As the new school term approaches, our friends at the charity WAY Widowed and Young offer their advice on how they’ve navigated the back-to-school routine with their children following a bereavement.
If it’s their first day back at school after a bereavement, it may help to talk with the child in advance about how they might respond to questions or comments from classmates when they return.
Karen
If your child is starting school for the very first time since your partner has died, make sure you have people on hand to support you for the first school drop off, if possible. What helped me was to know I had a friend on hand who could walk with me to the school gates to drop my daughter off. And I also made sure friends were available for hugs and a cuppa after I’d dropped my daughter off, in case I had a wobble.
It’s also helpful to join peer support networks like WAY, which has subgroups set up specifically for widowed parents. Just knowing there are people who understand how hard the back-to-school routine might be for you is really helpful and makes you feel less alone.
Vicky
It was helpful for me to have just one point of contact at the school who I could go to with anything – that way they knew our family situation and I didn’t have to explain myself over again. If either of my children had a tough night I would let the school know as it would inevitably affect their ability to concentrate and I asked to be alerted of any subjects/texts that could contain death or dying or (for my situation) anything around heart health and CPR.
Once they were in high school, I also reminded my children of the fact that, if they felt emotional, there was an agreed place where they could go to and that it was okay to do that.
One date that I hadn’t realised would affect my children at school was Remembrance Day in November. They found this very emotional and hard to deal with and we ended up excusing them from assemblies and classes around this, unless they felt okay to attend.
Veronica
Remind teachers/contact point with school to share the information that the child has lost a parent. Sadly, it needs repeating year on year. For younger kids, it might be worth thinking ahead now to prompt teachers to think about Mother’s/Father’s Day (may be easier to do it all at the same time). For those with teens, it’s worth checking in with what they are happy/not happy to cover at school and how they want to handle it (e.g. death/bereavement etc in lessons).
Charlie
We didn’t go straight back to school. We left the first few days settle down with kids discussing their great summers and we also had a few duvet days.
Amy
The school issued my son with a time-out card/pass, which meant he could leave the classroom to move to the pastoral space if a lesson was too much, or he got overwhelmed. I don’t actually think he used it, but knowing it was there helped.
Tanya
About WAY
The WAY Widowed and Young community offers a safe space to talk to other people (both with and without children) who understand how it feels to be widowed at a young age.
Find out how WAY can support you at www.widowedandyoung.org.uk
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