probably leaning more towards concrete thinking. um They tend to have more adult clarity, but at the same time, they are facing very intense emotions, mood swings, and invincibility. There's always this sort of feeling that teens have like nothing can happen to me.
00:09:53
Speaker
And so death shows them that yes, my friends can die, i can die. What does that mean for me and my future? um If grandpa died, what does that mean for all the things that I wanted to share with grandpa that I can't do with him now?
00:10:07
Speaker
And so they are really at a stage of processing how loss changes their identity and their future. And you can sort of lean more into, i would say,
00:10:20
Speaker
more encouraging conversations with them. You know you can say, i understand that you're having these emotions and I'm not going to force you to attend this event or you know spend time with the family or whatever, you can talk to me whenever you're comfortable.
00:10:37
Speaker
And that that kind of gives them the opportunity to set everything on their own pace. Yeah. Thank you for breaking that down. um now let's talk about how you prepare children for a family member's death.
Talking About Impending Death with Children
00:10:52
Speaker
How do you, um start those conversations, um, about the reality of what's happening? And most importantly, I think for parents, how do you balance grief with supporting this communication to your children through their grief?
00:11:10
Speaker
Hmm. So, When someone you love has a terminal illness, um a lot of times what you're going to experience is anticipatory grief. You're grieving before they've even died due to the the circumstances.
00:11:28
Speaker
And when it comes to explaining this to children, i always think that it's better to start this conversation sooner than later because there's no benefit to waiting.
00:11:38
Speaker
um and A lot of times if you wait, the person's condition, depending on how degenerative it may be, is going to worsen and you're going to lose valuable time. though i would say you know you need to be upfront with them. Children know that there's something wrong, but they don't always know what is wrong. and When they don't know what is wrong, their imaginations tend to fill in the gaps and that can be worse than anything you would tell them in many instances. um it's important to understand that having these conversations, whether it's with ah a child or with a teen is an ongoing process. It's, it's not a moment of having this conversation and now we're at this, this understanding and everything is okay. It's a continual conversation. so you have to filter that through their developmental lens. Um, and you have to be honest with them. So this can be like saying something along the lines of, you know,
00:12:36
Speaker
mom or grandpa are very sick. um This is an illness that people usually don't get better from. um They are going to die at some point, but we don't know exactly when.
00:12:50
Speaker
And as I said, it's a process. So later on, as time is progressing, you can say, well, You see she's becoming a bit weaker, so now she needs to rely on, you know, a feeding tube or something along those lines so that they understand that this progression is happening and they can comprehend what what is occurring visibly, right?
00:13:13
Speaker
And in doing that, you are also communicating to them that grief is survivable. um I would say that, you know, the the other key factor about this is that um when we are grieving, how we navigate that experience is being modeled to our children and to teens that are around us. So it's difficult because you have to navigate your own grief while they're grieving. But at the same time, it is an opportunity for a teachable moment ultimately.
00:13:51
Speaker
Yeah. Now, what about after the you know death occurs?
Benefits of Children Attending Funerals
00:13:58
Speaker
Should a child see they're dying or the the the body, should they attend the funeral? i mean, this sounds like a common sense question, but for a lot of people, it's really not. you know um Can you help parents understand what's appropriate and what benefits children gain from the entire experience?
00:14:22
Speaker
Absolutely. i you know I think that's a great question because it's very common and this is probably one of the most common concerns that people approach me with um in regards to children. So I would say that, you know, as a society, we have attempted to sanitize death and to shield children. And when we do that, it is also shielding them from the meaning and the importance of being in community and, you know, experiencing ritual both after someone has died and throughout the grieving process.
00:14:56
Speaker
um The common fear is that in exposing them to viewing the body or to attending the funeral or to even visiting while someone is in the hospital with a terminal illness, um people are also people are often concerned that they're going to traumatize the child.
00:15:16
Speaker
And The reality is that a lot of times the true trauma comes from being excluded from these experiences because children will blame themselves. They will feel resentment that they weren't weren't asked to attend these events in their loved one's life.
00:15:35
Speaker
um And so I do recommend it. I do say that it's important not to force a child because obviously if they don't want to do something and you force them, that can be traumatic. But if you're going to have them go to the hospital, for example, you you can explain to them ahead of time so they know what to anticipate, you know? um Grandpa's going to look different.
00:15:59
Speaker
His skin might be a different color. When you touch him, he might be a little colder than usual. um You know, mom is on a life support machine. The machines are helping her to breathe. um their eyes are closed and it may seem like they can't respond, but they can still hear what you're saying. It's okay if you want to hold their hand. It's okay if you want to touch them. Things like that can be really helpful in a hospital setting. um For a viewing, the same thing applies as well. Now, there are some people that are afraid of having their child view a dead body.
00:16:36
Speaker
And I think that, you know, there's, usually less trauma associated with that than one might imagine, as long as you prepare them for it. Because what you are showing them is, this is what mom looked like when she was alive. This is what mom looks like now that she's dead.
00:16:55
Speaker
You can still touch her, you can say goodbye, you know, you can have this moment to say whatever you want to say with her and that helps them to process things.
00:17:06
Speaker
um And I think in regards to attending funerals, if you're going to bring a child to a funeral or a teenager, it's really great if you can give them a role or something to do in the funeral.
00:17:18
Speaker
It gives them something that makes them feel like they are actively participating versus passively observing what's going on, which can really shape their experience and their attitudes surrounding death and dying. um And it also kind of gives them a sense of belonging, which reinforces that importance of community in a death adjacent situation.
00:17:40
Speaker
Yeah, that's a great tip. Thank you. Now, when a parent loses their own parent or tragically, if they lose a child, you know, a parent will be grieving heavily and supporting a grieving child at the same time.
Differences in Grief between Children and Adults
00:17:59
Speaker
What do parents need to understand about this, about a child's grief and how it differs from adult grief? And this second question is, what are the signs to look out for if your child is struggling ah with the grief?
00:18:18
Speaker
So
00:18:21
Speaker
when we are grieving and when a child is grieving, um this is a bit challenging because you are that child's emotional, social, psychological anchor in that moment. Like you are the most familiar person they have in the face of loss.
00:18:40
Speaker
um And you are also trying to process your own grief and deal with all of the emotions that are arising from it on your own, right? And so i think an important way to differentiate between ah a child's grief and an adult's grief is I like to give the example of puddles and oceans. So a child's grief is like a puddle. There can be depth to it, but they can jump in and out of it. For them, it can be incredibly deep and an incredibly um intense at times, depending on the circumstances, but it's
00:19:15
Speaker
intermittent they can do other things whereas for an adult it's like an ocean it's constant it's heavy you can't jump in and out of it that easily um you can feel very overwhelmed and feel like you are you know struggling to keep up with everything and so in this regard we have to understand that when children grieve they sort of experience this in a way that we we don't conceptualize as adults. You know, they can be sad about grandpa dying 10 minutes ago, and then they can go play with their friends, or they can go draw or play with Play-Doh, or you name it. Whereas for us, we're ruminating on those thoughts about, oh no, grandpa just died, like he meant so much to me, et cetera, et cetera.
00:20:01
Speaker
um And so what I've found is children really need to know that what they're experienc experiencing is okay because again we're an anchor for that. So you can say, you know, like, hey, it's okay to play if it's okay that you were sad, you know, 10 minutes ago and that you don't feel as sad right now. That doesn't mean anything bad about how you felt about grandpa or mom or whomever it was that died. um it's okay to feel happy for a little while if that's what you feel like doing. It doesn't mean that you're always going to be happy and it doesn't mean that you've forgotten grandpa or grandma. um it just means that you are in the present living life.
00:20:47
Speaker
ah You can also kind of on the flip side reiterate reiterate to them that when they're having these moments of sadness that are so confusing for them, you know, it doesn't mean that you're never going to laugh again. it's okay to be sad. It's okay to express these emotions and to share them with others. um And so ultimately what you're doing is you're teaching them that death and loss and grief are painful, but they are not going to absolutely destroy you. They're going to be these pivotal moments in your life and you are not going to forget them. And in many ways, you're going to carry them with you.
00:21:26
Speaker
but they are going to shape you and it's not going to have a detrimental impact on your life or your future. ah And then the final thing I would say about that is, you know, children don't often And this varies by age, but children don't often verbalize what they're feeling. A lot of times when they're struggling with grief, it comes out in their behaviors. you know They have outbursts. They start having difficulty keeping up with their academic performance. They experience you know regressive behaviors. um
00:22:02
Speaker
bedwetting, you name it. And so those are some key indicators that maybe there's something going on there that we need to explore a bit more with the child because maybe they're just not verbalizing it or maybe they are at a developmental stage where they can't verbalize those feelings. um But the flip side of that is that when we're grieving,
00:22:23
Speaker
we go through a wide range of emotions, right? Frustration, anger, sadness, loneliness, you name it. And so there's going to be times when you're going to feel frustrated when you're interacting with children during this moment, you know? there's going to be times when you are not going to feel like you have it all figured out and put together. And if you have a moment where you, you know, snap at your child and you have an attitude and you realize that this happened and you feel bad about it, it's okay. You're human. But at the same time, you can use that as a teachable moment for that child. You know, you can hold space for them in that moment and say, Hey, you know, i reacted really poorly
00:23:06
Speaker
and I'm sorry for that. The reason why I yelled or the reason why I was snappy is because I'm upset and I feel really sad that grandpa died and i didn't know how to manage those emotions at that time. So that teaches them that even if you were to have an outburst, you can come back from it and you can ground yourself, you know? Yeah.
00:23:30
Speaker
And what I'm getting through this whole conversation this, yeah talking to children about grief is this message that um life may not be survivable, but grief is survivable. And that is something that we have to keep in mind. um So I love that. Thank you. All right. One more question for you. um When parents or for parents who haven't exactly gone through this, they haven't faced death in their family, but do know that it's coming.
Preparing Children for Death and Grief
00:24:04
Speaker
um you know, through parents or terminal diagnosis down the road, how do they prepare their children to talk about death proactively? I know you covered this a little bit, but I want this to be what we leave parents with today. Like how do they prepare their children um and talk about it proactively?
00:24:25
Speaker
o So i would say, you know, I'm, i'm a very keen supporter of, um, death positivity in the context of being proactive about having these conversations. um I think that, you know, just as we want our children and and the children around us to ah be proactive about living and to have a passion for life, we also have to weave the reality of death and grief into our daily interactions because ultimately this helps us to um not only develop a healthy relationship with mortality independently, but also to model that relationship with mortality to children. And so what I've found to be ah pretty successful with children is to find examples in your day to day life of life and death. You know, this can be
00:25:25
Speaker
a leaf falling during autumn and it's changing colors and it's crunchy now that it's fallen from the tree because it's lost its life source, right? It can be a flower that's wilting. It can be a dead bug that you found, ah you know, when, when you were on your walk. Um,
00:25:43
Speaker
And you can use this as an opportunity to say, like, you know, this is what it looked like when it was alive. This is what it looks like dead. um This is a natural biological process. it's It's present not only across human beings, but animals and plants and so many different aspects of nature. Right.
00:26:03
Speaker
And that can sort of help them to just get a general understanding. conceptualization of life and death. I think another great option is to read stories to children, um read stories that include explanations about death and grief and loss. um And this is important because these stories are usually, I would say they're they're packaged in what I would call a container. And a container is something that is a safe space. It's a fictional space that is not going to directly impact them in the real world, but it influences their thinking. It helps them to understand like, this is what this could look like if it were to happen in real life. um And there's so many stories now that focus on death and grief and explaining this to children. um and you know similarly with movies, If your child has a favorite movie and maybe someone has died in that movie, you can point that out. um If you notice that there's a character that is sad because some aspect of loss is happening, you can say, oh, do you see that character? Well, you know they're going through loss. This is what happened. This is what's making them sad. That can help them to make those connections to the different emotions they're going to feel while they're grieving. um
00:27:24
Speaker
And then the final thing I would say with that is, you know, be be honest with them about your own grief journey. Perhaps, you know, maybe grandma's death anniversary comes by or their birthday or you name it and you're like, you know what, I was thinking about grandma today.
00:27:43
Speaker
I really miss her. My favorite thing that we ever did was, you know, x y and z And it teaches them that you can reflect on this and you can embrace those memories and that you can miss them, but it doesn't have to be a negative or, you know, overwhelming experience to miss them. You can incorporate them in your day-to-day life.
00:28:04
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. That's beautiful. Thank you. So where can we find more information about you,
Resources for Community Death Care
00:28:11
Speaker
Dr. Doc? Do you have a website or is there anything you can provide for anyone who wants to find more information about the work that you do?
00:28:20
Speaker
Absolutely. So you can find more about me on my website. It is www.lrecdoc.com. You can also check out the the Home Funeral Alliance. I am the president there and we you know, we lean into all aspects of community death care. So that's another thing to potentially explore. If you want to look at different methods to have children involved in a funeral process and rituals and what that looks like.
00:28:50
Speaker
All right. Well, thank you so much, dr Doc, for your time. i appreciate the conversation. thank you for having me. It's been an absolute pleasure.