My 6 year old son's fascination with death.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Every night, when I put him to bed, we have long, drawn-out talks about very important things. Lately we have been talking a lot about dying. A typical conversation:

Babyboy: Mom, am I going to die?

Me: Yes, honey, everyone dies. Nobody has ever lived forever, and nobody ever will. You will die, hopefully when you get very old.

Bb: Will you bury me?

Me: I will die before you. I’ll die when I get very old, but you’ll still be alive.

Bb: YOU’RE GONNA DIE??

Me: Yup. Everybody dies. It’s not a bad thing- every day old people die, and new babies are born to take their place. It’s a fact of life.

Bb: After you die, will you come back to life? Will I come back to life?

Me: No. When you’re dead, you’re dead forever.

Bb: WHAT?? DEAD FOREVER?? Will we go to heaven?

Me: Some people believe that you go to heaven when you die, but I don’t. I don’t think you go anywhere when you die. But you can believe in heaven, that’s okay.

<tears, consolation, hugs, more questions, more tears ensue>

Tonight during the Death Talk, I told him that some people believe that after you die you come back to life but in a new body, as a new baby. He really liked that idea, so I said, “Okay, then you can believe that. It’s okay to believe that you will come back as somebody else after you die.”

Case closed. Smiles replace tears, and instant understanding of death and the cycle of life ensues. After I agree that I will believe this scenario also. I’m only too happy to believe it to make him feel better. I love him, and I hope we always have these talks.

2

AFAIK, this is perfectly normal for his age. Curiosity about facts of life that we later take for granted is characteristic of childhood. I can remember asking my father what it felt like to be dead when I was but a wee spacetime wrinkle.

3

Trublmaker –

I think that the questions are quite natural and show a great deal about your children. Treasure them.

Our daughter refused to acknowledge dreams for her first 5 years in a way that would worry parents. Well, it would worry parents who talk about dreams and who expect candid communications from children, at any rate.

Then one day, about age 5, I get the question. (These seem to happen in the car in our household.)

“Dad: what makes you think this is all real?”

Though not as wise and as old as I am today, I knew enough to ask for a clarification. “Anne, understand that many wise people have asked that question, starting with a philosopher named Descartes. But what do you mean?”

“What makes you think that this isn’t all a dream?”

“If it were a dream and I pinched you, it wouldn’t hurt,” I responded. But reaching over to her I said, “What happens if I pinch your now?” She understood immediately that it was a “more immediate” physical process.

She’ll be 20 this week. It’s still an interesting issue. Maybe string theory makes it less certain. It’s not likely that she’ll bring it up . . . she’s on to other issues.

What did the incident at age 5 teach us? That our child had thought processes that were sophisticated and not obvious. It might – or might not – be related to the “death” concerns of your child.

You may be much wiser than use in working through this. Or it may be indicative of a phase unrelated to later activities.

Best regards,

Mooney252

4

I think I would have asked what brought on the subject…did he see a film or did some kids in the neighborhood bring it up?

When I was little, there was fear of nuclear bombs (showing my age here) and I asked my grandmother if we were going to die.

“Everybody dies eventually. That is the deal you make if you want to be born.”

It made perfect sense to me.

5

Well, adults avoid the subject of death often around kids. I’ve always thought that’s why kids’ songs and such are often so gruesome, and why they love disturbing and alarming books like Lemony Snicket and Roald Dahl - it’s their way of exploring death and other facts of life. No wonder my mom could never stand the things we used to sing in the back seat!

I’m looking over my dead dog Rover
That I over-ran with the mower
His front legs are missing
The back ones are gone

I forget the rest. And this one’s really been bothering me - I can’t remember the rest of the song and nobody else seems to know it:

My mother has tuberculosis
My father has only one lung
They sit and spit blood in a bucket
…

I’m glad you answer his questions instead of avoiding them, although it must be awfully frustrating for a child to ask a question that to them must be much the same as “why is the sky blue” or “what makes the wires in the toaster turn red” and get answers that have “nobody knows” in them. I wish my folks had said “nobody knows” or even “some people think” instead of “you die and go to heaven”, though.

6

I heard a variant that went like:

*My Bonnie has tuberculosis
My Bonnie has only one lung
My Bonnie (something something)
Oh bring back my Bonnie’s left lung…

My Bonnie looked into a gas tank
The height of its contents to see
I lit a match to assist her
Oh, bring back my Bonnie to me…*

My mom taught me these. My dad was responsible for the dirty rhymes of the “Three Irishmen, three Irishmen…” variety.

Getting back to the actual subject, I don’t recall asking a lot of questions about death – I just remember that the earliest inkling of it was that even Wayne Gretzky will eventually die. :eek:

7

I heard it-
“One leg is missing,
the other is gone,
the third one is scattered
all over the lawn.
No need explaining
the fourth remaining
it’s spinning on the car porch floor.
Oh, I’m looking over…”

Thanks to Dr. Demento!

8

Taught to me by my later father (Thanks, Dad!)

My Bonnie has tuberculosis
She only has one little lung
She spits out the blood & corruption
And rolls it around on her tongue!
Rolls it, rolls it- she rolls it around on her tongue, her tongue! (repeat once)

I love my Dad!

9

I think at his age he is not really looking for the factual answer to his questions. He is rather looking to be reassured that you won’t be leaving him anytime soon and that he won’t be dropping dead on the playground. I would answer him a bit differently. For instance:

“You will most probably live to be a very old man. Is that what you wanted to know?”

And, “Mommy will probably be around for a very long time. I am not planning on leaving you anytime soon.”

Honestly, I think that continuing to answer him by telling him he is going to die and you are going to die is just continuing to foster his anxiety. I think the fact he keeps asking is a clue that he is seeking to be reassured, not answered with the unvarnished truth.

10

My daughter (almost six) obsesses about her “dead Grandmas” We lost two Great Grandmas within a week about a year ago that she knew personally. She is named after another that died before she was born - so she really misses her. (All these women were quite elderly, in the case of my grandmother, death came as a blessing after years of continued decline). She is always very sad about all of this.

Then I made the mistake of introducing the “dead grandparents” she didn’t know. She has one living Great Grandfather that I haven’t seen in 20 years - who probably has pictures of her (my father keeps up a Christmas card correspondence).

(If you are counting, we may be up to more “dead grandparents” than happens naturally. Both Brainiac4 and I come from families that prove step-families were not invented in the 1970s)

And the idea of generations. Her grandmother had a grandmother. And she had a mother and a grandmother. So know my daughter wants to know how many dead grandmas she has.

(Is this a sign she’ll be a geneologist?)

11

Putting my former student teacher (Prefirst, first, second grades) hat on, it’s perfectly normal. This is the age when they start to understand there is a world outside of you and them, and that things can change, and that you, or they, could go away and leave them.
Your kid wants reassurance as much as anything, but face it, death is pretty fascinating. I mean… people are alive, then they’re not? Why? How? Where do they go? I mean… it’s a person! I know that person! It can’t end, right?

Don’t worry, don’t encourage it too much, just treat it as part of life.