The other day she announced out of the blue, "My daddy DIED." As she is sometimes wont to do. But this time my assurances that this is in fact correct and factual were followed by, "I know my daddy DIED.... but where is he NOW." Huh. Apparently because dying is a past tense thing, he must be done with it now and what else is he doing? I am afraid I didn't do to well with this question. I hemmed and hawed a little. Mentioned that some people believe that he his in heaven watching over her. Skimmed over the part when some believe he won't rise until Christ returns, and some don't believe this at all. Which of course led to a round of "Where is heaven." It was all I could do not to lead with a distraction. "Hey, look at they big shiny object!" "Is that a cookie?"
Wanting to be more prepared I went back and consulted my handy- dandy (heavy on the sarcasm there) pamphlet on discussing death with children. So this morning when she brought it up again I led with a small discussion of what it means to die.
A: My daddy is dead
Me: He is. Do you know what it means to be dead?
A: *Blank look*
Me: Dying and Death mean that your body has stopped working. You can't do any of the things we do anymore.
A: Daddy's body stopped working?
Me: That's right. When you die you can't eat or sleep or hear or talk anymore.
A: But where is my daddy?
Me: Well, when your daddy's body stopped working we put it into a box, and we keep it so we can feel close to him.
A: So daddy's body is broken?
Me: Yeah kind of like that.
A: Oh, so we can get some batteries and fix daddy and then I can see him.
Me: Kiddo, I don't think that batteries are going to do it.
A: Yes they will mommy. We just need batteries.
This is all at once hysterical, heartbreaking and super frustrating to me. It is just one more thing on a long list of conversations I have to have over and over and over again. Such is her age.
