My husband died recently, and now my 6-year-old is acting out

Q: My husband died four months ago, and he was my 6-year-old daughter’s absolute best buddy. Since that time, she has been kind of hurting her 2-year-old sister, melting down and refusing to do anything except grunt or whine. She will not let me or anyone else (grandparents) talk to, hug or console her, and she keeps moving away from anyone that tries to talk to her at all. No one is punishing her, we talk about her dad often and positively, we collect feathers and coins and tell the sky “Thank you, daddy,” and are very aware that she’s grieving.

A: Oh my, I am so sorry for this terrible loss. Not only have you lost your partner, but you have to watch your 6-year-old suffer, which is also gut-wrenching. And here’s the funny thing about being a mental health practitioner and a parent: You know enough to understand what you are seeing, thanks to education and practical experience, but you are also in deep personal grief. What you’ve learned about emotions and children is easy to forget when the pain is so great, and it is human for overwhelm to take over. In terms of what you can do to help her, let’s unpack why children lie, melt down, hurt siblings and seem to regress when they are in deep grief.

When a child is 6 years old, they are often — but not always — in a developmental in-between place. Their brain has taken huge leaps in maturity: They are able to wait, take turns, communicate their needs (mostly), have and maintain compassion for others, and they understand the permanence of death.

But they are still little. They need to find refuge in the people they love after a long day, they still believe in magic and, while friends are increasingly important, it is their primary caretakers who soothe and help them grow. Children at this age will still have tantrums, growth spurts and regressions, and it is typical for 6-year-olds to be quite bright and still clutch their lovies.

Because your daughter is old enough to understand loss, she feels the deep frustration and alarm of your husband’s death. After someone we love dies, our brain forgets about the death and keeps “looking” for the person who has passed. Are they at home? Will they be in bed? Will I see them at breakfast? But unlike an adult who can readily talk to themselves about themselves (thank you, prefrontal cortex), your daughter cannot consistently harness and control this alarm, frustration and confusion.

She is old enough to not hurt strangers, but these big emotions come out sideways on her little sister, in meltdowns and in lies. I want you to imagine her as turned inside out, all raw endings and nerves. She is so raw that she is even grunting; the emotions cannot create words in her head. She can’t make sense of this stunning loss. We often […]

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