Who helps children when a parent or sibling dies?

This is a guest post from Phonenix Bereavement Support as part of my promotion of charities for free on my blog during June 2012.

Ben* was devastated when his Dad died. It was so sudden. He went out in
the morning to work, but didn’t come home. His motorbike had skidded off
the road. Ben’s Mum couldn’t stop crying, and his little brother kept asking
him, ‘When’s Daddy coming home?’

None of us like to think about death, especially our own, but for some children
and young people death comes into their family very unexpectedly and very
suddenly, like in the story above. What happens to children if one of their
parents or a brother or sister dies? Their whole world is turned upside down.
Their sense of security is lost. How many fairy stories are there, where a child
loses a parent? This is because it is one of our worst fears, our most primal
fears. Even when we are adults and a parent dies we can feel abandoned,
lost and alone. We can feel angry, bitter, sad or all of these at the same time.
For children and young people, this swirl of emotions is very confusing. They
wonder, ‘Am I normal?’ ‘Why do I feel like this?’ And often, the surviving
parent or carer is so lost in their own grief that they find it very difficult to
support their child.

Back at school, Ben*discovered that his teachers didn’t know how to talk to
him. They had told other children that Ben would be very sad and might not
want to talk about it. Ben found that no one spoke to him at all, because they
didn’t know what to say.

Children and young people who have lost a parent or sibling can find school
a very difficult place. Thought it is hard to believe, some are bullied precisely
because of their bereavement. Many of them find it hard to cope, and start
behaving in ways they would never have done before. They get in trouble at
school, and can even be excluded. They may try drugs, early sex and alcohol,
because it is a way of forgetting or of feeling close to others.

Eventually Ben heard of somewhere he could go for help. He was beginning to
think that nobody understood, that nobody felt the same as him and that he
was alone. So when he heard about Phoenix Bereavement Support he got in
touch.

Phoenix Bereavement Support helps children, young people and their families when someone close dies.

We offer group support and social events to help
bereaved children rebuild their confidence and learn how to face the future
with hope. We also offer one to one support for those who need it most.

Phoenix Bereavement Support receives no financial help from the government
or local council so we depend on our community to support us. To donate and
help children like Ben* please call Tina or Lorraine on 01432 264555 or email
info@phoenixbereavement.org. You can also like our page on Facebook or
follow us on Twitter @linda_phoenix. Thank you for your help.

*name changed for illustration