Do you think we're talking about death in an appropriate manner with our 2 year old?

It sounds like you have given her a well balanced and age appropriate talk about what has happened. She is expressing herself without being overly grievous or overly happy. Sounds like you have a great kid!

Sorry to hear you’ve had a lot of loss lately.

I think she is just being matter-of-fact about it as her father was with her, When she is a little older you can suggest that she not talk about it in front of others she does not know well, but for now let it be.

Did you husband’s talks include remembering the good things about the person instead of the fact of their death, Such as, “We can remember visiting Aunt jane and baking cookies to keep her in our hearts.”

I am sorry for your recent losses.

I talk about death with my son – who is now 4½ – in much the same way. A little over a year ago, my husband’s grandfather died. E came with us to the funeral. He had developed a relationship with Grandpa before his passing, so we thought he should say “goodbye” too.

E has a computer in his room, and the background picture is Grandpa, my husband, and E. Three out of four generations in one picture. E will tell anyone that listens “That’s Grandpa. He was my friend, and he died. But I remember him”.

The only thing more natural than being born is death. It is a fact of life – the ultimate fact of life. We can love people while they are here, and remember our love for them after they are gone. No need to hide it from the young ones.

She sounds fine to me. If she’s two, she probably doesn’t have much of a sense of place for extended family. Meanwhile, sudden, tragic death isn’t going to be that frequent in her life compared to her ancestors. Be thankful you aren’t launching a dozen siblings out who each have a 50% survival rate. If these are people she doesn’t know well, she probably shouldn’t feel sad.

Meanwhile, I’m sure close family is the world to her. She would probably feel especially sad if Mommy or Daddy died. If she didn’t, THEN I would worry.

I think your approach is good. I might suggest that if she brings it up at an inopportune time you might distract her or deftly change the subject.

Something along the lines of “You’re right dear, Auntie Em isn’t with us anymore. Say, is that Princess Sparkle there?” Child rolls eyes; “No mom, that’s Rainbow Dash, Princess Sparkle is lavender, not very light cerulean!”

I’m also sorry for the losses that you’ve endured.

I think that if you’re going to take a bright two-year-old to a funeral at all (and certainly if more than one in a short span) then you’re going to have to explain something to her. Kudos to your husband for being forthright – to the degree that it’s even possible – with a young girl such as your daughter.

As for the older / other relatives becoming upset, someone should probably talk to them about the natural facts of death, dying and funerals – and about the specific request to include a two-year-old at the service. You can’t please everyone; you should know by now that it’s useless to try.

I lean towards not talking about or exposing to children to death so young. But, I can see the argument for talking about it as part of life. I don’t think 2 year olds need to go to funerals. Not that I am critical of people who bring their young kids, I just think I would leave my very young children at home.

It encourages me your daughter speaks about it matter of fact. Since she seems to have no trauma from it, and especially if she is not worried about you dying, it seems like it is a non-issue. That is what would concern me, if she started obsessing or becoming paranoid that you can die. I think young children need to feel safe and have total confidence when their parents leave they come back. Of course that is not always the reality, but I think unless mommy or daddy are terminally ill, God forbid, young children should not have to contemplate death in general.

I agree with your husband. It’s part of her reality. If the other grow ups get upset tell them them to, we’ll, GROW UP! It seems like your daughter has a more realistic and mature approach to death than they do.

It would be nice if she could remember some good times with these relatives, but most of them she has no memory of them except for the funeral. These were not close relatives – which is one of the reason family kept asking us to bring her. This was the only time they get together except for an odd christmas or so. “Great Grandma Jane” did but lots of presents and mailed them to Maddie. But as much as she loves the presents, she doesn’t associate them with “Jane”.

I think the only thing Maddie found disturbing was the casket itself. She’s only seen a closed one and she got kind of worried when she found out a person was inside. She kept saying “She needs to get OUT. It’s dark in there!” She doesn’t have enough empathy to think of herself in that situation yet, but she does know that being trapped in a little box would be dark and scary. She doesn’t seem too upset about it anymore though. Dead people like boxes or something.

For her, death seems to be a state that some people are just in, rather than a state that people get into. I don’t think she has any idea that the people in the caskets were ever alive. I don’t think she really gets what death is. It’s just .. you go to a church and look at a box and then daddy takes you out to play on the swings for a while.

I worry that the child might be showing the effects of trauma by interrupting her own play with dialogues such as she has been saying,?
But on the other hand it is said that youg children can sense their loved ones whom had passed on?
As l for the older relatives they have there own hangups about death to work out.

For most of human history, kids of all ages were unabashedly exposed to death. Relatives lay in state right in the multi-generational home. Why has that suddenly become an issue?

I see nothing at all wrong with the way you’re handling it.

@Inspired_2write – That’s just the way two year olds do everything. They have the attention span of a gnat. She CONSTANTLY talks or sings to herself. She switches topics every few minutes—sometimes every few seconds. She mixes songs together or starts singing about how daddy has gone to work and will come home soon. Sometimes she’ll surprise me and start talking about things that happened several months ago. The funeral she mentions is just one of the MANY things she chatters about. She doesn’t talk about it often.

We DID draw the line and did NOT take her to a child’s funeral. We feared she might say something inappropriate that would upset the family. We also feared that seeing someone that looked like a friend to play with in a box might be WAY too scary.

@keobooks Is there some sort of family get together or reception after the service? Could she just attend that and see the family?

My husband as an adult is freaked out about being in the box. LOL. He isn’t claustrophobic or anything like that, but the coffin and being underground is an extremely uncomfortable thought for him.

My grandmother lost her father when she was 5 and what she remembers most about the funeral was her aunt banging on the coffin angry at her brother for dying and leaving all his money to his wife with three little children. Burned into my grandma’s brain that scene. My only point with that, is if you have any relatives who might carry on a lot and scare your daaughter, I would avoid that.

But, fundamentally I don’t think it is wrong for children to go to funerals. I think you were right to not go to a child’s funeral with her. She might identify too closely with the person who passed away. Same if it is a young mother or father with very young children, she might identify with the children who lost their parent. Older relatives she probably won’t make that sort of connection.

Since her babble, like most toddlers, is all over the place, it seems the thoughts she expresses about the funerals affect you more than her. She seems to be just sorting information. A several years from now she will understand death better and might think back to far off memories of these funerals and suddenly it will all make sense to her. It’s a big puzzle in her mind I think, with pieces everywhere.

Sorry there has been so much loss in your family recently. :(

I agree with your husband. Sure, she’s young, but death is a part of life, so she’ll know eventually. I think you’re handling it just fine and her reaction/behavior is totally normal. Nothing to worry about.

I do, however, find it amusing that she was talking about death and then sang Ring Around the Rosie, of all songs.

I don’t understand “know eventually.” Many people have said this. Eventually everyone finds out about sex, violence, all sorts of things we don’t talk about with a 2 year old. We introduce things to children as we think they can process and handle them.

@JLeslie If I had a child that asked me a question about death, sex, or violence, I’m going to answer them regardless of their age. You can make the explanation age-appropriate without lying or giving cop-out answers.

A two year old is old enough to know that people die and they don’t come back. Saying something like “Grandma’s with the angels” is a huge cop-out, even if you believe she is.

My niece was curious at a young age. Her mom is a lesbian, so she was exposed to same-sex PDA’s early on. When she asked my mom, who practically raised her, about it, she’d never give her a straight (no pun intended) answer. This annoyed me. How hard is it to tell a 4-year-old that some boys like boys and some girls like girls? You don’t need to go into the nitty gritty sexual details at that age, but I’m not big on hiding real life from kids as they’re exposed to it.

@livelaughlove21 I agree if they ask tell them the truth at their level of understanding. I remember learning about what a cemetary was and what happens when you die around age 7 or 8. That might be very late, I don’t know, I am not advocating for that. I learned how babies are made way before grasping death and being buried.

The two year old didn’t ask. My guess is she wouldn’t even think about death, except that she has been around it.

@JLeslie We don’t know if she asked or not. The OP didn’t say. If she is going to these funerals and seeing bodies in caskets, I’m pretty sure she had a question or two.

@livelaughlove21 That’s what I am saying, the OP is exposing her to situations that would prompt questions. The OP herself has questioned whether that is the right thing to do. Most jellies seem to be fine with it.

@keobooks I’m the youngest on both sides of my family, therefore my son is the youngest child on either side of my family. He’s become a pro at funerals.

He was 2 when my father died. For many months he would interject that grandpa was dead into conversations.

He’s been to many more funerals since that one. He still discusses death intermittently. He’s now almost 8.

This willingness to discuss is a sign that a child has come to terms with a fact.

IMO, If she wasn’t handling it well, your daughter would be asking when the person was going to visit your phone again, or when she could call the person.

If you are desiring her to remember the good times, then due to her age, you could show her photos, videos or tell her stories with the good times as the highlights to the person’s life.

I probably wouldn’t take a toddler to a funeral, but just because they are likely to become restless or disrupt the proceedings, not because of dealing with death itself.

That said, I think you and your husband are great parents, based on what I know of your parenting style from here. This case is no exception. You’re handling it just right with your daughter, in a truthful and age-appropriate way. It’s unfortunate that it upsets some other people, but the only thing I can think of to prevent that is to keep those relatives away from your daughter for a little while after each funeral. That way she is free to talk about it, but they won’t hear it.

@augustlan I didn’t understand it to be that other people are bothered or upset about what her daughter says. It was the OP herself who found it a little creepy at times. I might have misunderstood.

Older relatives get upset when she talks about it. She’s only done it a few times. I think she went on and on and on about it to my mother in law once. She’s always asking me to tell her son to stop talking about morbid things with our daughter. She knows I wuss out and dodge the subject for the most part so she assumes I’m on the same page she is.

The worst one was when my grandmother died (great grandma jane was my stepdad’s stepmother when his dad remarried in his 70s – so we weren’t too close, btw) When my grandma died, my aunts and dad weren’t taking it very well at all. They were really broken up. We went to my grandma’s house after the memorial luncheon. She asked “Where’s great grandma?” I had no clue what to say, so I just said “She’s not here.” When she asked “Where is she?” My husband said that she died. My daughter started running into all of the rooms, and telling everyone she saw “Great Grandma’s not here! She died!” My family was NOT happy about this. I don’t think she had any idea what “dead” meant back then. She was just excited that she had some sort of news to tell people.

I would’t worry. She’s so young she doesn’t understand what is happening. It sounds like she is a normal little girl. Last year, my 3 year old granddaughter’s kitty cat died and shortly after that her other grandmother’s friend, a homeless guy who hung out on her curb, died. She was a little obsessed with this new knowledge of death and sort of fixated on it for a while. I think it is normal.

I also think that children that age pick up on the emotions of those around them and their learning antenna go up. Your little one, like my granddaughter, knew something out of the norm had happened and they were going to be a part of it-whether anyone wanted them to or not! It sounds like you are a superb mom and are pretty in tune with her and keeping her healthy and happy.

I too think the matter of fact approach is fitting. In my experience, with this age through probably 7, it is important to be careful about talking about how and why someone has died. She says “grandma has died. she was sick.” Toddlers and young children are pretty black and white. What can happen when the child or parent becomes sick with something like a cold is the child begins to think about or fear impending death. At such a young age it is enough to keep things to the “what” of things. “Grandma has died. This means she won’t be walking around and breathing anymore. Grandma is not going to visit anymore.” As they get older and are better able to understand some sicknesses, accidents, and choices are fatal and some are not will make talking about the “why” and “how” less confusing.

It’s sounds like you are doing a fairly decent job.

When my husband was sick, I brought my daughter to the hospital to see him before he passed, since he had an accident he looked completley different. One thing I do know is that children will grieve exactly like adults, as in the case with my daughter who when she saw her father said she wanted to leave, she did not want pictures after that day she was angry. She has now accepted it and can talk about her dad and laugh about stories and wear his jersey.

If a child has the understanding to know that a person is there with them in life then they have every right to understand that person is not there with them in death.

@keobooks I think this is healthy. I agree with a statement above that adults that find your child’s seemingly nonchalant discussion about death are probably having trouble themselves dealing with the passing of loved ones.

@livelaughlove21 the irony of Ring around the Rosy had occurred to me as well!

Any adult who is upset with a 2 year old babbling is being ridiculous in my opinion. If the adult is upset by it, because the topic is very upsetting, I don’t see why they can’t say to the child, “yes, grandma died and it makes me sad.” Just be honest, but not angry. Or, change the topic, or ignore it. She’s 2, she will say something totally unrelated in another minute. I just don’t understand some adults.

I think the problem with my dad’s family is that my dad was the only one of his siblings that got married and I was the only child. So there hasn’t been a kid in the family for almost 40 years until Maddie came along. I think they have a ton of unrealistic expectations about what kids should and shouldn’t do. It’s somewhat off topic to go here, but it’s really stressful sometimes to visit any of them because they basically expect my daughter to either act like a mute infant or a miniature adult.

With my husband’s family, they are more forgiving because they are used to kids being around. But his mother just worries about everything and gets concerned that her talking about it at all is a sign that she’s growing up warped.

It creeps me out mostly because I can’t stop thinking of what other people think. I should do that less, but I am constantly worried that people will think my husband and I are freaky parents for other reasons. We are freaky people for the most part.

@keobooks LOL. Well, freaky can be good. My impression has always been you are a loving, pensive, wonderful mommy. I know some of your, I’ll call them quirks, from questions you have written, and none of them make me think it would affect your parenting skills.

Even some adults who have children expect things from children I completely don’t understand. I wonder sometimes if I were a parent if I too would forget my own childhood, or the perspective of a child like some other parents. I get that as the parent one’s perspective has to change, but still, many of my friends really don’t remember being a young kid. It isn’t just that now they have to play the parent role and need to present a certain expectation to their children, literally even when not in front of their children just talking to me they have no clue, or no memory, or really were a different sort of child maybe. Not all of my peers, but enough that it is noticeable.

@keobooks Let your freak flag fly!

@keobooks Don’t worry about being perceived as freaky. I agree with @JLeslie, I think you are a wonderful mommy!. As @augustlan said so eloquently, let your freak flag fly! Set an example for your daughter to be the strong individual you seem to be.