One of a series of leaflets published by The Compassionate Friends Some of us struggle to support our other children, especially in the early days. The circumstances that led up to our child’s death, and how they died, may have left us too overwhelmed by our own shock and pain. Later on, we may feel guilty that we were not always able to support our children to the extent that we would have wished. We recognise that this was because at times our grief overwhelmed us, but knowing this doesn’t always remove our regret. We should be kind to ourselves; we have been managing the best we can in an immensely difficult situation. Hopefully there are other people involved in their lives – friends, other family members, teachers or colleagues – who have also been there for our children. We may have an urge to overprotect our surviving children. We can find it difficult to allow them to lead a normal life, and to let them out of our sight. This is true especially if we feel that the death of our child could have been avoided, such as if it was due to a road traffic incident, an accident or through suicide. “If my surviving child does not contact me or respond to my messages quickly, I imagine that the worst has happened. I try to hide my crippling anxiety.” When our child has died as a result of illness, their siblings may carry their own secret fears that they too will become ill and die. If it was an older sibling who died, they may dread that something will happen to them when they reach that same age. It is not unknown for siblings to wonder if their parents would have preferred for them to die instead of their sibling – survivor guilt is very common after all deaths. We need to try to understand what is going through their minds and allay their fears. Many families include children from previous relationships. We may be left to care for children who are not biologically our own, while a child we gave birth to is no longer with us.
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