Transcript for
How to support your family and yourself through grief and loss
Narrator (00:02):
Welcome to the Emerging Minds Families podcast.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (00:04):
Hi, I am Nadia Rossi, and you’re listening to an Emerging Minds Families podcast. Throughout life, grief is an unfortunate part of the human experience. When a family experiences a loss, whether it be that of a loved one or perhaps a family pet, each member of the family may sense and process their grief differently. For parents, it can be hard to juggle supporting children and also know how to help them understand their grief while also trying to honour and navigate their own feelings. Today, we are speaking with Kaz Amos. She’s a provisional psychologist at The Hummingbird Centre in New South Wales and has spent many years helping people address grief and loss. Today she will be talking with us about grief and sharing with us the unique challenges that can arise within the family unit when confronted with loss. She will also offer some practical strategies families can use to navigate their way through these hard times. Welcome, Kaz. It is great to speak with you today.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (01:02):
Thank you. I want to say it’s a pleasure to be here, and yet we’re talking about such a sensitive topic. I guess the pleasure is in being able to share information that may be helpful with anybody who’s listening. It’s a great privilege to be able to do that and be in this position, so thanks for the invitation.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (01:19):
Thank you for being with us. So Kaz, could you describe for our listeners what we mean when we talk about the emotion of grief and how people experience it?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (01:28):
So I think that the word grief, when we talk about people experiencing grief, we are using an umbrella term to describe a huge collection of emotions that swirl and all move around at one time. So it’s also in saying that, and I guess having that imagery in mind of lots and lots of different things happening all at once, grief is not really a linear process in that it doesn’t have a beginning and an end as such. As much as we would love to believe that there are five neat stages of grief that we jump through neatly, anybody who’s experienced grief, which is probably everybody everywhere, knows that that is not how it happens. Any one of those swelling emotions, be it love, loss, longing, and negative emotions that come with grief too, deep sadness, and depression, can strike you at any time when you’re not ready for it. Grief, the umbrella term, is a pretty good place for us to start, I think.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (02:29):
That’s a great way to picture it as well, and to picture it as an umbrella and something that is ongoing, even though I guess we are taught and you hear about the five stages of grieving, and I think that’s something that came in popular culture somehow. So maybe people do really think that they’re the steps that you go through, but it is, in a way, refreshing to hear that it is something that is not linear and comes in waves, and it can help you, in a way, prepare yourself for that if there is a loss or something that happens. So, Kaz, when a family has experienced a loss, how can parents create an open space for their children to express their grief and share their feelings?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (03:11):
When it comes to our households, whoever’s in those households, I think the first thing to notice is, everybody feels differently all the time. So while one person is not feeling a wave of crushing grief, someone else might be, and it’s okay for them both to be present at the same time. I tell a story about my kids, my own three. We had a bit of a pet tragedy, which is one of our children’s. I guess introduction to grief sometimes is losing our first pet. In this case, it was the Guinea pig. Poor little Guinea pigs. They were our first pets, and we came home to find a very dramatic scene. I won’t go into the details. It was very traumatic for our kids at the time, and each of the children responded differently.
(03:55):
So one of them was very angry, and he took a stick, and he was like, “I’m going to kill that thing that hurt our Guinea pig.” He ranted and raved around the backyard, and he probably was releasing huge amounts of emotion and adrenaline and all of that, but channeling it right into anger. One of the other children ran upstairs, took out her journal, and started writing everything down. She said, “Mom, I’m doing a recount of this event.” And the other one just lied on her bed and sobbed her little heart out. So even in just the three, and as a mom, I’m trying to hold space for all the three and make it okay for each of them to feel how they were feeling.
(04:35):
I also was observing my own feelings. I was really upset too, but I had to put a bit of a pause on that for myself so I could help my kids manage their own emotions in their own way. Then I was able to vent a bit later to my partner, and he was also then able to vent, and we could discuss it together as adults. So it’s a small example of what a loss can look like in a family, but loads of families I know go through similar things like this with our pets as almost a first-time experience, and nobody knows what the right thing is to do. But we hang in there with each other while we’re doing it.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (05:09):
It’s interesting, the notion of the pet being the first experience in death or in loss for a family. I didn’t actually have that in mind when we were talking about this and talking about this podcast. It’s always maybe a relative or a friend, but the pets are, in some respect, they are a family member, and they are something that children may be born with the pet in the family or they get the pet and they grow up together and they’re in the house with them. So it is such a close connection. In the immediate learning of a loss in a family, what is something that you could share with parents to do in those very first instances of learning about a loss to support their children or help them learn that someone has passed?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (05:52):
The power of presence is really strong, for particularly with children who don’t know how to feel these. If it’s a first time that they’ve been… Maybe they’re hearing about the loss of a grandparent or someone close to them. Also, news that’s traumatic could be in parental separation. There’s loss in those places as well. So any news that represents change, big change can have that same sense of grief and loss that goes with it. So for a parent, allowing the child to hear the news delivered in a way that is honest but not brutal, that is paired back but connected with the truth, sometimes there’s not going to be the right words, but less is more with children, and they will ask if they want more information.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (06:39):
Do you think that varies depending on their age?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (06:42):
Level of curiosity?
Nadia Rossi (Host) (06:43):
So it’s more about the level of curiosity to their age, really.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (06:47):
Like the personality of the child, you might have a very curious child who says, “Oh, what did happen to Nan and where is she now and why can’t I see her?” And a parent can explain, “Nan’s body is no longer living. It doesn’t mean that you can’t talk to her. You can talk to her anytime.” Go back to the relationship that they had between Nan and still build on that, “What do you remember about her that you loved the most? What smells remind you of her? What did you do together that you just loved?” So I suppose create that sense of still connected even without the presence of the other person? There’s a great children’s book which you can pick up at Big W, Target, anywhere like that called My Love for You is Everywhere. It’s such a beautiful book because it takes a child through where they are in the world and how they find the love of the person who’s not with them in the physical, but how they can feel their love all the time. Such a lovely little gift.
(07:43):
Something else with children is, they’re really creating. They write stories, make up a song, bake together, play together, make room for your child to express how they feel. Even if it’s setting aside time because you probably experienced the same loss, but that you can manage your own feelings, and if you cry, you cry together. If you’re angry, you can be angry together. It’s okay if you’re longing. We can be longing together, and there’s such a deep connection in that. When you think about what loss is, loss is a separation. So if we can nurture loss with connection, we’re just giving ourselves such a wonderful gift of being together in presence.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (08:23):
Are there any phrases or language that you would advise parents to steer clear from when they’re discussing grief, loss, or a death with a child?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (08:33):
Yeah, it’s an SH word, but it’s should. So what you think you should be doing, or you think how someone should be responding, or what your previous experience of grief and loss is, “This is different. It should be the same.” Or, “You shouldn’t do that.” We really need to pause ourselves if we notice the sh, sh, sh coming out, because I think what that does is sometimes squash that natural expression of feeling, the words that are going to come out, or the stories that are going to be told. Should is also really judgmental on ourselves. I shouldn’t be feeling like this. I should be over this by now. I suppose rather than make space for the experience of loss, trying to control the experience of loss, that’s where the shouldn’t comes in. It’s not that helpful, and our children really have never, usually, done these things before.
(09:22):
To be honest, as adults, we probably haven’t either. So there is no proper, correct, effect way to move through and around with grief other than to acknowledge the feelings as they come up, make room for those feelings. Sometimes with children, it can be great to say, “What do you want to do about that? What do you want to do with those feelings?” Or, “Do you feel sad about Auntie not being here anymore? What would you like to say to her? Is there anything you didn’t get to say?” Then you write her a letter. Taking all that judgement out of what we think it ought to be and then putting that on children and ourselves can really help to relieve that pressure. It makes us a little bit more open to curiosity as well, where we can say, “Hey, what’s happening here? And what’s happening to you?” So much more curious and gentle than what this is supposed to look like.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (10:08):
As you mentioned, everyone grieves differently, so they’re going to process and show different signs of grieving. I’m wondering if we go back to the story you mentioned with your children and how they all grieved differently. How would you, as a parent, approach those different grieving processes? How did you do that with your children?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (10:28):
I just checked in on them and made sure that they were getting what they needed, and the one who was ranting and raving around the backyard so angry, I just let him go and made sure that he was safe. I knew he wasn’t hurting himself. I knew that he wasn’t going to actually be able to follow through with what he wanted to do. So I knew that that was safe too, and I just allowed that to be. But you know what? In that moment, I really did feel like I needed to be in three places at once and just save myself for later, if that makes sense. I just had to go, “Okay, I’m noticing that I’m feeling really upset about this too, but I just need to check in on my babies first, and I can look after me later.”
Nadia Rossi (Host) (11:07):
Checking in on your children, I’m wondering. We all go through different, varying levels of grief, and we all process it differently, as you’ve said, but is there any signs that a child’s grief is overwhelming them or is becoming prolonged that a parent can look out for, and what steps they can take to support their child or get them the help that they need?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (11:30):
So in psychological terms, we call it an extended period of grief that seems to interrupt functioning in life. That’s what we are looking for. We’re looking for signs that the child… Maybe they’re not eating as well because they always feel a bit sick in the tummy about the loss. Maybe they don’t want to go to school. When they go to school, they go to the office because they feel sick. Those are signs of stress in children, and if it’s happening beyond… Because there’s a time and a place for that. But when it starts to interrupt everyday functioning for an extended period, I think that that’s an appropriate time to look for a counsellor, look for a psychologist, look for somebody who can help you, help your child, and also help the child have a place to express how they’re feeling.
(12:13):
I worked with one little girl who was seven, and her grandma died, had passed away. The family had really honoured the grandmother’s memory really well, but this little one, she didn’t want to let go. She was worried that if she let go of her sadness, that her grandma would go with it. So our conversations together, and mom, was present in the room with us too, which was lovely because it felt like a little team together. Mom wasn’t alone, and the little one wasn’t alone, and I wasn’t doing all the work, so to speak. We told stories and we drew pictures of grandma, and we separated the sadness from who grandma was because grandma was love and light.
(12:51):
Grandma was like cupcakes. She told me about how grandma used to make their fairy cupcakes, the ones with the chocolate cream and the little wings. So we were able, together, to say, “These are two different kinds of feelings, and one doesn’t have to stay the whole time. If it gets in the way of you remembering grandma, then it might be okay to let some of that go. It might be okay to let a little bit more of that go. With that all of sadness that’s left, maybe we fill it with grandma stories and grandma memories and maybe grandma’s jewellery.”
(13:23):
She had a little ring that grandma had said, “Would you like to choose something?” Because she knew she was going. So yeah, she was able to connect and keep her connection with her grandmother without having her physically here. Gradually, the sadness eased, still sad, but not getting in the way of her going to school, not getting in the way of her playing with her friends, and doing all the things that she wanted to do in her life too. In terms of therapies that are on also for children, it doesn’t have to be a typical glow to a psychologist or a counselor’s room where there is four walls, there are play therapists, there is equine-assisted therapy, there’s pet-assisted therapy, art therapy, music, because some children use their sensory parts of themselves to express themselves more than their words. Parents state that about their kids, “This one is an emotional one. This one’s a drawer. This one’s a feeler. They like to write.”
Nadia Rossi (Host) (14:18):
So it’s really about knowing your child, that trusting yourself, knowing your child, and what avenue that they may need, and building that team around them. I’m wondering if you think it’s also important to involve other family members or friends that the child has. Is that helpful to bring into that sphere of helping them process grief and loss?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (14:40):
Yeah, that’s a great thing to notice, Nadia. That’s, again, it’s the connection that we miss when we’re grieving. So to be reminded of how strong our family connections are, and it can’t all be. As parents, we often bear the weight of looking after our children alone or with both partners. So as a family unit or a social network, sharing that can be… So lighten the load on the family as a whole. So one person just doesn’t have to do all the lifting and the carrying of that grief umbrella and everything that goes underneath it.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (15:12):
Kaz, I wanted to go back to when you mentioned that your children had experienced that loss and you had helped them in that moment, but you felt that you had to take a step back and you would look after yourself later. How can parents process their own grief while supporting their children? Is this something that parents have to eventually do? You’ll have to eventually go through the grief process yourself. So how can a parent juggle that along with helping their child through it? How do they look after themselves? Is there some self-care strategies you can offer for parents to do in that time that they are balancing grief in the family unit?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (15:51):
Yeah, the self-care part in grief, often, that’s the last thing that we do. We’re so sad. We’re so deeply missing and longing that presence of the person, the relationship, or the thing that is no longer there, and it can be easy to tuck up into bed with that big, giant sadness sooner, get under it, and hide. I guess if we know that about ourselves, and you said this before about parents knowing their children, if we know ourselves, we can also ask ourselves, “Hey, what’s happening to me and what do I need right now? And maybe I do need someone to look after the children. So I really can tuck myself up in that sadness because that will help to massage the pain in my heart. If I can do that for myself, then I’m able to offer that to my children as well and to my partner because everybody is experiencing something difficult here.”
(16:42):
I recently heard Brené Brown talking about in partnerships when someone’s feeling exhausted, putting a number and saying, “Hey, I’ve only got 25% today.” And the other partner says, “Actually, I’ve got a bit more than that. I’ll take the 75.” And that’s a conversation between a couple. I think that that can also be taken to extended family as well, and best friends who pop in, people who come over with the food, there’s a loss in the family, “Do you think you could just step in for…” However, thanks for the food, that means that I don’t have to do that. I guess even amongst all of that, are connections, beautiful connectedness, that helps us to feel health.
(17:19):
Something about the grief process physiologically that happens when we have that initial trauma, our brain goes into, “Let’s just numb this person and this body and this brain for a bit. The news that we’ve just received is too much.” So the brain will send out huge levels of chemicals to numb us, and it will gradually ease that off over a 6 to 8 week period. So oftentimes people get to that 6 to 8-week period and they turn around and they’re like, “Where’s the lasagna that I was ready to throw? Where is all the support?” And people experience and have shared that they’ve experienced people avoiding them because they don’t know how to help them through their loss. It’s uncomfortable, and it’s awkward.
(18:04):
That’s really that point in time where self-care and what I need and checking in with myself because likely you’re going through that, your partner’s going through that, your family’s all going through that together, checking in with each other, “Is it like this for you because I feel really lonely right now. Where’s everybody gone?” And all of that fog, that post-trauma fog, is lifted, and I think it can be a very isolating and vulnerable place for families. So that self-care at that point in time is really important because I think we seem vulnerable right at the minute when we get news like that. But I think that that vulnerability continues, and depending on who it is and how deep that loss is for us, has an impact on that too.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (18:44):
I love the numbers because even if you can’t put into words how you are feeling, it’s a very quick way to go, “Okay, out of 100, how am I feeling?” And you can get that across quite quickly. It’s kind of like a shorthand you can have with your partner and even with friends or relatives that you’re close with where you can go, “I’m at a 20, I’m at a 10.” And so that is a concept for someone to really quickly latch onto. Even when they’re feeling uncomfortable, or you may not feel comfortable talking about grief, or they may not feel comfortable having that conversation with you, just that shorthand, everyone knows what that means. So they know, “Okay, what can I do to step in? Or how can I…”
Kaz Amos (Guest) (19:24):
How much do you need me?
Nadia Rossi (Host) (19:24):
Yeah,
Kaz Amos (Guest) (19:25):
How much do you need, 70?
Nadia Rossi (Host) (19:25):
Yeah.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (19:25):
Because I’ve got 70.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (19:27):
Yeah, exactly.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (19:27):
Yeah, and you’re right. I think something about loss is that I don’t really want to share it over and over and over again because every time I speak about it, I feel another wave of that, “This is the reality in my life now, and I’m not sure I like it.” And I don’t want to really be standing maybe in the supermarket or on the edge of the soccer field or at dance with all the other parents feeling that level of vulnerability. This doesn’t feel like the right place or time. So maybe if we’re outsiders to a family that we are watching go through this, maybe we choose a particular time and a place where we ask these questions, and it’s not there. We’re asking somebody to talk about the most recent difficult change that they’re experiencing. We can be sensitive to that as friends and supporters of other families going through grief.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (20:11):
Kaz, we’ve been talking about how partners can support each other or you can reach out to other grownups and adults in your life. What about discussing and communicating with your children where you are at in the grieving process? What are some effective ways that parents can communicate where they’re at, how they’re feeling in an appropriate way to their kids so that they understand?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (20:36):
I have these little stickers that I give out in my practise. They’re a pause button. I actually have one here on my laptop, and I also had one on my steering wheel because it would help me to remind myself, “Hey, be less reactive, be more responsive.” Because emotions are so heightened at a time of loss, reminding ourselves to pause, maybe it’s taking a couple of breaths to consider what it is that we want to say, what question we want to ask in order to share how we feel. It’s completely okay for parents to say, “I’m really sad, honestly, I’m really sad. I miss this person. I miss our dog. I miss the Guinea pigs.” I think our honesty gives room for vulnerability, and in families, if we can encourage each other to be more vulnerable and supported in our vulnerability, then we’re doing ourselves and our children a great service.
(21:26):
We’re teaching them to be like that in the wide world as well. Because little ones at school probably have friends going through losses and they hear about that, and it’s okay for kids to offer some compassion, and it comes, I think, with learning self-compassion as well as part of that. So I think parents being able to say to their children, honestly, but with compassion, “This is how I’m feeling.” And to check in, “What’s happening with you, what’s happening to you?” And maybe they’re not that great with their words, but there’s plenty of other ways, as we’ve touched on, to express how they’re feeling.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (21:56):
We talked about children and maybe experienced prolonged grief and what you would suggest a parent do for their child in that process. But what about for a parent? Is it similar?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (22:06):
Yeah, it is. It’s similar. Sometimes, actually having a person outside the family unit to speak to can be of real advantage because you don’t come as a professional. I don’t come to the conversation with a preconceived idea of who this person was and what my role is with them. As an outsider, I’m an observer. I’m a reflector back of what I’m hearing. For a person experiencing extraordinary grief or to that degree, complicated, complex grief, having somebody outside the family can be a real reprieve because it gives you room that you can just say what you need to say. Sometimes people aren’t perfect, and oftentimes, in grief and loss, that the person who’s gone now is raised to a higher level of saintliness, and that is a wonderful set of memories to have. But sometimes it’s not always that way. You may not be able to say those things to other family members, but it is okay in a private, safe space to share that with a professional, which can help to relieve the emotional weight of what that’s like. Carrying that by yourself, share it, have it observed.
(23:16):
I read something recently that what grief requires is a witness, and it’s somebody witnessing my story. I don’t need resolution. I just need a witness to my story. In that, we experience that connection that our brain requires, our physical emotional body requires to move through and to experience it, but in a safe place with a safe person who’s not going to go back to the family and go, “You should hear what she really thinks about that, what Amy really said.” And so I think it’s really cathartic to have a person like that on board. Isn’t that part of helping people in the role that I get to play is about witnessing pain in a safe place? I can’t fix the pain, but I can be with you while you are moving, allowing it to move through you so that you don’t need to take it with you.
(24:06):
You can leave some of it. I always say to my clients, “Just come in, leave some of that on the rug. The rug gets vacuumed up, it goes to the bin, the bin goes to, and we never see it again. Some of it you might want to take with you though, so why don’t we choose what you want to take with you?” And I guess in this situation, this circumstances of grief and loss, we’re doing the same thing. We’re saying maybe we can’t fill that hole, but maybe there’s some of the emotional baggage that we don’t need to take with us, and how do we help each other do that?
Nadia Rossi (Host) (24:32):
Kaz, earlier we spoke about grief not being linear, and it can kind of sneak up on you when it’s coming up to an anniversary of a loss, and that grieving can sneak up on you again, or maybe behaviours in the family unit are changing. What advice would you give to families in the lead up to an anniversary of a loss?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (24:56):
Often, people might say the first is the toughest. I think I meet people as a professional, at the second. My experience in that is that someone says, “I still feel the same as I did 12 months ago, and I still feel the same as I felt 12 months before that. It’s not so much to the point that I can’t function, but it’s always there.” There was a movie that talked about grief as a brick that you always carry in your bag. So the weight is always with you, but you don’t wear the brick on your shirt. You don’t put it out there where everybody can see it. You just carry it with you all the time. It is just something that’s a part of your handbag that you carry. It might feel heavier for you than other people, but we don’t know everybody’s story.
(25:41):
So when it comes to anniversaries, yes, preparation is, it can be a thing. It can sneak up on you. Something to be mindful about with anniversaries is, our bodies know what season, what time of year something happened, what it felt like at that time of year. So sometimes, that anniversary, you can feel all of the grief that you felt at a similar time of year. As soon as it starts, we’re sensory. We sense. We’re made of all of our senses, and our senses know well when it was hot, it was December, and it was just before Christmas. So we’re already thinking about that in November, when it starts to warm up. Those early anniversaries often take a huge toll because they’re so close time-wise to the original time of loss. So yes, preparing and coming up with creating ways to honour the memory of our person, to honour the legacy that their life left, that mark that they left in the world, some people are big on doing things, and other people would prefer to just be quiet and stay at home and not shout it, not do anything, but rather just sit with.
(26:52):
So I guess, individually, we would have what feels right for us, and then, as part of our family unit, we could do something together if that’s what we wanted to do. It’s really hard with anniversaries because they’re just little reminders that that person’s not present. It’s interesting. We lost a family member nearly 10 years ago now to motor-neuron disease. That was actually my husband’s dad. Just a few weeks ago, we were watching our wedding video from 24 years ago, and our youngest daughter, who was 18, was in the room watching us. The speeches came on, and his dad got up and gave a speech, and our 18-year-old just burst into tears.
(27:31):
She said, “I never saw Poppy not in a wheelchair. I’ve never seen him stand up before. This is the first time, and he’s not even here for me to say to him, ‘Gee, you look good in it.'” And she cried. That was a loss. That was a grieving crying that because she never got to see or meet him in that way. I was so happy to have that, almost like the evidence of him and what his life was like before that. She got to really take all of that in. But it caught her by surprise. It was really unexpected. It caught all of us by surprise. It’s been so long since we’ve seen him, and he didn’t just leave a little golf ball-sized hole in the ground. He left a whole divot of when his body left the planet, there was a big fat hole left behind, and that was just a reminder of big fat hole that we don’t get to hang out with anymore. So yeah, those things can be sneaky. Not so much an anniversary, but definitely a reminder in time.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (28:26):
I guess, yeah, it’s a conversation about the person and bringing in strategies that you spoke about earlier of how can we remember them, how can we form that connection of them again and have a conversation about them, draw about them, read about them, write about them, those kinds of things that you could probably take to younger children as well as older children as well, and everyone in the family can kind of use those strategies.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (28:49):
Yeah, it was interesting in that moment because we all started telling stories. My husband’s like, “I remember dad and he was like this, and he was like this.” And then she was like, “Oh, I remember when Poppy used to say this all the time.” And I chipped in with my two bobs, and we all just had a bit of story time around Poppy, and it was lovely. It was like a beautiful revisit. So those moments, yeah, you don’t even know they’re coming sometimes.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (29:11):
Kaz. I’m wondering, where can people go if they want to learn more about grief? What resources are out there for parents, for adults, for themselves, and then maybe also for their children? Do you have any you could recommend to our audience?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (29:27):
I do. Of course, they start with podcasts because I love this platform. There is one called Shapes of Grief, and actually, that was recommended to me to listen to by a client of mine who’s been going through very complicated and complex grief. That client has now found that extremely helpful, and I did ask for permission, first of all, before I shared that. Jono Fisher, I don’t know whether you’ve come across Jono Fisher. He used to have, I think they were called Kindness Cards maybe about five or six years ago, and very much a person promoting mindfulness in our community. He has also just released a new podcast, which is all about grief, rituals, and having intimate conversations about grief. There’s another couple. One is called Grief Out Loud.
(30:16):
The other one, this podcast, has been through a lot, and it’s called Terrible, Thanks for Asking. So she had a number of losses quickly, and it’s the story of her being able to cope with that. She also brings on experts to discuss grief. Knowledge is power for me in any emotional state. So if I can learn more about it, then I can understand how it applies to me. So sometimes even a quick Google search can really help find resources and listen to what resonates with you. Skip anything that doesn’t resonate with you. For the children, I’ve got a few books that I would recommend, and I already mentioned My Love for You is Everywhere. There’s also The Invisible String, The Memory Tree, and The List of Things That Will Not Change, and the other one, the last one I have there, is In My Heart. In My Heart has got a beautiful cover on it, which has got a really deep set of coloured hearts on the front. I think all those ones are very much in line with how do we stay connected to somebody we can’t physically see anymore.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (31:17):
Kaz, do you have any parenting support groups or any grieving support groups you know of that are maybe national?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (31:26):
So, have you heard of Grief Cafes?
Nadia Rossi (Host) (31:28):
No.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (31:29):
Grief, you may find if you do a search for a Grief Cafe around you, that there are groups who are. They’ve probably been sprouting around the country and maybe around the world for a little while now, and it is basically a conversation, a group of people who get together and we talk about their grief. It’s over a cupper. It’s nothing extraordinary. It’s not like, “This is a support group, and my grief is this.” It doesn’t have to be like that. I do know that Jono Fisher is doing retreats where people can come together, and the aim of those is to heal grief wounds. So that’s probably a next-level, deeper one, but definitely relevant when grief is very traumatic. So yeah, looking around for those kinds of groups can be very helpful.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (32:16):
Kaz. I’m wondering, after everything we’ve spoken about and our discussion today, if you could leave our listeners with just a few things to remember out of what we’ve spoken about, what would you really want our listeners to take from this discussion?
Kaz Amos (Guest) (32:32):
It’s okay to be sad and feel feelings. Feel the feelings. They do move through. They move through our hearts, they move through our bellies, they move through our brains, they move through us, and they pass. The feelings do pass, and it’s okay to acknowledge that in that moment of time. For our children, it’s okay to acknowledge that and share that. It’s also okay to help them recognise when this is something for them to, and in those moments, that’s when connection is the most important for me. Connection is it’s the goods, it’s the chisel, it’s the glue, and we know that in our brains when we are connected externally, our brains light up because it’s like a happy place in there. But imagine if we can use that connection to help us with our sad places and we can make it okay to be sad together. Make it okay to remember together.
(33:22):
It’s funny because even the word remember is to re-member, to bring back together. It’s doing it again and again and again. We know that about our human selves, that we function better when we’re not suppressing our emotions but rather giving good attention when they rise and allowing them to settle through. Lots of people avoid grief because they think they’re never going to stop crying. That’s the reality of how it feels, and yet it does, because each one of us lives with grief. The more we connect and support each other in that, I think that that’s something I would love everybody to take away. Everybody’s got something, a loss that they’re experiencing often. So yeah, being able to connect with somebody in that, even if you don’t know the right words to say, just say, “I don’t know what to say, but my heart feels for you.” That can be hard. Maybe it’s okay for us to also be honest and aware and use that as our compassionate place to come from.
Nadia Rossi (Host) (34:18):
Thank you, Kaz. Thank you for talking with us today. I know I’ll take a lot of this podcast with me into my life. So thank you so much for sharing all of your wisdom with us and talking about that unavoidable but very powerful thing called grief. Thank you.
Kaz Amos (Guest) (34:34):
Thanks.
Narrator (34:37):
Visit our website at www.emergingminds.com.au/families for a wide range of free information and resources to help support child and family mental health. Emerging Minds leads the National Workforce Centre for Child Mental Health. The Centre is funded by the Australian Government Department of Health under the National Support for Child and Youth Mental Health Program.