grief resources

By Comfort Zone Camp, 2008

As the surviving parent, you can proactively do the following things to help the family copy with their tragedy and grief:

• Guide the family’s grief journey — Make choices to help guide the family to grieve in healthy ways by seeking support systems and resources.
   
• Don’t go it alone — Seek professional grief counseling for the entire family. In addition, seek grief support systems that are age appropriate for each member of the family, such as teen support groups or camp.
   
• Children will take cues on how to grieve from you. If you talk and share memories about your loved one, they will feel good talking and sharing memories. Also, if you normalize crying as a way of coping or “letting it out,” you let them know it is okay to do too. On the flip side, if you never talk about your loved one, or demonstrate negative coping skills, children will too.
   
• Children will try to protect you, which could lead to refusing to talk about the loss and their grief in an effort not to upset or hurt you.
   
• Reassure your children that things will be okay — validate their feelings and try to help them feel their world is still safe. Try to make sense of the loss. Let them know that as a family, you will be okay.
   
• Reassure your children that their feelings are normal — there is no one way to grieve, and ther are lots of feelings that come after the loss of a loved one. Look for opportunities for your children to meet peers who can help validate their feelings through support groups, camps, online forums, and/or books.
   
• Keep in mind your child’s age — Children of different ages and developmental levels will have different grief understandings, reactions and needs. Keep their age in mind when responding to their grief.
   
• Encourage your family to actively remember — Actively engage your children in remembering their loved one through conversations, mementoes, photos, journaling, private rituals and recognizing special days.
   
• Don’t expect the grieving period to have an end date — Grief does not have a timeline, such as 6 months or a year. Grief is a life-long journey that will have highs and lows. It will ebb and flow, and will often be triggered by life events.
   
• Recognize the impact of other life changes — Understand that changes like moving to a new house and/or school, having the surviving parent return to work, or having new caretakers may trigger secondary losses for the child. In addition, life events such as school dances, graduation, and weddings may trigger grief in the future.