Skip to main content

20 New Christmas Angels Were Welcomed into Heaven This Morning


Tragedy happens all around us, but when it involves innocent children there are few words that can express the pain any caring person feels.  This morning, a shooter took the lives of 20 innocent school children including several teachers and staff members at a small town school here in Connecticut.  That means Heaven accepted 20 new little angels this morning.  If your own children haven’t heard about it, they most likely will.  Here are some tips on how to help your children handle the news of this unthinkable tragedy.

First and foremost it’s important that you settle any fears your children may have.  They are torn between the worlds of fantasy and reality, so it may be very difficult for them to tell the difference between what is real and what isn’t.  Make every effort to listen to them carefully and with 100% of your attention.  It is important that you help them feel safe and calm.  Sometimes they may fear that what happened to the children at this school will happen to them.

Minimize (if not eliminate) any news coverage or discussion about the tragedy.  The less they hear about it the better it will be for them.  Refrain from having the news on when they are present at home or in the car while you’re driving.  Too much exposure will overwhelm them and generate more fearful feelings that it could come to their school

Allow yourself to grieve privately.  Your children look to you and your feelings as a guide on how they should feel.  If you are feeling sad about this event and they notice, your children will feel sadder.  Allow yourself to grieve in private, away from your children.  Allow a friend or family member to stay with your children while you find the time to be alone to let your feelings out about this tragedy.  Avoid keeping it all bottled up inside.

Take measures to pull your family closer together over the next few days.  Cancel less important activities and create family time to help your child feel more loved.  Take measures to feel gratitude that this did not happen to your family and hold and love your children a little more than usual.  It will help to further settle your child’s fears and help you deal with the sadness we are all feeling about this tragic event.

Finally, use this occurrence to be sure that you are taking all possible measures to ensure your child’s safety where ever she goes.  It is doubtful that the families who lost children in this massacre could have done anything different to avoid what happened.  But tragedies come in all forms so take a closer look at all possible risks that could affect your child’s safety and well being.
Labels:

Comments

  1. BarbaraDecember 14, 2012 at 9:32 PM

    Excellent suggestions for comfort and care. We just cannot stress enough to not allow ourselves to overdose on the disturbing details. The media has a way of sucking us in by replaying the tragedy over and over again and we must take care of ourselves now, too.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Bill CorbettDecember 15, 2012 at 4:36 PM

    You're right Barbara. I think what many of us do is continue to watch to search for that one piece of information that helps us understand why someone could do such an evil thing to innocent children and adults. We hope to find that one piece of information so we can help others to avoid such acts, or to avoid those who might fit the profile. But all to often, we discover the person who committed the act appeared to be as normal as us, previous to the tragedy. Thank you for readying.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousDecember 15, 2012 at 5:37 PM

    Excellent commenrary, Bill. The only thing I want to add is Nurture EMPATHY!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Bill CorbettDecember 29, 2012 at 2:48 PM

    Good comment Timothy. This tends to be a difficult task for some parents. The first step in parenting, in helping to nurture empathy is to STOP using "feeling stoppers" when a child brings a problem to his or her parent. Parents are too quick to "stuff" the feeling in front of them for many reasons. I urge parents to just let their kids feel the feeling they are experiencing in the moment, and to help the child process it effectively.

    Thanks for reading Timothy!

    ReplyDelete
  5. albina N muroAugust 26, 2013 at 6:59 AM

    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why Love and Logic has it Wrong... Again!

Children don’t often demonstrate respect because they either don’t know what it looks like or, as the Father of Individual Psychology, Alfred Adler taught us, their disrespectful behavior is their way of attempting to get unmet needs satisfied.  The secret to getting kids to treat their parents and others with respect is to first treat them with respect and to then help them find their place in the family or the classroom.  But the creators of the LOVE AND LOGIC parenting program would have you believe differently.  All parenting programs are not created equal and in my opinion, many are misguided and offer parents and teachers bad information.  It is my belief that we should not just be demanding and manipulating our kids to be more cooperative, we should be raising children who WANT to cooperate and be engaged in the family or classroom because they feel encouraged to do so. One of those programs that frequently offers misguided information and gimmicks...
6 comments
Read more

When Your Child Says "I HATE YOU!"... They are Really Just Mad

You've done so much for them, slaved for them, and sacrificed for them, and then if you don't give them what they want, they get mad at you. It hardly seems fair, all the things we do for our kids and they don't appreciate it. Then we hear them say things like, "I hate you," or "I hate this house." We hear, "You're a mean mom," or "I'm mad at you!" It's common for kids to get mad at their parents but the solution is the hardest for parents to do... just let them be mad. Effective parents learn quickly that they are not their child's friend; they are their parents. But if the parents aren't prepared to hear it and know how to respond, they get defensive or they get even. Worse, they give in to regain the love the child is withholding. I was in the toy section of a department store one day, shopping for a gift for my grandson. A mom and her little boy were in the same aisle, and the little boy, about seven, was admir...
Post a Comment
Read more

Why Some Parents Spank

This is for all the parents who set out NOT to spank their children, but end up doing it anyway; you are NOT bad parents, sometimes you just don’t know what else to do.  I believe you may get frustrated to the point of using it to gain the child’s attention or as an attempt to stop challenging behaviors immediately.  I can say that I've been in your shoes!  I raised 3 children of my own and often felt myself get to the point of having the urge to spank.  So I feel for parents and know how hard it is when our children push our patience to the upper limits. (Photograph courtesy of David Castillo Dominici and freedigitalphotos.net) I was the oldest of eight children and took notice of my parent’s anger and how it would provoke them to the point of spanking, and they did.  I remember having the sense that one or both of them would be bothered by something outside of my control and then I would do something that kids do and it would push them to th...
Post a Comment
Read more