Parents - How do you help your kids grapple with the idea of death?

Our 5 year old looks at death as " your ghost falls out". We're not religious.

Majority of kids are visual learners, so my approach was to make it as graphic/visual as possible. If the issue is something they can think about in a series of understood images, then they can better process that information without the "fear of the unknown" factor.

Ours looks at it like you have a body, and a mini love ghost that hangs out in your brain and heart, recording all the time in the body, until its time to fall out. Then, the mini ghost gives the recordings to all the family and friends, so that they can love and remember each other forever, since skin bodies can't live forever. And, after the mini ghost is done , it goes into another person's heart and brain to do it all over again.

She understands that death is permanent, but so are memories. That you lose the body, but not those memories and loves. That it may be sad and scary, but it's from an "I miss you" part of your heart, and not a "lost in the grocery store" part of the brain.

/r/atheism Thread