Walking With Kids Through Their Loss Podcast Episode

We really have a great opportunity to speak into them and to speak for them, to speak with them, right? We get to be the comfort to them, the father of all comforts, right? We get to be a comfort in all things and be able to speak intentionally to the kids, even if they don’t have an issue, even if they’re not struggling or in grief or any of that type of stuff, they still are learning. 

Welcome everyone to Breaking Bread, the podcast brought to you by Apostolic Christian Counseling and Family Services. I’m delighted to have Craig Stickling with me by phone. Craig, it’s great to see your face through the portal of cyberspace here. Yes, glad to be able to connect with you today, Matt. Craig, these are interesting times and interesting times often pose interesting challenges. 

If anybody out there is like me as a parent, I find myself out ahead of myself making mistakes, and as I review the things that I say and the way that I act towards my children, I realize that I should have been more thoughtful about that, or I’m not sure I handled that correctly. So, we want to narrow our scope, Craig, to our children and our young people as we help them navigate these waters of COVID 19 and specifically thinking about some of the loss that they have incurred and helping them walk through that. Does that scope make sense to you? Oh, absolutely. How do we as parents get to speak into our kids during this time to engage our kids purposefully even during this time is a huge opportunity that we have. 

Yeah. And I want to paint a bit of a spectrum here because when we talk about grief, when we talk about loss, that’s a huge bucket topic everywhere from capital G grief to lowercase g grief or capital L loss in terms of loss of loved one, right? All the way to a lowercase L loss, which is loss of maybe a privilege or loss of something less. 

Okay. Craig, yeah. Pardon me a moment while I inform my family that I’m doing this recording. Just a second. 

Hey guys. I’m on the phone and I’m recording something. I’m so sorry that there’s some real stuff, what’s the matter? He said that he could kill me right now. No, okay, well he’s wrong. And he’s not, we’re as scarce as that. Okay, I’m on the phone and I’m recording something, okay? Alright, thank you. 

Well Craig, that’s proof enough that this is not hypothetical for me. Okay, here we go. I want our listeners to know that when we mention grief and we mention loss, we’re including that whole spectrum from the big and heavy things to the seemingly small things, but it’s the seemingly small things that have put this on my radar, Craig. Okay. As I have engaged with some of my children, I will find that there’ll be anger, right? 

There’s anger about something. And as a parent, I just process it as my child is angry. Stop that. And with a little bit more thoughtfulness as I listened to them, I realized there’s a loss that is coming out as anger at the core of it. There’s a very understandable loss. And let me give you one example and then I’ll stop talking. 

So, my daughter’s in the eighth grade. And she wants closure on eighth grade, and that closure may or may not happen, and that’s loss, isn’t it? Absolutely, Matt. It’s a loss, and yet, in one house, it might not be a big deal, and in another house, it’s a huge deal. And within the house, for one child, it’s not a big deal, and for the other child, it is a huge deal. 

Craig, help me as a parent think through what you think through all the time as you engage with kids because I feel like I need a pair of lenses, right? I need a refreshed thought process to get me out of myself and into their world. Yeah, great question, Matt. And what a great one to be reminded of as adults, as parents, right? Sometimes we’ve moved past, we’ve experienced so many ebbs and tides of the grief cycle that we are kind of comfortable in knowing that, okay, this too shall pass. And we have that understanding growth confidence. And yet we have to remember that our kids are very early and new in this experience and this cycle of trust and understanding how things are going to work out. 

And this is newer ground to them. And so, we have to remember a little bit that they’re still learning. I’m processing my surroundings based on my full experience. And part of that experience is realizing, as you mentioned, this too shall pass, that there is a cycle. There are waves in grief, waves in loss that are very intensely upon me. 

But somewhere in my mind as adults, we do have the wherewithal that the wave will recede. Yeah. But for a kid who doesn’t have that experience, this lack of closure or this loss that they’re giving up is catastrophic. Yeah. What is going to happen? I don’t know how long this is going to go on. 

Is this, for kids, their mind can sometimes be pretty black and white concrete. So, this is now does this mean this will be like nearly forever? So, their brain really has to process and wrestle with things that we don’t necessarily get stuck in. Give them some perspective that loss has occurred before. And it will probably happen again. And maybe some of that, to build that empathy, Craig, is to reflect on perhaps what did it mean for me to be in that choir at school? And suppose that was taken away from me when I was in the eighth grade or imagine my senior year the basketball squad got canceled. 

Boy, it takes a real effort for me to go back and to place myself into their reality. Yeah. But that’s important. That’s huge to remember. And I think it’s a great connection piece right for us to be able to say, oh, when I was in fifth grade or high school, this was really a big deal to me and to be able to share that. I have a classmate from my school that we’re still trying to connect with through some of the online mechanisms. 

And as I’ve reached out to them and just ask them, yeah, there are eighth graders. Hey, how are you doing? How are you handling this? You know, what’s going on? It’s interesting. Those kids that are involved in things, their loss is those things that they’re not able to do, right? So, the music stuff, the track stuff, baseball stuff, right? 

So that’s where their losses and those kids that aren’t involved in things, their loss is just connecting with peers. And that’s been a huge loss for them, even though they may be on the phone and FaceTime, all that stuff. But they’re missing, actually, it’s weird to say they’re missing just the presence of others. 

Craig, give us a few more lenses as to what might my children be struggling with and how can I meet them? Yeah, but you’d mentioned this earlier just meeting them in understanding. I think this is a good time to understand some of the components and elements of grief and how that impacts, right? Just a simple understanding that grief is a normal process and it’s in response to a loss. 

So, we have something that’s normal that’s happening in their response to a loss, right? We don’t always get to dial up or dial down. Hey, this isn’t that big of a deal for you. So, turn it off. Right. It’s their loss. And part of our job is helping them unpack what that means to them. And to appreciate that that’s kind of step one for us parents. 

Yeah. That’s a critical assignment for us because I find myself very easy to dismiss the loss and say, all right, well, listen here, there are bigger fires out here and I start waxing eloquent about what’s happening in some parts of the world and some parts of the inner cities. Yeah. And Craig, I don’t need a counselor to tell me that it wasn’t a good idea to try to minimize their loss. 

Yeah. What did Jesus do when he was around people, what did he do first? He was always about asking questions. And I love that. If we take that lens as a parent and say, okay, so what can I do here right now? You know, do I feel like I have to become the COVID 19 expert and there might be some facts and sharing that might be helpful, but the best thing that we can do for our kids is just to be able to ask them questions and to listen. 

And as you’re talking with students, what would be some of those prompts that you’re asking? Yeah. For some of my teachers at my school, we came up with four entry points and created dialogue based on four words. The first one was fear, the second one was frustration, the third one was focus, and the fourth one was future. I can think about my child or this young person’s well-being, perhaps, in some of these four different ways.  

So, I like that. That’s helpful. Right. So, yeah, please unpack that. As we connect with our kids, I like having the number line picture, right, of 0 to 10, and from low to high, and giving our kids a measurement scale to be able to say what level of pain are you in. 

And so, it’s always good as we talk with our kids to ask questions. Ask them. So where would you say you would fall into this? What number would you give yourself between low, not at all, to high? Oh, I’m thinking about this all the time. So, it’s good to keep that in mind, too, to be able to get measurable feedback from our kids. 

So, let’s start with that first one. Fear. Yeah, walk us through what that might look like as we engage young people. You know what? This is a hard one, but it is such a necessary one to speak about the fear of, hey, what are you worried about? What are you really concerned about right now? 

What actually is occurring and to be able to speak into that and to hear what they fear. What is in their heart of being scared or afraid. And again, like I say, in the rear-view mirror of my life, I think I’m a pretty good counselor to myself realizing that, oops, I think that was the wrong way to go. 

Because I find having done that and talking about the fear with my kids, I found that I’ve been correcting them a lot. Like no, don’t fear that, but fear this and I’m not sure that’s really fair for me to dictate what they’re afraid of. It may be. Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely. 

Right. Getting back to our experiences, right. Our experiences can tell us to be like, what? Are you kidding me? You don’t have anything to fear about that. That’s a non-issue, right? So, we tried to sweep that off the table as easy as possible. What does healthy fear unpacking look like? I love the mental picture of having a cup of water, right? 

And our kid has a cup of water, and I have a cup. And I’ve got important things that I want to pour into their cup, right? So, I got an understanding. I’ve got insights. I can see bigger pictures of where things are and I want to pour that into their cup, but if their cup is full and all I do is pour into their cup, we just end up with a mess, right? 

And so, I want to make sure I get their cup poured out, right? So that’s where I’m asking them and I’m processing and I’m not, okay, well, that’s inaccurate. Okay. Let me nail that one and we can take that off the table. That’s not a big deal. We just listen and we’re like, okay, wow. 

Yeah, I could see that. I could see that. Tell me more. Why are you saying that through dialogue we are allowing them to elaborate on their fears? That’s one way to allow their contents to come out of the cup. Yeah. So, they have to pour out and sometimes some of our kids, we ask them one question and we might as well just park it for 45 minutes because they’re just going to go with it. 

Right? And other kids, we could ask them a question and they might just look at us or they might give us a one-word answer, or they use that beautiful phrase. I don’t know. So sometimes I’ll ask a kid. Well, if you did know, or if one of your friends was going to answer this question, what do you think your friend would say? 

So, we just take a little bit of pressure off, but even kids who say, I don’t know, still know something. Is it a true statement to say that a lot of times it’s hard for us to even read the fear meter on our kids? I mean, some wear it on their sleeve, others mask it quite well. Oh, you know what? I was reading something on grief and how kids react and respond. And some of their signs, some of their symptoms of grief are clinginess or they get into this developmental regression and behavior regression and sleeping issues and concentration, anxiety, guilt stuff. And then they said for some kids, it is invisible, right? 

It is just totally invisible. You know, they just look like they always have. They must be doing okay. Right. But it’s invisible to them. So, would you say it’s important that parents have intentional interactions with their kids in the sense of asking, hey, is there anything bothering you? 

Yeah, we really have a great opportunity to speak to them and to speak for them to speak with them. Right. We get to be the comfort to them, the father of all comforts, right? We get to be the comforter in all things. And be able to speak intentionally to the kids, even if they don’t have an issue, even if they’re not struggling or in grief or any of that type of stuff, they still are learning. 

I’m so inspired by that picture that you just cast about being like the heavenly father and to think how and what ways can I model God and his attention towards his children. Yeah, could my children come out of this season of COVID 19 and quarantine and incurring loss with a better understanding of how God the Father cares for his children? 

What an inspiring goal and you’re getting on to some of those others, into the future, right? To some of those other steps and stages. Let’s go there. Yeah, so frustration I think was the second one that you had listed off. Yeah. What’s that metric? I like that. It’s different than fear because fear really drives in the oh, what is out of my control? 

What I am so unaware of but frustration is this is what is impacting me. These are my changes. These are my disruptions that I am going through. Right? Mom is more this or dad is home or dad is where, and I’m picking up on some of those are just some frustrations that are there that are just as a result of the dynamics that we’re in right now. 

Is it important to correct frustration or is it important to process frustration? What do you do with frustration? I mean, in my world, it’s not too big of a scavenger hunt to surface frustrations. Now, what do I do when I’ve got them? Yeah, I think it’s good to connect that frustration is like the diving board to anger, right? 

So, I can stand on that diving board of frustration and bounce up and down a bit, but man, when I go off of it, then, okay, now all of a sudden, I can start expressing it in different ways. I think it’s good to speak about that. Hey, frustration is going to be normal in these situations and understand that, but tend to say okay, be angry and sin not right. Don’t go. Be careful what we do while being frustrated. Let’s find some other things to do. I can see that you’re frustrated. Oh, I understand that. So, what are some other things that we can do? How can we replace some things? So, speaking into that for them? And giving that awareness of, okay, we understand that now. 

What do you get to do? Right? So where do I take the frustration might be part of the skill set. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that’s the next word on our list. So, we’ve done fear. We’ve done frustration. Now the next word is focus. So, what can I do? And I love the present mindset of this word focus. 

Okay. What can we do right now? All right. This is the moment that we have right now today. What can we do right now? And establishing a healthy mindset and attitude and action. Let’s focus and think about what can we do right now? And so, you’re providing an outlet. Am I thinking through what you’re saying correctly? 

Yeah, it’s a two piece, right? It’s the outlet of things I can do, things I’m able to do. So, it’s the physical pieces, the action piece, but it’s also the attitude piece. What can I focus on? You know, I can take this always down a negative path and I can be angry or upset. I can bounce up and down on that frustration diving board all day. 

But yeah, I want to have a better attitude. What can I think differently? How can I think differently right now? So, I don’t have to spend all day on the frustration. And even to your previous point, Craig, about having a lack of experience, from what I’ve observed, they just don’t have the ideas for focus. 

So, for some of our kids, this is going to be hard for them. This is going to be kind of tough for them. Yeah. Well, I really liked helping this young person with focus. I’m guessing that loss and grief key on attention. And what I mean by that is the more acutely attentive we are to that loss, the more present that loss and grief is to us. 

Is that a fair statement? I mean, this is me thinking on my feet here. Right. And what you’re suggesting here is that focus is sometimes the help or the remedy to help a person or help our children not be fully consumed by the loss as real as it is. I’m not discrediting their loss. It’s very real, but they’re making a deal of it.  Right. Does that make sense? I like your direction with that, Matt, about sometimes realizing that I could just go sit in my pool of feeling or my pool of loss or grief, but sometimes you just got to go do. Sometimes I just got to make myself take that walk or make myself get out that coloring book or say, you know what, I haven’t played that game, or I haven’t done that for however long but I’m going to go do something. 

So that action helps sometimes bring the attitude along a little bit better. Let’s go now to future. Fear, frustration, focus. Oh, this is a great one, isn’t it? This is where we get to really encompass hope and we get to talk about things and to be able to have conversation with our kids and what a great question to ask her at the supper table to say, you know what, what would you like to see come out of our family time? 

As a result of this, we’re going to be hopeful that as the medical field and as things get better and this will eventually kind of move on, and life will finally go back to normal. What don’t you want us to lose out of this time? Let’s think about the future, right? 

So, getting our kids to think about. Hey, I really want to keep this. And so, asking them about that, getting their brains turned on. As a huge part of the future element, it’s interesting as we tell our stories as we age, we don’t just think of all the good things that happened, do we? 

We often share about those things that were hard, those things that were very huge struggles at that time, but with time, we get to share those with a sense of just appreciation of, wow, God got us through this, you know, and what a gratefulness in that. Is that part of the lesson of grief and loss, Craig, that you just mentioned there, that in a realization that there will be a time in the future whereby we will be able to reflect on this loss through some different lenses, and some of those lenses will be quite welcome.  

Isn’t that interesting to think about? What if each family member did a COVID 19 time capsule, right? We all wrote out a page of where we were at and what we thought about this time, and we all stuck it in that little capsule thing there and if the Lord wills on April of 2021, we pulled it out again, right? And we read it again just to see, oh, this is what I was feeling and thinking back then. Right? So, every time capsule is future vested, isn’t it? I think it’s good to be reminded of the future piece, right? That’s, you know, we look at the future of, hey, you know what, Lord willing, things will get better again. 

Life will get back to normal. We’ll have things that we’ll be able to do again. So, you know, we’ll be able to connect those things again down the road. So that will happen. I mean, that’s a future piece, isn’t it? And also, then there’s the future piece of what do I want to learn about this? You know, well, we don’t ever want to waste suffering. 

So, what do I think God wants me to learn about this? What can I learn about this? So, what’s a future piece that we can take and grow out of? Oh, we never want to waste suffering. That’s a profound statement, but very true. We get this opportunity to teach that to our kids, right? I think one of the objectives of this podcast is that we as parents need to be the astute ones. 

And put some of those pieces together, connect some of those dots that our kids are not going to connect for us. And I love that we don’t necessarily have to come in with the expert hat, but we just get to say, you know what, I would like to know, I would think that this would be tough. Help me understand if I’m correct with where you’re at or not. 

We can’t change some things, but to be able to affirm to them, you know what, that has to be really hard. And you know what? I’m sorry for you in that. And that just makes my heart hurt because I love you. You’re my child, right? Is there PTSD or that too heavy of a term, but that’s the nuance that I’m trying to get at here. 

That should we expect that we won’t return to normal with a flip of a switch and there might be some processing even once this crisis passes. Yeah. I think that’s very fair to say. We don’t necessarily know what that will look like in our kids. We know that some will be hugely impacted. You know, I think of that high school senior or the person who this was the year that their baseball team was going to be so good, or we had the track relay that was supposed to win state or whatever and to have that all of a sudden not there. Oh, that’s going to be huge. Or I had the solo at the spring performance and that’s not going to happen. Or I had the graduation speech to share.  

Should we be thoughtful even just realizing that there’s going to be some residual to that, even on into the future. We’re living through it now in real time, but we’re still going to live it in reflection, right? And just because by the calendar, the senior year is over. Yeah. The loss is still very present. Yeah. And you bring up a great piece about grief. Not everyone operates on the same timeline. You know, it’s not like, okay, you get three weeks to be this, and we’re done. 

So hey, let’s pull up that shade of normalcy again. And yeah. Let’s go run off into the sunset, right? And some kids might need to recycle through that fear, frustration, focus, future lens, a couple times down the road. They might have to recycle through that a couple times and to understand that for where they’re at, okay, that’s my job. 

And I think that provides the level set that we need as parents too, Craig, just by that admission there. That this isn’t a once and done, four steps to touch with your kids and you’ve got them repaired. But these are just some lenses to continually come back to. Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate this, Craig. 

This is a great deal of help for me personally and for many I would expect. And I appreciate your time and your expertise and your thoughts on this. Great opportunity to be able to speak and share. So, thank you for facilitating this, Matt. Thanks, Craig. And thanks to each one who has tuned in to this. 

We hope and pray that This content meets you at a place with and grace and we Love each one and pray each one is blessed. Thanks