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Helping Teens Cope with Death
This practical guide covers the unique grief responses of teenagers and the specific challenges they face when grieving a death. You will learn how death impacts teenagers and ways that you can help them. The book also offers advice from parents and caregivers of bereaved teens on how to support adolescents and how to determine when professional help is needed.
64 pages, Paperback
First published March 10, 1999
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November 23, 2025
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"..children who lose a parent need two conditions to continue to thrive: a stable surviving parent or other caregiver to meet their emotional needs and the opportunity to release their feelings.
Sheer physical care is not enough."
-Hope Edelman
Motherless Daughters, 1995 Pg.44
Teens are more likely to accept professional help if it is in the context of the entire grieving family adults, children and teens. Inviting the teen to participate in therapy for the betterment of the family's situation is more likely to elicit a positive response than pointing out the teen's complicated grief signs as evidence of his or her need for counseling. It is also helpful to give teens informed options about therapy.
Grieving teens need parents and other adults who will take care of themselves and their own grief. Research indicates that caregivers are the primary bereavement models for teens. A teen is more likely to grieve in healthy ways when he or she has a supportive and healthy parent.
Although parenting teen grievers is a difficult task for parents who are overwhelmed with their own bereavement, how a surviving parent copes with death has a major impact on their children.
Parents are also advised to be aware of the normal developmental changes that occur during adolescence. During the teen years, an emergent need for independence is addressed between the teen, parents and other adults. The ease of achieving independence and the degree of open conflict between the teen and his or her parents over independence issues are shaped by the parents' particular style of parenting. Pg.44
Some of the ways parents can be helpful to their teen during the grieving process include:
listen, listen and listen before speaking
act as a consultant to your teen: ask questions, listen to explanations and offer choices
demonstrate that you trust yourself and your teen
discuss important decisions and explain them to your teen
problem solve together, considering many options
negotiate reasonable limits
build self-esteem by allowing your teen to experience the rewards and consequences of choices and behaviors
offer advice and options if the teen wants to hear them
Emphasize with your teen about the death, but make it clear that appropriate behavior is still expected
avoid the temptation to overprotect your teens, or rescue them from the consequences of their behavior Pg.45
A grieving teen has the right to...
Know the truth about the death, the deceased and the circumstances
Have questions answered honestly
Be heard with dignity and respect
Be silent and not tell you his or her grief emotions or thoughts
Not agree with your perceptions and conclusions
See the person who died and the place of the death
Grieve any way she or he wants without hurting self or others
Feel all the feelings and to think all the thoughts of his or her own unique grief
Not to have to follow the "Stages of Grief, as outlined in a high school health book
Grieve in one's own unique, individual way without censorship
Be angry at death, at the person who died, at God, at self and at others
Ignore people who are insensitive bigots who spout clichés
Have his or her own theological and philosophical beliefs about life and death
Be involved in the decisions about the rituals related to the death Not be taken advantage of in this vulnerable mourning condition and circumstances
Have irrational guilt about how he or she could have intervened to stop the death Pg.50
"..children who lose a parent need two conditions to continue to thrive: a stable surviving parent or other caregiver to meet their emotional needs and the opportunity to release their feelings.
Sheer physical care is not enough."
-Hope Edelman
Motherless Daughters, 1995 Pg.44
Teens are more likely to accept professional help if it is in the context of the entire grieving family adults, children and teens. Inviting the teen to participate in therapy for the betterment of the family's situation is more likely to elicit a positive response than pointing out the teen's complicated grief signs as evidence of his or her need for counseling. It is also helpful to give teens informed options about therapy.
Grieving teens need parents and other adults who will take care of themselves and their own grief. Research indicates that caregivers are the primary bereavement models for teens. A teen is more likely to grieve in healthy ways when he or she has a supportive and healthy parent.
Although parenting teen grievers is a difficult task for parents who are overwhelmed with their own bereavement, how a surviving parent copes with death has a major impact on their children.
Parents are also advised to be aware of the normal developmental changes that occur during adolescence. During the teen years, an emergent need for independence is addressed between the teen, parents and other adults. The ease of achieving independence and the degree of open conflict between the teen and his or her parents over independence issues are shaped by the parents' particular style of parenting. Pg.44
Some of the ways parents can be helpful to their teen during the grieving process include:
listen, listen and listen before speaking
act as a consultant to your teen: ask questions, listen to explanations and offer choices
demonstrate that you trust yourself and your teen
discuss important decisions and explain them to your teen
problem solve together, considering many options
negotiate reasonable limits
build self-esteem by allowing your teen to experience the rewards and consequences of choices and behaviors
offer advice and options if the teen wants to hear them
Emphasize with your teen about the death, but make it clear that appropriate behavior is still expected
avoid the temptation to overprotect your teens, or rescue them from the consequences of their behavior Pg.45
A grieving teen has the right to...
Know the truth about the death, the deceased and the circumstances
Have questions answered honestly
Be heard with dignity and respect
Be silent and not tell you his or her grief emotions or thoughts
Not agree with your perceptions and conclusions
See the person who died and the place of the death
Grieve any way she or he wants without hurting self or others
Feel all the feelings and to think all the thoughts of his or her own unique grief
Not to have to follow the "Stages of Grief, as outlined in a high school health book
Grieve in one's own unique, individual way without censorship
Be angry at death, at the person who died, at God, at self and at others
Ignore people who are insensitive bigots who spout clichés
Have his or her own theological and philosophical beliefs about life and death
Be involved in the decisions about the rituals related to the death Not be taken advantage of in this vulnerable mourning condition and circumstances
Have irrational guilt about how he or she could have intervened to stop the death Pg.50
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