@ teaching about death resources?

[ringstrue]

Was it SBP who mentioned this before?

I will probably have to put the rabbit down on a few days. DD isn't horribly attached but she'd obviously know of he and his pen were gone. We are just trying to figure out how to explain what has happened to him and where he went.

[Deleted]

Considering how old she is, I'd be inclined to tell her the rabbit when to live somewhere else.

[MrsAxilla]

How old is she again? We had to put a dog down when Ben was two. We told him the dog was old and sick and we took him to the dog hospital where he died. He isn't coming back but we loved him and will always remember him. I'm sure Ben didn't quite understand, but he didn't really ask any difficult questions.

[ringstrue]

She's 3 in a month. Idk how to talk about where his body went (we will cremate him but idk if we wanna get into that, lol) i don't want to say he went somewhere specific that she'll beg us to take her to visit him.

[MrsAxilla]

Ben just assumed his body was still at the vet.

[wawa]

Really? People actually do the "big awesome farm" lie about pets dying to 3 year olds?

huh.

I thought it was just a TV thing. Seems like a lame copout to me.

[Deleted]

I think a 3 year old is old enough to have a straight forward conversation about losing a pet. You don't have to go into great detail, just something about how the rabbit was old and sick and her body didn't work anymore and then she died. Your child will ask questions and that is a-okay, just provide age approrpiate answers. I don't get lying about it.

[y4m]

My childhood best friend's mom told her that her gerbil (Betty Lou) was traveling the world. And then Betty Lou regularly sent postcards.

I'm not recommending this as a parenting strategy, but it is a fun memory from my childhood.

[Deleted]

I'm not lying. He did go somewhere else! lol

If grandma died when the kid was little, sure, we'd discuss death. Or even a family pet my child was overly invested in or one we found dead.

But an animal that I had to have put down? In a way, by telling them they just died, you're lying to them anyway so why not go to full monty and just say he had to go elsewhere? Because I sure as shit am not going to tell my almost three year old that mommy let the doctor kill little bunny foo foo.

[bluestreet]

I think pets dying is a great opportunity to explain death and that all living things eventually pass out of this form into another. It's like a starter concept-of-death kit!

When my girls were 7 and 3, a neighbor's hamster we were taking care of died (of old age). It was comical, in a macabre sort of way- I was freaked out that he'd died on my watch and the girls were poking it with a stick (poor guy) and laughing at me. A family dog would be much harder, I'm sure, but I still think it's an easier way for kids to grasp death than the first instance being an uncle/sibling/parent.

But I think our culture is generally backwards about shielding kids from death. It's natural and inevitable. Making it a taboo subject just sets people up to be devastated and confused, IMHO. Not that having a pet die will make a human's death awesome or fun down the road, but less freakish maybe.

[Deleted]

Plus, I think that given that her child is attached to this bunny, that it would be more confusing to tell the child that you just up and let the bunny live somewhere else for no reason. I am certainly not advocating that you tell her that the bunny got put down, just tell her that the bunny was sick and died (which is true, right?). It doesn't have to be more complicated than that.

[Deleted]

But she isn't attached to the bunny. She'd just notice the bunny is gone. Not necessarily the same thing. If she were attached, I'd spend more time discussing it.

[wawa]

Jul 18, 2012 9:23:41 GMT -5 @habbsies said:

I'm not lying. He did go somewhere else! lol

If grandma died when the kid was little, sure, we'd discuss death. Or even a family pet my child was overly invested in or one we found dead.

But an animal that I had to have put down? In a way, by telling them they just died, you're lying to them anyway so why not go to full monty and just say he had to go elsewhere? Because I sure as shit am not going to tell my almost three year old that mommy let the doctor kill little bunny foo foo.

Even though it's not al all the same, this reminds me of my slightly crazy SIL who yelled at me for assuring my neice that there were no sharks in the water at the jersey shore. They don't lie to their children! And then she told the kid that because it's the ocean there could be sharks, but probably not. Yeah...she didn't touch the water for the rest of the vacation.

/unrelated side story

Anyway...The bunny was sick and old and his body didn't work anymore. So he went to the vet and died and is gone now.

Which part of that is a lie?

It's not like you show the kid a forged death certificate showing natural causes.

But my mom was perhaps overly honest about the death thing, because I remember being royally pissed off at her for taking our cat to be put down when I was 4. She told me she was taking Claude to the vet because he was sick, and then came home without him and explained that they couldn't make him better so he got put down. I was SO FUCKING MAD at her for not giving me a chance to say goodbye to him. (since she chose to have him put down, I knew that she could have chosen to wait and let me see him again. And I remember thinking in my 4 year old way that she was fullofshit and knew that was going to happen when she left with him). Little 4 year old rage ragey enough that I distinctly remember it. So...yeah. Middle ground somewhere in there for sure.

ETA: And I'm pretty sure I grilled her every time she took a pet to the vet for the next 5 years or so just in case she was going to kill that one off too without telling me.

(wow. Two random stories in one post. I think I've been bottling them up ever since the oneupper thread)

[wawa]

Andplusalso - just to be clear, I'm not judging "the bunny went away". Not hard at least.

Maybe on "hmmm, those are not the shoes I'd wear with that outfit" level rather than "OMG LEGGINGS ARE NOT PANTS i CAN SEE YOUR THONG YOU TWIT" level.

[wawa]

Jul 18, 2012 9:52:28 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Jul 18, 2012 9:12:22 GMT -5 wawa said:

Really? People actually do the "big awesome farm" lie about pets dying to 3 year olds?

huh.

I thought it was just a TV thing. Seems like a lame copout to me.

Says the woman who has never tried to explain death to a toddler.

Right, because my 3 year old sister never crawled into my lap when I was 8 and asked why daddy wasn't coming home.

go fuck yourself.

[Deleted]

Jul 18, 2012 9:55:56 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Jul 18, 2012 9:27:21 GMT -5 @mjmksb04 said:

Plus, I think that given that her child is attached to this bunny, that it would be more confusing to tell the child that you just up and let the bunny live somewhere else for no reason. I am certainly not advocating that you tell her that the bunny got put down, just tell her that the bunny was sick and died (which is true, right?). It doesn't have to be more complicated than that.

Oh my god. Have you people ever had this conversation with a toddler? "It doesn't have to be more complicated than that."!! How many questions can your child ask about breakfast cereal? What do you think they will do with a topic like death? It is over their head. It is scary. It is rife with euphemisms and nearly impossible to put into toddler-speak. I cannot think of a reason in the world why you would have this conversation with a child who will absolutely not understand it unless you absolutely had to. Which you don't with a pet.

Yes, I have had this conversation with a toddler and it was about a sibling, not a bunny. My DD died when she was 14 days old and my DS was 2 at the time and we had to explain that to him. So, thanks for making assumptions. And now I am shaking.

[Deleted]

Dude, wawa, I'd be pissed at your mom too. And dude I'd rather fudge a lie than explain the statistical odds of there being sharks in the water. It's not really a lie anyway. There are likely no fucking sharks at the Jersey shore and if there are, they will probably eat one of those twats further out than the toddler building a sandcastle at the water's edge.

For me, it totally depends on the relationship between the child and the animal. Like I told pete his goldfish died and made him bury it in the backyard. He was four. And it was his fault the poor thing croaked because I specifically told him we had to be careful feeding him and taking care of him. So he decided he would pour a whole container of dried shrimp up in there.

At that point, I felt I had no choice but to be all see, he's dead. Animals die when we don't take care of them. YWIA!

[Deleted]

Jul 18, 2012 9:55:56 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Oh my god. Have you people ever had this conversation with a toddler? "It doesn't have to be more complicated than that."!! How many questions can your child ask about breakfast cereal? What do you think they will do with a topic like death? It is over their head. It is scary. It is rife with euphemisms and nearly impossible to put into toddler-speak. I cannot think of a reason in the world why you would have this conversation with a child who will absolutely not understand it unless you absolutely had to. Which you don't with a pet.

What if I'm get sick? Am I going to die???

Grandma is sick and in the hospital. Is she going to die??

But rabbit didn't look sick. Are you sick? How will you know if you're sick? Are you going to die?

Am I going to die??

Never underestimate a toddler's ability to run with shit.

[wawa]

Jul 18, 2012 9:58:29 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Jul 18, 2012 9:56:41 GMT -5 wawa said:

Right, because my 3 year old sister never crawled into my lap when I was 8 and asked why daddy wasn't coming home.

go fuck yourself.

Whoa! Did not know that and I'm very sorry that that happened to you at that age.

You did actually. I distinctly remember talking about it in the post where you asked for advice about your grandmother. so frankly you can still go fuck yourself. I don't expect you to remember every personal story anybody ever told you, but a little reflection on a touchy topic before saying something that assy might have been in order.

[Deleted]

Okay, now I'll just be sitting in the thoughtless asshole corner with sbp feeling like a world class dickface.

How do you feel about cornbread, sbp? It's kind of dry but we kind of deserve it. I'm out of milk too.

[Deleted]

Please don't turn this back around on me. You asked "Have you people ever had this conversation with a toddler?" as if I was too stupid to understand what was at stake.

[heyjude]

I'm sorry about the bunny RT.

***backs slowly out.***

[wawa]

Jul 18, 2012 10:02:49 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Jul 18, 2012 10:00:58 GMT -5 @habbsies said:

What if I'm get sick? Am I going to die???

Grandma is sick and in the hospital. Is she going to die??

But rabbit didn't look sick. Are you sick? How will you know if you're sick? Are you going to die?

Am I going to die??

Never underestimate a toddler's ability to run with shit.

7 mos later, I'm still answering questions about death, heaven, old age, child mortality, parental mortality, where God lives, why we can't visit...

Again, sometimes the conversation is necessary. The fact that it is so incredibly hard is enough for me to say don't do it unless you have to. And you don't for a bunny.

I do understand this way of thinking. My theory (yes, untested with my own children thus far) is that at least with a bunny it's easier to distance the kids from the concept. They'll learn about it eventually anyway - and it's much gentler to be talking about dead bunny than dead human.

But ya know, how you deal with the dead bunny is not your make or break parenting moment, so really you just go with your gut.

[wawa]

Jul 18, 2012 10:08:15 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Jul 18, 2012 10:01:39 GMT -5 wawa said:

You did actually. I distinctly remember talking about it in the post where you asked for advice about your grandmother. so frankly you can still go fuck yourself. I don't expect you to remember every personal story anybody ever told you, but a little reflection on a touchy topic before saying something that assy might have been in order.

All I can say is I'm sorry. If I had remember that, I obviously wouldn't have said what I said.

thanks for the sorry.

[Deleted]

Jul 18, 2012 10:06:21 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Jul 18, 2012 10:02:20 GMT -5 @habbsies said:

Okay, now I'll just be sitting in the thoughtless asshole corner with sbp feeling like a world class dickface.

How do you feel about cornbread, sbp? It's kind of dry but we kind of deserve it. I'm out of milk too.

I love cornbread. I have a really good cornbread casserole recipe:

1 box Jiffy corn bread mix
1 stick of butter
1 can creamed corn
1 can kernel corn (drained)
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
chopped onions and peppers to taste

Mix. Bake in oven at 350 till toothpick comes out clean.

That sounds tasty. I might make this next week with some bbq chicken.