Single grandparenting

My youngest child (a boy), died when he was 25 years old. At that time I had only one g.child, a toddler. Since his death a further seven have been born and are growing up (four in their teens and the other four all school age). The first one born after his death was named for him (although the female version of his name).
All my children have photos of him in their homes, and all have talked about to their children about their dead Uncle G.
As we are a family of definite atheists, there has never been anything about heaven, or meeting again, etc. etc.
We talk about his life, and laugh about some of his shortcomings. All the children have grown up knowing that Uncle G is dead, but we all still love his memory very much.
None of them have ever had any sort of problems with this.

I’ve always been a single grandma. My husband died long before I had any grandchildren. I’ve never given it a thought, apart from being pleased they have a nice grandpa in my DIL’s father.

Not long ago my little granddaughter (4 at the time) worked out that I was Daddy’s mummy and asked where Daddy’s daddy was. My son just said that he had died when he (my son) was a little boy. GD looked sad for a minute but accepted it easily.

Children, even little ones, should not be protected from the circumstances of ordinary life. It makes them vulnerable and more likely to be distressed when they do find out.

By talking about death when your granddauughter doesn't quite understand it enables her to grow into understanding of death in her own way.

Thank you all for your advice and support. I have been honest with my DGD and used the word "died". I don't think she understands what it means, but I hope that we will be able to talk about him more as she gets older. I do agree that her parents should be the ones to explain but they have never been around at the relevant time. At the moment she is so young and innocent that I want to protect her from all upset, but I do realise that it can't be done !

I was a childminder when my husband died and my minders parents had obviously explained as I had some time of until after the creamation service etc. The first day back when I collected them from school they said that they were very sorry about what had happened and that they understood that he wasn't in the cemetery like their granny that he had gone up to heaven in a puff of smoke from the big fire at the creamatorium. They were very fond of him and I thought their explanation was wonderful

There is a lot of good advise here for you. My Mum died when I was 2 and although I always knew this, I felt I couldnt ask my Dad about her because I didnt want to upset him. If I did ask or on the odd occasion he mentioned her, he would suddenly change the subject, so I learned not to ask. I feel that if he had told me that yes, he got upset when talking about her but he wanted to and wanted me to know about her and had photos of her around the place, i would have been able to ask. There is so much I wanted to ask and now its too late. Having a Step Mum made it more difficult for him as he couldnt mention my Mum infront of her. Thank fully you dont have that problem. I personally, dont think its a bad thing for children to see adults upset as long as they know why. It teaches them that its ok to cry.
Hope you feel supported by all the wonderful messages here.

When I worked as a counsellor in a hospice, I came across a brilliant book for explaining death to young children. It talked about (and I can’t remember the exact name, though someone out there might be able to help me) a particular creature which started as a bug in the water but, when it matures, it flies from the water to find a new life. Once it has done this, it can’t come back into the water but we know that it has grown up and gone on to another place. It was such a beautiful story, better if I knew what creature I was talking about, though. A dragonfly or something, maybe? Yes, I’ve just googled it. The larvae turn into dragonflies, then leave the water, in their majesty of colours, so it can be a pretty story and not a one to be afraid to tell.

DDiL's father died when she was 5 after a longish illness. She has photos of him on display and he has always been part of family conversation since DGC were tiny. The children accepted, at a very young age, that they only had one living grandfather and that Mummy's Daddy had died when she was only 5. His widow never remarried and she is the grandmother they see most as she lives close by. It has never been an issue.

My GCs learnt about death through family pets dying. GD found the rabbit dead of shock in the hutch. She had forgotten to shut them up and the fox or wiesel got in.

It was her fault. She couldn't stop crying in school and in the end all the girls in her class were crying, so the teacher gave them a talk about death and dying. What a morning!

Then they had to pull themselves together and they did and when GD came home she was quite calm.

The fact of death is treated as natural if parents and grandparents dont make it up into something else.
Why not shed a tear?

Two of my grandkids only have me, as their deceased dad s dad died before they were born and his mum who they only met a couple of times when they were very little soon afterwards They re very limited bless them one parent and one grandparent

We have a wall of family photos in our dining room going back a couple of generations. They are of my H family and mine. Many of the people are now dead. It has provided hours of discussion by family and visitors and the GC just know they were all part of our family and people we loved. They know they are dead.

My gdsons are also missing a grandad...(my dad is still here and my mum so they have great granparents) but they are 82 and cannot run around etc..

so yes like many have to be "mum and dad" we sometimes have to be Gran and grandad..I suppose children just accept.

My gs are 11 and 3 n half.

so the 3 n half has never seen met his Gd
a few months ago...he suddenly said to his mum (my DD)
Grandad is taking me to the park after...she said which grandad as knew it certainly couldnt be my dad ) he pointed the my dhs photo and said "that one"! hmmm...

I would answer any questions honestly, children are very resilient. My DGS1 was almost 3 when my DH died, he still remembered Gramps & both DD (he was her adored Step-F) & I have a photo of us as a couple in the house. DGS1 told my DD when she was pregnant with DGS2 that he would play "peek-a-boo" with his little brother just like Gramps did with him, DGS1 is 7 now so the memory is still there.

My DD had difficulty understanding why her Granddad wasn't my Dad, she was about 4. I had to explain that my Dad had died & Granny had married Granddad before she was born, took her a little while to understand. A few times of asking me & then nothing more was said. Recently she has asked me about my DF as I rarely talk about him, I was in my early 20s when he died, DD is now 37, she is interested in her Ancestry.

I was widowed 5 years ago & the sadness is that DGS2 will never know his Gramps, my DH would have adored having another DGS. I am also unattached & other GPs are a couple. Children accept straightforward facts, if you get upset explain why you are upset & that you still miss your DH, children understand more than we give them credit for. Hope all goes well

I was teaching a small group of 6 years olds a couple of years ago, when one little girl informed us all that her granny had 'flown up into the sky'! It prompted a very interesting discussion with the more logical children saying that that was impossible!

My husband died when my GS was 3. My daughter explaining that grandad had died was taken aback by Georges response. Having asked why Grandad died and being told that he was very poorly and the doctors hadn’t been able to make him better, he responded with “ Did he eat too many sweeties”?

DGD2 was sad and cried but then very matter-of-fact about her other grandad's death, she was about 3 when he died. When I was taking her out one day she pointed to his old house and said 'That's where Grandad J lived. He died and he's in heaven now with S'. 'S' was the cat. She said she wasn't sad because she knew he was happy and there were other people there too.

Atheists may not wish to use that explanation, of course, but it is easy for little children to understand until they learn more and make up their own minds about life and death.

I think you Gd's parents should be the ones to tell her where G is. Either that or ask them what you should say to her. They may have a different view on how or when to talk about dying to you Gd's.

Being upset is part of life though and it's a positive thing for children to learn that they don't have to hide or bury their feelings and they can only do this if they see other people upset but then be able to manage those feelings and then see them happy again.

singlegranny
My maternal grandfather was killed in a road accident 3 years before I was born.
I was aware of him though, as his photo was on the sideboard both at our house and at Grandma’s, and nearly every week we would go to tend his grave.
At 3, I knew he was dead and that I would never see him. My family had no religious affiliation so Heaven etc was never mentioned.
Mum talked in a matter of fact way how sad they all were and how much he would have loved me and my sister, but it was many years before I appreciated his loss emotionally and realised what a tragedy it had been for Grandma and my mother.
So I wouldn’t worry too much at this stage about your DGD getting upset. She would be more upset seeing you upset, I think.

You just need to be truthful and answer questions as they come in the simplest possible way Two of my grandkids were 4 and 6 when their daddy became ill and subsequently died it had to be done and the only way is to be totally honest and up front if they want to know anything I m a single Nan through divorce and I ve been asked questions that I ve answered honestly without going into any detail
Only yesterday a grand daughter asked me to do a family for her to see who everyone was tree and the question of divorce came up and she matter of factly asked if he’d cheated on me so I matter if factly said yes that was it nothing more asked

Two of my grandparents committed suicide, one by deliberate starvation when I was an adult; the other by gassing himself (at Christmas!) when I was 5 - my parents did not mince their words - they said he had killed himself. My main distress at that was having to walk by the gas oven where it happened and imagining him lying there dead. But I do think they were right to be honest - it was obvious that something was amiss and at least I knew what it was.

GC used to ask where my mummy and daddy were and I used to say they had gone to live with the angels. Three and four year olds understand about angels and heaven, they accept the story of the Nativity without question.

mamarclaire - my father took his own life too - when I was young. We tend not to use the word suicide as it implies a time when taking your own life was a criminal act.

I explained to my children [at an appropriate age] that he decided that life was too much for him and he wanted to leave it and that actually that was ok. It helps that I have completely accepted what happened and no longer blame myself - or him - for what happened to us.

I sometimes think we're afraid to discuss this in case we 'put ideas' into someone's head but even with people who are feeling as though they don't want to go on any more they often feel better if we do talk about it rather than we don't.

There's information about this on the Samaritans website if anyone wants to find out more.

Agree mabon1- another word best avoided with little ones is 'lost'. For a child a lost item will often turn up again.

It is hard but honesty is the best policy. Children can be very matter of fact and then come back and ask again, as someone else posted, making it a bit of a story helps them.

It may help you too, I hope it does.