Jane Moore has
facilitated grief groups for children through the Good Mourning Program at
Rainbow Hospice for 21 years. Thank you, Jane, for sharing your thoughts.
Tell me how you became interested in working with children
around the subject of grief.
I was an elementary school teacher
for 27 years. Around year fifteen, the father of one of the children in
my class suddenly died at 36. I had no idea what to do nor did I receive
any suggestions from my principal. I ended up contacting a clergy person
who coincidentally was a hospice chaplain. I became a hospice volunteer
myself and ended up writing my dissertation about the death of a student and
how three of his teachers experienced the death and were not supported in their
grief at school. As a result, I developed a course for teachers at
National Louis where I taught called “Death in a School Context.” I
taught it for ten years.
What would be 3 important points you want people to know
about grieving children?
1. Young children are egocentric and
believe that they are the cause of everything that happens. It’s
important to let children know that nothing they did (or did not do) caused the
death to occur.
2. As children reach new
developmental levels, they re-grieve the losses that occurred when they were
younger. So a child who suffers the death of a parent at 5 may re-grieve
that loss at 10 or 12 when he or she fully understands that death is permanent
and that the loved one will not be there for important milestones or every day
occurrences.
3. Just like adults, children
experience a variety of emotions after a death—they are not just sad.
They may be angry at the person for leaving them, or afraid that their
ghosts might come to scare them, or anxious about being alone or afraid that
someone else they love will die soon. It is important to validate those
feelings, while making sure that the child does not hurt him or herself or
others.
Has your personal experience as a grandmother altered any of
your professional insights?
I think that the loss of my own
mother once I was a a grandmother really helped me to understand how important
it is to tell the stories and share memories with grandchildren. My
oldest two granddaughters knew my mother and I like to help them remember their
times with her. My three grandsons never met her. I keep her picture at
home and talk to them about her and connect the things that we do together to
the things she did with their mom.
How can grandparents help a child during a troubled time -
if not death, then parent divorce, miscarriage, or distress about things seen
on TV?
Grandparents can be the “safe”
people to talk to about a loss or a worry. Sometimes children protect
their parents (while usually their parents are protecting them) and don’t want
to cause any more upset. By talking about the concern with the children,
you let them know that it is an okay subject to bring up. That is a huge
help to children.
Thank you, Jane.
Jane
Moore is Professor Emerita at National Louis University where she developed and
taught a course, “Death in a School Context” for educators. She currently
teaches “Theories of Bereavement and Intervention” and “Death in Pop Culture”
in the Thanatology (study of death, dying, and bereavement) program at the
University of Western Ontario. Jane is a long-time member of the
Association for Death Education and Counseling, where she holds a Fellow of Thanatology
designation. She is a the mother of two adult children and grandmother of
five, ranging in age from 2 to 11. https://www.facebook.com/St-Marks-Episcopal-Church-Glen-Ellyn-190386384342276/
