Stages of Grief for Children

Grief is part of everybody’s life. It is a natural psychological process.  Grief is caused due to feeling of irreparable loss. Such loss could be either physical like death of loved one or social like loss of job opportunity. Everyone has own of expressing emotions.  The gravity of the grief depends upon intimacy with the deceased and how fast the loss occurred (whether it was expected or was sudden).   Like the way of grieving, the period of grieving also defers from one individual to another.


 Children have their own way of thinking about the concept of death.  Children from different age groups respond differently to death. Following illustration will provide you brief idea about how children understand the concept of death in their own way and how they respond or conclude aftermaths of death.


Age of children Conception of Death Way of expressing their grief/emotions
Children below age of 2 years
They can not understand the death
Separation from loved one (mother) may develop certain changes
Crankiness
In-activeness or reduced activity
Quietness
Sleep problems
Loss of weight
Children between age group of 1 years and 6 years
Assume that the loved one is in deep sleep
The deceased is still live and function in some ways
Think that death is a temporary condition and it is not an end.  Their loved one will get up soon
Expect the deceased to become alive again
Makes many queries like how does my mother eat or go to bathroom when she is sleeping?
Difficulty in sleeping and eating
Problems in bowel and bladder control
Tantrums
Fear of loneliness or abandonment
Irrelevant thinking such as Did I do or thought something that has caused death of my mother?
Children between age group of 6 years and 9 years
Death is a though of as a spirit or person (ghost, bogeyman or skeleton)
Death is frightening and final
The death has happened to loved ones it should not happen to me
Asks specific questions
Curious about the death
May developed fears about school.  Usually these fears are exaggerated
Display aggressiveness in behavior.  This way of expressing grief is more prominent in boys
Fears about the imaginary sickness
Feeling of loneliness or abandonment
Children above age of 9 years
Like my loved one has died everyone will die
Death is inescapable and no one can change it.  It is the end.
Like my loved one I will also die
Anger, guilt, heightened emotions, shame
Enhanced anxiety about own death
Swings in moods
Feeling/fear of rejection. Not willing to be different from peers
Changed eating habits
Sleeping disorders like sleeplessness or interrupted sleep
Lack of interest in outdoor activities (regressive behavior)
Impulsive behavior
Guilty feeling about self liveliness.  Such way of expressing grief is more in cases where the child has lost one of the parents, sister or brother.