So, last night makes 4 nights in a row of high emotions over death. :) We need SPRING to distract us already, haha! This coming Tuesday it's going to start raining, with higher daytime temps, and then it will rain for 7 days straight. But at least it's not snow, so I'll take it. April showers and whatnot, right?
So anyway, back to death and dying. It always comes up now during read-aloud time at night, and at bedtime. These are some of the things we covered last night:
Finn:
1. What if our star (the sun) goes supernova?? What then? How will we have light to see? Will we even survive?
2. How much does it hurt to die?
3. Can you please pray that none of the Schaefers will die unless they are really, really old?
4. Does Papa still have his sword (he has a random, ornamental sword in the basement)? I'm worried that it's in the basement. When the war gets to our house (we never talk about wars!) how will he protect us?
5. Organ donation.
6. Briefly touching on some topics from Revelation, like the new heaven and a new earth. When will the earth become new? Do we get to live on it? What happens to all the animals? Will we all have to DIE before we get a new earth?
7. Decided that he will open up a dinosaur petting zoo in heaven. (the only moment of levity in the hours of conversation)
8. Tons about wars. Is there a war now? Where are the wars? Who fights in the wars? Is it always two bad guys/bad sides who are fighting each other? Do the good guys always win wars? Do only adults get killed in wars? How would we survive in a war? Would we come back to MN after the war was over? etc. etc.
9. At 3:00 a.m. Finn is standing next to my bed asking what happens the EXACT moment you die. Do you immediately go to heaven and get a new brain there, if your brain stops working on earth? Does this hurt? How do I know?
10. MANY more from Finn. I lost track. I should have been writing them down, but that would have made me look even more mean than I did when I lost control at one moment and start laughing about one thing he said. He was not amused.
Layla:
1. She was sad remembering going to my Grandmother's funeral and seeing Claire crying. She realized Claire was sad because she KNEW Granny, and Layla didn't really know her, so Layla was crying last night because she was sad that she never really go to know Granny. :(
2. She mostly just listened to whatever question Finn asked, then was sad and would cry about his new thought or addition.
3. Asked to sleep with me last night...didn't feel safe unless she was next to a parent
I mean....GEEZ, guys. I'm way over my head in this stuff! My first thought was to head to the library website and get books on anxiety and fear in children (written FOR children, not me...haha). That's likely not gonna help much I'm guessing, but I'll likely still do it, because...books help almost anything.
My second thought was we need more EXERCISE and OUTDOOR time in our lives right now! Time to start dropping to sleep totally exhausted from the physical energy they have spent in a day, rather than living quite so much in our headspace.
But as I was thinking about this today I remembered my own childhood: I totally went through this too, at almost their exact same ages, except I was far less concerned about my own physical safety or the spiritual aspects of things as my kids seem to be. All I cared about was my parents. My parents went out for a date every Monday night of my childhood, it seems like, and from the ages of about 7-9 (I think?) I was sure they had died and would never be returning. Every Monday night. Every time they went on a date I was pretty sure they'd never be back, and I'd be this anxious mess until they returned. I'm not sure if I ever talked to them about it, because I was also old enough to know some of the logic of the actual situation: they were safe drivers, they wanted to come home safe, they had ALWAYS come home safe in the past, they were rarely late, etc, etc. I knew all that stuff in my head, but it 100% made no difference in my emotional response. Based on this very anecdotal experience, I'm guessing there is something that happens around this age when it comes to brain development that lets kids ponder much bigger life experiences, grappling with fears in new ways, etc.
I'm very passionate about research and knowing as much as possible about child development and brain development in kids, but most of my passion and interest focuses on ages Kindergarten and under. I guess it's time to expand my research base a bit!
Very random, but this made me think back on two good books I've read on the topic of death and dying. Both are very good, and both I'd highly recommend.
1. On Death and Dying, by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, M.D.
https://www.amazon.com/Death-Dying-Doctors-Nurses-Clergy/dp/B0007OXTFW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1523127848&sr=8-1&keywords=On+death+and+dying
2. Being Mortal: Medicine and what matters in the end, by Atul Gawande
https://www.amazon.com/Being-Mortal-Medicine-What-Matters/dp/B00NPAJ32S/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1523127937&sr=1-1&keywords=Being+Mortal
