Talking about death to twin toddlers, a year later
A constant phrase that we have used over the past year when talking about our stillborn daughter to her older siblings is “Baby Blair died. Died means that her body stopped working.” Death is not a word that we avoid in our house. We say it frequently. We describe what it means frequently. It’s our reality when our twin two-year-olds continue to process that their sibling died and what that actually means. As with all things at age 2, the development of their language, sentences, and mental and emotional processing the meaning of everything has been a huge theme. With our daughters, death has been along for the ‘ride’.
Very early on, just a few months after Blair’s death, the girls and I encountered a dead worm. Though not as verbal yet, both girls were distraught at the worm’s wrinkled body. I returned to the brief phrase above, explaining that the worm had died and that its body had stopped working. I asked them if they remembered Blair’s burial service and how we placed a special blanket over Blair’s casket before lowering her into the ground. They remembered. I asked if they wanted to do something similar for the worm. I found a nearby leaf and placed it over the worm. In typical toddler fashion, layer after layer, they ran and found leaves and we covered the worm’s body. I invited them to repeat after me: “Thank you for your life, worm. We will miss you, worm.” A few months later when we were eating Chinese food with the girls’ grandparents, the noodles looked like worms. With a little more sentence development, C remembered the dead worm and how we buried it like we did Blair when Blair died. It was amazing to see that the life lesson on how we care and honor our loved ones after death had stuck at such a young age.
My husband and I have found that common, everyday phrases that we use like “my phone died" or “the battery is dead (on a toy)” needed to be re-framed. When we’d explain that whatever thing we were using just needed a new battery or to be re-charged, the girls would ask if Blair needed to charge or need a new battery. Their eyes and whole bodies were full of hope at the possibility. We would have to explain the finality of death of a human body in simple terms, that human bodies don’t have batteries the way that toys or phones do. Once bodies stop working, they can’t come back to life. They will always be dead. Since then, we have been more calculated in our phrases about death in casual settings. We emphasize that batteries need to be plugged in or re-charged, not that they ‘died’.
When we announced our new pregnancy to the girls, there was some obvious confusion. V especially had a tough time understanding at first that there was a new baby in there, and not Blair, as I spoke about in an earlier blog post. At one point, shortly after we had visited Blair’s grave, V also told me matter-of-factly that we will get to see the new baby “at a new cemetery!” in an exciting tone. In her little mind, the only place to visit a new sibling would be at a cemetery. She was excited about it, not really processing having a sibling die in a sad way. For her, it has been fun to explore graves and what people leave at their loved ones’ graves. For me, it was still heartbreaking that this was her reality. It was also terrifying as her mother in my early second trimester at the time who was also trying visualize a healthy ending to this new pregnancy and NOT another child that I have to lower into the ground. It took a lot of courage and practice, but I change my earlier language of if the baby comes to when the baby comes. While keeping it very high-level, I emphasized that Blair’s body stopped working but baby #4’s body is healthy. I have even taken what feels like the biggest leap of faith by telling our living children that while we visit their first baby sister at the cemetery, that this new new baby will be coming home to live and grow with us.
Before we knew that baby #4 was a girl, Blair was still their only little sister. While learning about the five senses during preschool, there was a page with a baby sister and a lesson on the sense of sight. The book read “When I look at my baby sister, I use my sense of sight. I am seeing.” I added my own spin to this page to share that for lots of families, they can see their baby sisters. Other families, like ours, cannot. They are not in our homes the same way, but that these babies are still part of our families.
Around Easter time while I was just starting my third trimester, we visited Blair’s grave and realized we had to readjust our language again. We used to refer to going to the cemetery as “seeing baby Blair”. As we were getting their shoes on, C said: “But I want to SEE baby Blair. I want to HOLD baby Blair.”, holding her hands out as if she were to hug a baby. She wasn’t wrong. We readjusted our language to visiting Blair’s grave, where we buried her body after she died.
Sometimes there has been some confusion when I say that they have two baby sisters, that there will be two baby sisters coming home with us soon. Cora has said, for example, that we will be going blueberry picking with both baby #4 and Blair. And Violet has said that we will go on car rides with both little sisters.
As we have gotten closer to the new baby’s delivery date and our living girls are now just a few months shy of three years old, their thoughts have become more complex. I knew it was only a matter of time until we got overt questions and commentary about why Blair died. With Violet this week (at 37 weeks pregnant), it finally happened.
When [baby #4’s name] comes out of your belly, she will drink your milk just like *I* did when I was a little baby. Yes, she will.
Did baby Blair drink from your milk? No, she wasn’t able to do that. My body did have milk for her, but when she came out of my belly, she had already died. Her body had stopped working.
Why did her body stop working? Oh, that is a very big question. We don’t really know why her body stopped working. All we know is that her body was very sick and died.
I then paused to allow for more questioning, but there wasn’t any, so I continued: It’s a very big question that we will always have - why Blair died. Sometimes even when want to know why something happens, we don’t always get to know the answer.
But [baby #4’s name]’s body is working. Yes, her body is working. [Baby #4] is alive in Mama’s belly.
Every now and then, we still get the request to hold Blair and do all the baby things with her, like wrap her in a blanket, put her in a car seat, etc. This is all normal and to be expected. We all daydream of what life could be like if she were living with us. We all miss her and wish she were here in our own ways.
I am thankful in a way that neither of our girls are old enough to ask “is baby #4 going to die, too”?, but sometimes I wonder if that is something they think about. There is no way I can honestly answer that question. We focus on the present: how the baby wriggles, where her feet and hands are, and what her heartbeat sounds like. I know, too, that as our girls get older and interact with other families in the ‘real world’, we will have to confront different challenges about Blair’s death in their eyes, and perhaps more frustrations that she is not here with us. For now, when Blair is brought up, we continue to use our simple, high-level phrases: Blair died. Her body stopped working. Repetition and keeping things as simple and high-level as possible has helped our girls to have a strong sense of our family identity and how Blair is and always will be a very special part of who we are as a family unit.
