A Parent's Guide to Managing Childhood Grief: 100 Activities for Coping, Comforting, & Overcoming Sadness, Fear, & Loss

by Katie Lear

Help your child navigate feelings of sadness and loss with 100 unique, activity-based approaches that help them manage their childhood grief in a healthy and constructive way.The loss of a loved one is a complex, confusing experience for a child to understand. Children may struggle to express, process, and manage their complicated and conflicting feelings, whether the loss is a parent, grandparent, sibling, or even a pet. So, what should you do to help your child process their sadness, loss, and frustration in a more healthy, positive way? In A Parent’s Guide to Managing Grief, you’ll learn everything you need to know about how children grieve and what you can do to support them during their most difficult moments. From there, you’ll find 100 activities that you can use in a group setting, activities that you (or another caregiver) can do alone with your child, and ways to make the most of virtual interactions to support a grieving child. Explore activities -Making a scream box -Playing with clay -Feelings charades game -Making a memory bracelet -And many more! It can feel difficult to connect with your child as you process your own complicated emotions surrounding loss. Use these activities to help bridge the gap between you and your child and to help you both find comfort in a difficult situation. You’ll find all the tools you need to help your child (and even yourself) healthily process your grief and move towards happiness, understanding, and acceptance together.

Genres: Parenting

202 pages, Kindle Edition

Published July 5, 2022

Reviews

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received a Net Galley ARC in exchange for an honest review of Katie Lear's book.

I came across this ARC after my father's cancer had been deemed terminal. With three young children myself, I knew this book was one I wanted to read. I appreciated how the author broke up understanding of and reactions to grief by age range, since my children are in different age groups.

After an explanation of grief and possible reactions, the author provides a variety of exercises and activities that adults can implement with children. The activities identify the appropriate age range, the skill(s) that can be developed, as well as a detailed explanation. I appreciated the variety of activities, so a reader can pick and choose based on the child and the circumstances.

I would recommend this book to any parent/guardian at any time - the issue with loss is that you don't always know that it's coming. If a loss is sudden and shocking, as an adult you may not have the capacity to read this book and learn from it in a way that will benefit a child; however, if you read it now and add it to your "parenting toolbox" you may have a better foundation for dealing with grief and loss in the future.

[Cathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This guide is approachable, comprehensive, and empowering for the caregiver who inevitably has to discuss/manage grief with children. Lear clearly breaks down grief, how it can manifest itself depending on the child's stage of development, provides thoughtful and relevant questions, and does it all through language that brings comfort to the reader. The activities presented are easy to navigate and each chapter is clear on what category within the grieving process the activities address which allows the reader to explore them in any order as per their individual needs. As a parent and an aspiring social worker, I can say this book is staying in my library for a very long time.

[Alan Kaliski · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is well written and easy to read on this sensitive topic. Valuable background information is provided on the topic of child grief, as well as many, many practical approaches that can be employed. The author clearly has a passion for the topic, as well as relevant professional experience and academic credentials to practice in this area. This book would be great addition to the tool kit for parents of children currently (or prospectively) dealing with grief issues, as well as academic curriculum and professional resource references on this sensitive topic.

[Mallory Plotz · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is good but the information section is very short and lacking. The activities seem great but will be challenging to do regularly with my child and may not always work coming from me... I am grateful that my daughter's therapist has a copy of the book and can consider using these activities with her and have more success. I would recommend the book but only because there are SO FEW books on the topic.

[Regina Cooper · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is replete with resources to help a grieving child (or adult!) Definitely one to keep handy during a season of grief and even for a while after loss, when grief changes and life keeps going on.

[Holland Rebekah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! I'm so happy I checked this out. What a great start to the conversation, both in my classroom and at home. Worth the read!!!

[RaeAnn]

I read part 1 and part 3 and skimmed part 2. What I read was excellent and I would absolutely refer back to it as needed.