When someone close to you dies  it can be a very difficult and confusing time for everyone who knew them. You could feel lonely, or like no one else understands how you feel.

Adults sometimes try to hide details of a person’s death from young people and this can make you feel left out. This may be because the adults are trying to protect you or are struggling to cope with their own feelings.  Or it may just be that talking about death and dying can be scary for any of us.

When we hear bad news, we can have lots of different feelings. We might feel some of these things:

• feeling very upset and needing to cry a lot
• feeling nothing at all and wondering why
• really sad –sometimes sadness can feel like a physical pain
• that the bad news is not true or is all a dream
• angry with the person who has died because it feels like they have left us
• that it’s someone else’s fault. We might blame a parent, a doctor or someone else
• guilty – even thinking that we have caused that person’s death.  Maybe we have wished that they were dead (or even said it to them) or have been unkind to them and believe that this is why they have died. Lots of us have thoughts like this towards other people at times but these thoughts do not cause them to die.
• Lots of feelings all mixed up together like being on a roller coaster – ok one minute then sad the next.
• scared - sometimes we wonder if something else awful will happen and this can make us feel afraid of everything.

We all have different feelings when someone dies. Other people should not tell you how you should be feeling – whatever you feel at the time is ok. You might find that there are times when you forget about what has happened and enjoy yourself – this is natural.