I was going to share a different post with you today, then yesterday I listened to the wonderful podcast of Christina Rasmussen talking with her two daughters, Elina and Isabel, about their father’s death 15 years ago when they were six and four. This kind of conversation doesn’t happen often enough.
Before I talk about this, I want to remind you that it’s important to pay attention when people say they are struggling to hold their thoughts together. Seven years ago today, we lost Robin Williams to suicide as he tried to cope with Lewy body dementia that brought depression, anxiety, paranoia, and hallucinations. You can read my post about that at: https://widowersgrief.blogspot.com/2019/08/lost-to-suicide.html
Like suicide, talking about grief should not be taboo. We should not feel ashamed when someone we love dies because then we will say nothing about it to others, and this is when we need their support.
Anastasia Higginbotham wrote a children’s book (Death is Stupid) about the importance of talking to your children when someone dies and answering their questions honestly. Depending upon their age, children may not understand everything we say, but they will understand enough to satisfy them.
On her Dear Life podcast, Christina talked with her daughters about death, grief, early memories, and resiliency. The three of them have had many conversations about this, and the daughters have come to understand what happened with more depth and insight. What surprised me was how normal it seemed for them to talk about grief. Elina and Isabel were eloquent and insightful.
Neither of them remembers much more than a blur about that day, but they could tell that something was off. The memories they have come from what others have told them. Christina was surprised by how much more Elina, then age six, understood than Isabel who was only two years younger.
The daughters spoke of growing up missing their father, feeling that a part was missing, and how death began a different kind of relationship with their dad that has kept him in their lives. Elina was delighted to read her father’s writings and discover that she thought like he did. Both of them are moving beyond their childhood memories and imagining him at their age and what he would say to them now. They wished that he could be here to see who they’ve become. As Christina said, it’s like watching the past and present dance with each other.
Even with Christina’s compassion and deep understanding about grief, and with all of their conversations with each other, the daughters said it was helpful to talk to counselors and therapists outside the family to gain perspective on what they were going through, and their relationship with grief has evolved.
It’s heartwarming to listen to young adults talk so openly about death and hear their acceptance and understanding. This should be the norm. When someone in the family dies, we should talk about it, not just when the death happens, but through the years. Too often, we try to protect children from a tragedy with vague cover stories. But children can tell when we’re not telling them the whole truth, and they will imagine something worse to fill in the gaps.
When they were growing up, Elina and Isabel were reluctant to let their friends know that their father had died, although they hoped that their closest friends would figure it out and start a conversation. When she was in her mid-teens, Isabel said she would sometimes bring up her dad’s death just to see how her friends would react. I suspect she wanted to know how something that was so important to her was perceived by her community. Now, more confident about her grief, she’s happy to talk about his death if it happens to come up. Elina and Isabel will be a great resource and support for their friends when they lose someone they love.
You can listen to their podcast at: www.dearlifepodcast.com/episodes/ep116
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