The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com. This is a letter from a grandmother, a grandmother who is very worried about her granddaughter Julie, who lost her dad to death. So see what you think about this.

Dear Dr. Kenner, I have a six-year-old granddaughter, Julie, who lost her father to death last year. My question is, I really don't feel she understands where her dad is right now. She is in school. Her mother moved in with another man, all within a few months after her dad passed away. So you've got six-year-old Julie; dad dies. She's five years old. Her dad dies; she moves in with her mother, and then Mom moves in with another man. Here's the problem: Julie is starting to have outbreaks of anger. She will slap, hit, and fight with her mom. Her mother has not been a real part of her life until her dad passed away; she stayed with me a lot and her other grandmother. How can I help this grandchild of mine? Any advice? I will be very thankful.

Well, first, it's so good that there's someone like you in Julie's life who values her so much and feels for her. Really feels that she's a kid who's in a very bad situation now. Right now, she's struggling. And also, it's very sad because I suspect this is your son; this is not your daughter. Otherwise, you would have mentioned it. So it's very hard to have to lose your own child. You know, as adults, as parents, we expect to die before our children. Thank you. And when that's reversed, it's one of the greatest pains a person can ever go through in life. So I hope you're getting some help for yourself to get through this, and I hope you've got a lot of support on your side.

You want to reach out to Julie. She's six years old, and what you're faced with is her anger. Anger is the emotion that tells you it's not fair. She's detecting injustices. But what, from Julie's point of view, is not fair? Well, her dad's death, maybe not spending time with you, with her grandmothers, who were very caring and loving and took her in, I'm assuming. And maybe she's very angry because mom didn't want her to begin with, and mom was never a part of her life until Dad passed away, and now mom is saddled with a kid burdened with Julie. Or maybe it's mom's boyfriend that she's angry about, and it doesn't feel fair that mom's paying more attention to the boyfriend than to her. Or maybe she's very upset because she feels singled out amongst friends in the neighborhood that she's the kid whose dad dies.

So she needs someone who will listen to her, whether it's a therapist or whether it's you as a loving grandparent, to sit down and not tell her what's wrong with her, but to just sit and listen, not to tell her not to be angry. It sounds like it's misdirected anger. Maybe it isn't. Maybe it is mom she's angry with, but to just sit down lovingly with her. You know, go have a strawberry milk. Now, take her out for a little treat, ice cream or something, and then say to her, you know, you seem so angry. What's up? Tell me, Honey, what's been most on your mind? And let her open up to you; then you will know what direction to go in.

When you said, "What do we tell her about her dad's death?" I feel very strongly about this. I know not everyone agrees with me. My goal is the rational basis of happiness, so I don't like to tell kids fairy tales or mystical, feel-good lies about dad's whereabouts. Because if you say daddy went to heaven, kids start to say, but if God took Daddy, can he come and take mommy? Can he take me? Can he take you, grandma? And will God? What is heaven like? Why can't I see him? Can he see me? If I'm good, will God let him see me? You know, it raises all these weird questions. Should I die so I can go with daddy? Daddy, what if daddy went to hell? Can I save him? If Jesus could come back to life, will Daddy, you know, show up tomorrow at school and pick me up? Fill in the blank. You know, it just becomes very—it gives the child the summation of uncertainty and self-doubt. The world doesn't make sense to them. Did I do something wrong, and God's punishing me, and that's why dad is dead?

So I think religions do an enormous amount of damage in the name of trying to give you a feel-good story. I ran the author and the novelist who wrote The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, my favorite book. Says, "I think the only real moral crime that one man, or in this case, a woman, a mother or anybody, can commit against another, is the attempt to create by his words or action an impression of the contradictory, the impossible, the irrational and just, and thus shake the concept of rationality in his victim."

So what I suggest is that Julie does need to know that people like you care. She needs to know that dad died and that death is permanent, and she needs to know that in six-year-old terms. Now there are books; I pulled two from my office when I got your question. One is When Dinosaurs Die: A Guide to Understanding Death, and this is by Laurie Brown and Mark Brown, and it opens up the conversation for kids. Sometimes I would just use a page or two at a time and spend a session just on one or two pages in dealing with death with a child, but they need to know that people die, and they need to raise their own questions and have them answered. But sometimes these books help them address issues that they haven't yet put into words.

There's also a little book, Everett Anderson's Goodbye by Lucille Clifton. Oh gosh, let me see if I can pronounce her name—Grief Falcone. I did it! So that would help too. There was an article in U.S. News and World Report after a loss: Kids need to mourn and be reassured. This is by Katie Kelly, and she said, you want to be direct and honest with your kids, but not overly detailed. And I, like one of the people she quotes, says, "Give headlines first." Just say, you know, it sounds like you're real sad, and then be present to answer their questions.

When they're five years old, they may be thinking, well, Dad's when dad's done being dead? Will, when will he come back? Nine-year-olds may want facts and details. Adolescents may tend to be more angry. Kids need to go through the grief, and they often follow the parents' lead. So if parents are angry, they're angry. If parents can cope better and grieve appropriately, cry appropriately, and become more stable, kids will tend to follow their lead.

There are programs you can get kids into so that they feel like they're not alone with a loss, whether the loss is due to death or due to divorce. I know this one right in Rhode Island, Butler Memorial Hospital. There was a rainbow program that helps kids deal with grief and divorce. Kids will often what's called somaticize. They will come up with bodily symptoms, somatic symptoms, headaches or stomach aches. They may want to stay home more after a death, and if they are having severe anxiety or hostility or regret or aggression or even regression, you know, acting younger than their age, wanting to climb in bed with you when they're 10 years old after a death, needing just some comfort.

Sometimes therapy is needed. In terms of climbing in bed with you, that's fine, but if they're acting like a baby and talking baby talk when they're 10 or 12 years old, then that is a problem. So you want to just be sensitive to your own loss and just kudos for you for being such a caring parent. Some people have clients have told me, If it weren't for my grandparents, I never would have survived the loss of a parent.

And here's a little more from Dr. Kenner.

Man cannot survive except through his mind. He comes on Earth unarmed. His brain is his only weapon. But the mind is an attribute of the individual. There is no such thing as a collective brain. The man who thinks must think and act on his own.

Okay, and you want to ask yourself privately, are you thinking and acting on your own, or do you live in the shadow of others? Do you kind of mirror what they want, what they say? If they go to the movies and they like a particular movie and you didn't like it, you still say, yeah, it was okay, yeah, I liked it. But you hear that reticence in your voice, that shot, that kind of pulling back it. You don't want to do that. You want to be able to say, and I didn't like that movie at all. I wanted to walk out at halftime, or I don't like what you just said. You want to be able to speak your own mind, not to just say no, it's I don't, I don't mind, or just mirroring what other people like or what they do. It's not that you want to rebel. Obviously, that's what teenagers often do. They see what their parents enjoy, and they define themselves as anti-mom or anti-dad. They'll do the opposite of what mom or dad enjoy doing.

So if mom wants values, good grades, or a clean room, they'll give you the opposite, messy room and very low grades. And that's not right. That's just rebellion, and that's not true independence. Independence is making independent evaluations based on the facts and acting according to them.

For more Dr. Kenner podcast, go to DrKenner.com and please listen to this. That’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance, the serious romance guidebook by Doctors Kenner and Locke. Here are some more tips for handling unreasonable resistance. Break unwritten codes by clearly naming what you see. For example, an irrational spouse might grab your favorite antique and threaten to smash it. He assumes you're too afraid to name what he's doing. In some situations, you may be able to diffuse the anger by openly describing what you observe and your reaction to it.

I see you're grabbing my grandmother's vase. I'm feeling intimidated and afraid. Is that what you're hoping I feel? It can be disorienting to the irrational person when you name his method of attack; such a person is counting on you focusing on your own fear and not shifting your focus to his method of intimidation.

You can download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com and buy it at Amazon.com.