How do you talk to children about death?
While I was looking for white chocolate icing for my daughter's birthday cake in the Coop, they played «Toucher» by Züri West over the loudspeakers. I scanned all the cupcake mixes and coloured sugar coating options and heard Kuno Lauener: «i fluge gärn, i bi geng gärn gfloge, knapp über em Bode oder ganz, ganz hoch obe.»
When I got home and switched on the radio, Kuno continued singing. «... but somehow I don't know what and why. We've just reached the point where nothing more can happen ...» I winced and was convinced at that moment: The sexiest man alive, the man who caresses microphone poles and turns the most precise prose into music with rough vocal chords, is no longer there. Kuno is dead. A Google search relieved me: Kuno «only» had a birthday. He turned 60, hence the increased radio presence.
The death of my father
Since my father died unexpectedly at the end of January, all I see is death and transience everywhere. Yes, he had a good and long life and yet I'm still left with a lot of «why's». Why is he suddenly no longer here? Why can I no longer philosophise with him about FC St. Gallen? Why does he never answer the phone when I call his parents?
Since then, a fine filter of melancholy has covered my everyday life with the children. They loved him, their «Grospi». And my 9-year-old daughter and 7-year-old son made a little shrine in the kitchen with photos, shells, a Buddha and notes on which they wrote «Grospi». They were very considerate of me and put up with my thin-skinnedness. But then came the dreaded Gretchen question: «Dad, where is Grospi now?»
I told my 4-year-old son about Rainbow Land and he was happy to accept the story and embellish it himself. However, when he saw the grave for the first time, I realised from his questions that he couldn't reconcile the fact that his grandfather was lying here in the ground with his ideas about the land of the rainbow. Nevertheless, he seemed quite content and I was glad to have reassured at least one child with a bit of afterlife poetry.
The older two made it more difficult for me. After the priest had reported at the funeral that his grandfather was now in heaven with God and looking down on his grandchildren, my seven-year-old son said soberly at lunch: «Dad, I don't believe in God, so Grospi can't be in heaven either.» Of course, this statement startled me at first, but as an agnostic, the reasoning didn't seem entirely wrong to me.
The daughter, on the other hand, struggled with the naked fear of death. How could it be that I would be gone at some point? She couldn't fall asleep and cried in the face of the existential threat that her grandfather's death had brought home to her.
How can I take away my children's fear of death?
How do you talk to children about death when you yourself only know that you know nothing? To go with Nietzsche or Camus and propagate to the children that God himself is dead and that we can never know what comes after - that's a bit difficult for me.
I grew up Catholic myself and the answer there is clear and understandable at first glance: if we behave well, then we will be rewarded with the kingdom of heaven. But that didn't work for me at all as a child. I was convinced that Jesus' sentence «A camel would sooner go through the eye of a needle than a rich man into heaven» would not let the dentist's son (which I was) into the beautiful afterlife. That scared me. Fear of hell.
The obvious answer, which the priest also used in the end and which is also generally popular, is that the grandfather is now in a better place.
Yes, this better place has a long religious tradition and is a primeval human hope with evocative names: Valhalla, Dschanna, Nirwana, eternity. But what if parents find it hard to believe that something better is yet to come? What if you struggle with it yourself? What does someone who doesn't believe believe in? Can children endure these doubts or is it educationally downright a sin (another religious term) to leave them in this doubt?
What ultimately helped me was the great sympathy, the conversations with loved ones who asked questions. They also wanted to hear what it was like to have been there when my father took his last breath. Yes, I felt the need to tell them because it was very close to me and I wanted to process it.
And what helped the children?
Probably everyday life. Yes, life goes on. Repressing things is part of human nature and we can be happy as a family if we are not like my mother, who lives in a flat where every piece of furniture reminds her of her deceased husband. A flat that is empty and silent. We, on the other hand, have each other, we have the noise, the arguments, we laugh, play and want cake with white icing.
We were also helped by two books that we received as gifts from loved ones.
Firstly, the book «Ich pass von oben auf dich auf. A story about going away and staying away» by Martina Schütze. It tells the touching story of the death of beloved grandfather Pico, who can make up stories, competes in rollator races and plays the harmonica. The second book is by Britta Teckentrup and is called «The Tree of Memory». It tells of the death of a fox in the forest and how the stories told about the fox grow into a tree with all the beautiful memories of the fox. The two books do not give final answers but show how humour and storytelling are probably the most important tools in dealing with grief.
And if I still don't feel better despite the fond memories of my father, then I listen to Züri West and Kuno Lauener whispers to me: «Somewhere along the line you'll find happiness, somewhere along the line, suddenly it feels like home again, somewhere along the line you'll find happiness.»
