Just a little background...
On November 24th my grandpa passed away. He was a great man and we were all very close to him. It broke my heart to see him go, but I know it was for the best.
They day he died we went to my Grandma's house to offer her support, followed by a day of visitation and a day of funeral. We brought Rylan and Tatum along with us, and my cousins also brought their children who are all around the same age as mine. I really didn't think anything of it.
At the funeral, Tony, Rylan, Tatum and I were there about 20 minutes before anyone else (that's a first!). We stayed in the entrance way as I wanted my Grandma to see Grandpa first. Rylan was running around as any 23 month old would be and went into the room with the casket. She came back out with her finger up to her lips and said, "shhhh, Big Papa sleeping". Of course I broke down. It was so sweet, I was super emotional and I couldn't be strong any longer.
Throughout the day she would say it again and again and we would just agree with her.
Now on to this weekend and again today. Tony and Rylan were flipping through a book and there was a picture of a baby sleeping in a bassinet. Rylan looks at Tony and says, "shhhhh baby sleeping" and had the saddest look on her face. Then she started crying, just quietly. Little tears were streaming down her cheeks and she just kept repeating it again and again. We tried explaining to her that the baby would wake up eventually. We finally just distracted her with some crayons and a colouring book to cheer her up. It was so sad.
Today I put her in a pair of pants that were too big so that she could take them off easily by herself if she had to go pee. They were quite big, so I put a little clip on them like the ones they use on Say Yes to the Dress to hold them up. She got annoyed with "clippy" and I took it off and was using it as a puppet with an insanely annoying voice. I got tired of playing with Clippy so I set it down on the couch and told her that Clippy was sleeping. BIG MISTAKE! She started with the sad little face again and then the tears started again. I picked Clippy up as fast as I could and kept saying, "I'm awake, I'm awake, I'm awake!!!!!".
I don't know what to do. I tried to explain to her today that Big Papa died and that he's not sleeping. Have I ruined my toddler? I didn't know a 2 year old could be sad over something real and not just over dropping a jelly bean! I didn't think she would be able to understand death or that taking her to the visitation and funeral would affect her like this.
I hope I can get her to like the word sleeping again.
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What a sensitive little girl you have, Paula! I hope things get better!
ReplyDeleteHmm, Poor Rylan. Sofias grandfather (my husbands Dad) died a week before Sofia turned 2. We didn't shield her from any of it and she spent lots of time with all our family and saw us all sad and crying. There was no funeral but she did come to the memorial service. We told her that Grandpa had died and we wouldn't see him any more but we could still talk about him. She brings him up often and we talk about how we miss him and how much we love him.
ReplyDeleteI know that she has no idea what "died" means but she seems to get it on some level. We took some criticism for involving her in all of it but I would do it the same way again.
Hope you can find a way to separate "sleep" for Rylan.