When a parent dies by suicide, kids experience what’s called “traumatic grieving.” How kids are supported while dealing with this has a big effect on how they recover.
When a parent commits suicide, the child may have scary or painful feelings. They may feel anger, confusion, guilt and rejection. The child wants to avoid these feelings. But healthy grieving means they need to think about the parent and let themselves feel sad. They also need to remember that their parent loved them.
The biggest risk to a child after a suicide is not being encouraged to express their feelings and get to an understanding of the death that they can live with.
To process their feelings in a healthy way, kids need honest answers to their questions. They need to know that all their feelings are okay and normal. And that they didn’t cause the suicide. They should understand that their parent was ill. That everyone did their best to help, but it didn’t succeed. Getting back into a normal routine also helps reassure kids.
Signs that a kid is not recovering in a healthy way include sadness and withdrawal from normal activities that last for so long they start to cause problems in their daily life. Their sleeping and eating habits may change. They may feel angry all the time. They may avoid things that remind them of the person who died or have intrusive thoughts about the suicide.
The most important thing to remember is that the best way to avoid a negative, long-lasting reaction is to be honest and loving and for the family to go on supporting each other.
When a parent dies, it’s always painful for a child. And a parent’s death by suicide — especially, research shows, a mother’s suicide — has an even more painful and potentially disturbing effect.
As with all traumatic events, the way in which kids are supported in processing their feelings about the loss affects how successfully they will recover. Children are very resilient, and while a parent’s suicide will never stop being an important event in their lives, with help they can recover their emotional health and vitality.
When children experience the sudden death of a parent, they go through what we call traumatic grieving. This kind of death is not just a painful thing to assimilate; it triggers an emotionally complicated or conflicted process.
Healthy grieving
When a death is shocking and disturbing it generates frightening thoughts, images, and feelings a child may want desperately to avoid. In the case of a suicide, children may have feelings toward or about their parent that they feel are unacceptable, that they want to deny. So they try to block them out, by not talking or thinking about the person they’ve lost, who they may feel has betrayed them, or rejected them. But to grieve in a healthy way, it’s necessary to think about the person you’ve lost, and allow yourself to feel sadness and pain. Kids need to be able to remember the parent they’ve lost as a loving person despite their flaws.
Even more than an accidental death, a suicide generates horror, anger, shame, confusion, and guilt — all feelings that a child can experience as overwhelming. The biggest risk to a child’s emotional health is not being able, or encouraged, to express these feelings, and get an understanding of what happened that they can live with. When a parent who has been depressed commits suicide, for instance, we want that understanding to be that they suffered from a mental illness, a disorder in their brain that caused their death, despite the efforts of those who loved them to save them.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center found that children who are under 18 when their parents commit suicide are three times as likely as children with living parents to later commit suicide themselves. This highlights the vital importance of providing support to children who are grieving. Not only are we treating the trauma of sudden parental loss, we are also trying to break the suicide cycle in families.
Supporting children
What do children need most in the aftermath of a suicide? First, they require simple and honest answers to their questions. They need to know that their feelings are acceptable: anger at a mother or a father who committed suicide is normal, and it doesn’t mean a betrayal of the love you have, or the terrible loss you may be feeling. If the person who died has been mentally ill for a long time, a child might actually feel relieved at the death, and that, too, they need to be allowed to feel.
After a suicide, children need to know that they’re not to blame. Being natural narcissists, kids tend to put themselves at the center of the narrative: If I had behaved better, if I had come home right after school, if I had tried harder to cheer Mom or Dad up, etc., this wouldn’t have happened. What we want them to understand is that the parent was ill. We did our best to help, but it didn’t succeed. This isn’t an understanding that’s achieved in one conversation; it’s something that has to be worked on over time.
It helps children recover to keep their lives as normal as possible — to return to routines as soon as possible, to return to school and regular activities.
#James Donaldson notes: Welcome to the “next chapter” of my life… being a voice and an advocate for #mentalhealthawarenessandsuicideprevention, especially pertaining to our younger generation of students and student-athletes. Getting men to speak up and reach out for help and assistance is one of my passions. Us men need to not suffer in silence or drown our sorrows in alcohol, hang out at bars and strip joints, or get involved with drug use. Having gone through a recent bout of #depression and #suicidalthoughts myself, I realize now, that I can make a huge difference in the lives of so many by sharing my story, and by sharing various resources I come across as I work in this space.#http://bit.ly/JamesMentalHealthArticle Find out more about the work I do on my 501c3 non-profit foundation website www.yourgiftoflife.org Order your copy of James Donaldson’s latest book, #CelebratingYourGiftofLife: From The Verge of Suicide to a Life of Purpose and Joy
When should you worry about a child failing to recover in a healthy way? Though it’s difficult to distinguish problem behavior from the expected process of grieving, there are some key things to look for.
With a “regular” traumatic experience, like being close to an accident, an attack, or a disaster, we expect signs of recovery in about a month. But the timetable for grieving is less clear, so the recovery process can take longer. If a child’s sadness and withdrawal from normal activities don’t dissipate over time and begin to cause impairment — refusal to go to school, changes in sleep habits, a decrease in appetite, irritability — they can be cause for concern.
The biggest sign that someone is not grieving in a natural way is a disturbed relation to the memory of the loved one. This can include avoiding places or situations that might remind a child of the parent who died, emotional numbing, or selective amnesia about the traumatic loss. On the other hand, it can manifest as intrusive thoughts about the event. These all get in the way of the process of forming memories of a parent that’s part of the healthy grieving process.
Who is at most risk for suffering long-lasting trauma? Children with avoidant personalities or extreme anxiety will more easily fall into an unhealthy coping style. Children who have experienced other traumas are also more likely to respond poorly, given the “practice” they have had. Kids who lack strong support networks — both within the family and within the community at large — suffer more. And girls, for reasons we don’t fully understand, appear three times more likely to have traumatic reactions to disturbing events.
Finally, when we imagine a child’s experience of the loss of a parent to suicide, we need to recognize that the family may have been struggling with mental illness, and often addiction, for years, which must surely have taken a toll. The most important thing to keep in mind is that the antidote to traumatic grief is honesty, loving support, and the continuation of the family in its strongest possible form.
James Donaldson is a Washington State University graduate (’79). After an outstanding basketball career with WSU, he went on to play professional basketball in the NBA with the Seattle Supersonics, San Diego/L.A. Clippers, Dallas Mavericks, New York Knicks, and Utah Jazz. He also played for several teams in the European Leagues in Spain, Italy, and Greece, and he toured with The Harlem Globetrotters to wrap up his career. James was an NBA All-Star in 1988 while playing center for the Dallas Mavericks. In 2006, James was inducted into the Pac-10 Sports Hall of Fame and also the Washington State University Athletic Hall of Fame. In 2010, James was elected as a board member for the NBA Retired Players Association.
James frequently conducts speaking engagements (motivational, inspirational, educational) for organizations, schools, and youth groups.
In 2010, James was the recipient of the NBA Legends of Basketball ABC Award, awarded for outstanding contributions in Athletics–Business–Community.
He believes in being a role model for success and professionalism to the scores of young people to whom he devotes so much of his time. He currently serves on several boards and committees and is a member of many organizations.
James believes in developing relationships that create a “Win-Win” environment for everyone involved, and in being the best he can be!
For more information about James Donaldson or to request he speak at your event, contact him at:
James Donaldson is the author of “Standing Above The Crowd” and “Celebrating Your Gift of Life” and founder of the Your Gift of Life Foundation which focuses on mental health awareness and suicide prevention, especially pertaining to our school aged children and men.
If you’re interested in having James come and speak to your group of young adults, business entrepreneurs, aspiring political and community leaders, and athletic teams, please contact him at jamesd@yourgiftoflife.org and or leave a personal message for him at 1-800-745-3161. Keep up with him and read about how he is reaching out and making a difference in the lives of so many around the world at www.yourgiftoflife.org
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