Grin and Parent
How (Not) to Explain Death to a Toddler
When my toddler asked about death, I tried to be honest.
Now that Sweet G is almost three, 95 percent of the time I spend caring for him is allotted to explaining the workings of the world, the mind, and the body. It rains when the sky fills up with water. Your mind is the part of you that fills up with thoughts and ideas. We poop when our butts fill up with the food our body doesn’t need. It amounts to some of the best conversations I’ve ever had and some of the most acute stress I’ve ever felt. Sometimes I end up worried that I’ve skewed my son’s worldview so drastically that no one—not even the therapist I’m inadvertently pushing him toward—will be able to realign it. In fact, I’m certain that I did some actual damage last year when I tried to explain life and death to Sweet G, who had just …
