May 14 2008
Hard Questions
My thoughts are very scattered today - our cat just died. Aside from coping with my own loss, I am struggling with how to break it to my children. We’ve tried to prepare them in advance so that it wouldn’t be a complete shock, yet I doubt that it won’t be. I was with her when she passed, and I’m a little shocked.
My son is a very intelligent child, but he, understandably, has trouble with abstracts. This is one reason why social situations stymie him so much. If I have a hard time explaining to him the concept of personal space or why he has to wash his hands after using the bathroom (relatively concrete things), how am I supposed to make him understand that our cat is gone, and she’s not coming back without giving him more anxiety than he already has? His counselor had said to draw him a picture, which I did. He keeps asking why medicine won’t make her better.
“Because she’s (or was) very old.”
Eventually he hits me with a big question, “Why does everyone have to die?”
He’s too smart for me, and I don’t know how to answer.
