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Imagine a scenario, rather a tragic scenario. In a chain of events, your toddler breaks his favorite remote operated toy car. Or maybe just the remote. The end being the car itself is of no use and wouldn't move. It is a sad demise and life has somewhat derailed with this sudden loss.
Your toddler is facing a major crisis and needs your support to cope with it. You have to be the rock steady shoulder on which your child can cry. Watery eyes and unreasonable hysteria is hard to deal with and you need coffee as a constant companion. But before you plunge into this sensitive situation, learn about the stages of grief your toddler will be going through to help him better!
Denial
It will all start with your kid being in a constant denial about the loss. “The car is not completely gone, we can repair it” will be heard, with you being presented the responsibility of bringing it back to life! He might try fixing it himself but he will need your screwdriver (YOU) for assistance. The car had life and now the life is out of it and your life is in danger. You better put it alright, which is next to impossible, so you’ll only be prolonging its suffering (and yours as well)!
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Anger
This is the second stage that is very tough to deal with. Your kid might present it differently through crying, screaming, unloading a river through eyes or completely lack of function. Though the probability of river flowing is the highest. As a parent you’ll have to be careful while consoling them. Saying, “Just stop crying, it was a only a toy car” will not be the ideal response from your side. Keep aside your coffee and hug them tight!
Bargaining
Once they have moved from the anger stage they are likely to land into the bargaining one. Bargain offers will be in the air and that is not going to help you at all! “Dad I don’t want this monster truck, take it away but fix my car”. Please just put it alright, please, please! But sadly the ball has left your court and its your destiny that the car will lie there lifeless!
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Depression
After the anger stage, this is the one that is tough to handle. Once that rosy picture of you bringing back the life of the car through some screwdriver operations and battery replacements, fades away the real crying begins. This is totally unbearable to a parent to watch their kid unload gallons of water through their little eyes. This is the depression that the parents are scared to deal with! For a major reason that sometimes your efforts to console them only trigger the lunatic in them. In that case it is best to feed them words of condolence through the other room to be safe from toys being thrown in the air!
Acceptance
The only ray of hope in this situation is that when left alone to mourn, the kid will eventually forget about the demise of his car, or even that such a car existed! Wait for him to fall asleep, then creep into the play room and get hold of that lifeless car. Shove it in the garbage bag and put it out of sight. If your kid gets hold of it again, the long journey of up-cycling will start off again resulting in more suffering of the car (and of course you)!
Now that you have successfully dealt with the toy situation, you can go back to your coffee only to realize its cold. No issues, make yourself another cup and let sleep finally take over you!
