Talking To My 6 Year Old About the Las Vegas Shooting
In the wake of the tragedy that happened in Las Vegas where 59 people lost their lives and hundreds were injured, it is hard to try and make sense of it as adults. It's even harder to try and explain it to our six year old. But we answered the questions he had, the best we could. According to a pediatrician with ABC news, Dr. Lee Beers said that a tragedy does not have to be traumatic for kids if it is "buffered by good, strong and caring relationships by adults and parents around the child." Open communication is key no matter what the age group.
Obviously the older the child, the more in depth the questions will be and the more detailed your answers will be. It is also important to stay in tune with your kids emotions. Make sure they aren't overly stressed at the events that they are seeing on the news. Make sure they know there is open dialogue where you will answer anything they may ask.
Here's a breakdown of how to talk with your children about a tragedy like this according to their age group.
Ultimately, you know your child. We handled the questions from our six year old with honesty. He asked us what what happening, we told him that there was a bad man that hurt a lot of people at a concert when people were just enjoying music. He asked why. We didn't have an answer for that. We just said that more people would have been hurt if there weren't so many good people helping the people that were hurt. There are more good people in this world than bad people. That seemed to satisfy the questions he had, for now.
It's just a sad day. I never thought that I would ever have to explain this type of tragedy to my six year old.