If you've been reading the blog you know that my husband's Grandfather passed away on Thursday. He'd been sick so it did give us some time to prepare the children for his passing. We used the term "died" rather than "sleeping" or "passing on".
When I asked some friends how to explain this to my kids, one suggestion was to explain that death was a punishment for Adam and Eve's sin. While this may be true, I knew my 5 year old would "promise to be good" or something along those lines to get Great Grandpa back.
I believe in being totally honest with my kids (with the exception of Santa and Easter Bunny---kids have to have some magic and imagination) when it comes to life. They learn the proper terms for body parts, all of my boys know the word penis and know how to use the word, correctly (we don't yell it in church but we can say it if that's where your brother hits you). So when Grandpa Bob died, that's what we said. He died.
Our topic of conversation has moved on to heaven. What heaven is like, where it is, how many people are there, etc. He's decided that heaven is "in the sky, in the clouds. Angels live there. Great Grandpa Bob is up there...I think he misses me. I think it's happy in heaven because good angels are up there. And that's where God lives too!"
I'm glad he's happy about it. It will be interesting to see what happens at the funeral tomorrow...but I'm glad he's aware about what's going on.
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