Coaching practices for Telling a Child About a Playmate's Death
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Telling a Child About a Playmate's Death, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- The day they died still plays in my head in jagged pieces
- Everyone’s gone quiet about them, like saying their name would upset me, so I never get to hear other people’s memories
- My memories of them and of how it happened come at me in scattered, jagged pieces with no order to them, and I keep replaying the end on a loop
- There’s so much I never got to say to them, and so much happening now I wish I could tell them
- Something scared my child
Practices that may help
- Retell the story of the death and its aftermath
Construct a coherent, detailed narrative of the loss — including your experience before, during, and after.
Meaning Reconstruction in Grief, Made Practical - Share the continuing bond in community
Talk about the person with others who knew and loved them, keeping the relationship alive in shared memory.
Continuing Bonds in Grief, Made Practical - Construct a coherent narrative of the loss
Tell the full story of the loss — who the person was, what happened, and what life is now.
Worden’s Tasks of Mourning, Made Practical - Speak or write to the person directly
Address the deceased in letters, journal entries, or internal dialogue as a form of active continuing connection.
Continuing Bonds in Grief, Made Practical - Name it to tame it: tell the story of the big feeling
Help the child narrate what happened and how it felt — storytelling is brain integration.
The Whole-Brain Child (Siegel & Bryson) - Listen empathically and validate the feeling
Reflect the emotion you see accurately before you do anything else.
Emotion Coaching (John Gottman) - Practice speaking about the loss to people outside your immediate circle
Gradually widen the circle of people who know about the loss and can offer recognition.
Disenfranchised Grief, Made Practical - Develop an internalised representation of the person
Build a rich inner sense of who the person was that you carry and consult in daily life.
Continuing Bonds in Grief, Made Practical - Notice lasts — the last-time meditation
Notice that every experience has a last time, and acknowledge when you’re in one.
Memento Mori: Using Mortality Awareness to Focus What Matters - Task 3: Adjust to a world without the person
Actively develop new skills, roles, and identity elements to navigate the changed life.
Worden’s Tasks of Mourning, Made Practical
Related concerns
- How To Talk To A Friend That Just Lost An Eye
Resist the reflex to relate by topping their story with your own.
Don’t make it about you
- Our Hamster Died And Witnessed By Our Child How To Communicate With Support Her
Address the deceased in letters, journal entries, or internal dialogue as a form of active continuing connection.
Speak or write to the person directly
- Difficult Conversations After A Loss
Separate what happened, the feelings, and the identity stakes — they’re tangled and need different handling.
Untangle the three conversations
- Grief Journaling
Write in detail about who or what was lost and why it mattered — creating the record that no one else will maintain.
Journal specifically about the relationship and what it meant
- How To Address With A Child That A Deceased Actress Appears In An Upcoming Movie
Address the deceased in letters, journal entries, or internal dialogue as a form of active continuing connection.
- When Meaning Reconstruction Grief Event Narrative Retelling
Construct a coherent, detailed narrative of the loss — including your experience before, during, and after.
Retell the story of the death and its aftermath
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