Children and Funerals
John E. Schowalter MD1
1 Professor of Pediatrics and Psychiatry, Child Study Center and Department of Pediatrics, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut
Death is the most inevitable and irrevocable problem that we face as physicians and human beings. Although many people seldom think about death, when the death of a close friend or relative does occur, everyone is confronted with a feeling of loss and reminder of his or her own mortality. The emotional reaction triggered by such a loss is called mourning. While in decades past it was debated whether or not children mourned, the consensus now is that they do, but not as completely or satisfactorily as adults. The manner in which children mourn is based on their level of development and on the emotional climate provided them.
Almost without exception in our society, when a person dies, there is a funeral. More often than not parents do not know whether children should attend funerals. Because of this, they often ask pediatricians, but there is little published data that can be used as a guide for an intelligent response. The purpose of this review is to provide practical guidelines and suggestions that can be discussed with parents when this question arises.
FUNERALS IN GENERAL
The funeral is the most ancient rite known. Much of what we know about prehistoric cultures comes from burial customs that favored including everyday objects with the corpse.
