Dealing With the Death of a Child: How Parents Should Deal With the Death of a Child
Many people find it difficult to console a grieving parent. It is because the loss of a child is the most painful thing for any mother or father to handle. It is one of the most heart-wrenching sights to behold, seeing a mother cry ceaselessly or a father suffer in silence.
A child is a source of hope for any couple. He or she is a little bundle upon which they have weaved their dreams upon. He is the epitome of perfection, innocence, beauty and a bright future. Since there isn’t much that relatives or friends can do to ease the parents’ feelings, it would be best to just help around with the untended chores or to simply offers words of sympathy and kindness. Now this is much easier to do but what if you are the parent and now you are left alone sleeping on your child’s empty bed? What then can you do?
Acceptance Is Key
First, it is perfectly normal to feel a surreal, sinking sensation at the pit of your stomach. After all, reality is sinking in and you slowly realize that your child is no longer coming back to you.
There is no difference whether you are losing a toddler, a teenager or an adult child. There is a common factor on such cases – the mother (even the father) faces a lifetime of loss and a journey of grief. Bereaved parents feel that a huge part of them has died away with the child and that their very core has been taken away. It is also believed that this is the ultimate form of deprivation but there is a need to confront this stressful and painful paradox; that there is still a need to move on and live their lives to the fullest.
Remember the Child, Free Yourself of Pain
Though it is difficult, bereaved parents must always deal with two things – the burden of freeing themselves of the pain and going back to their daily lives. Most parents end up holding on to their grief because they have the wrong notion that this is a reminder of their child. What they fail to realize is that they can still live full lives without forgetting the happy memories that the child left behind. Think of it this way – would your child have wanted you to linger with the pain?
There are ways of holding on to the child’s memories without spending your whole life, suffering. Memories are precious gifts so just hold on to the happiest moments that you spent with the child and allow these to create an inner sense of peace.
What Psychologists Say
Psychologists define parental grief as a multi-layered traumatic situation. Parents often end up with emotional needs yet the pain must be acknowledged and felt to be able to continue forward. Inevitably, parents need to deal with the lifelong process of understanding the meaning of life now that they have lost their child. It can be a frightening and oftentimes lonely journey. It never really ends but you can heal and eventually help others who are experiencing the same pain to live on and be persistent in overcoming the grief. If you have to seek bereavement specialists, do so.
The Role of Religion
If the parents are members of any religious sect, this is a great moment to focus on their faith and find peace in what happened. A parent can express his or her grief through religious testimony meetings.
Having faith that their child is now “in a much better place” will surely give them comfort during their most trying moments. Believing that a much greater Force or Entity has the child in His bosom also gives a feeling of peace and serenity.
A branch from your family may have been torn off but the tree is still alive and it can become a living testimony of strength during the darkest times. Nothing can prepare you from this kind of situation but it is possible to be courageous and still live on.
Elena Shella Villamor is a full-time mom of two kids and a wife to a great husband. She currently works as a freelance copywriter/ghost writer and is located in Manila, Philippines. She has attended several secondary schools press conferences and has won several awards in feature writing and editorial. She also served as the Editor-in-Chief of her high school paper. Her head is constantly brimming with great ideas and she has chosen to focus her works on producing blogs on motherhood (and all other aspects of parenting). Please visit her blog at http://www.mothersnook.wordpress.com/
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