How to tell kids about suicide

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A family member committed suicide.
I'll need to tell my oldest daughter about this at some point, somehow.

She didn't see this person very often but they got on well. She's 9 and undiagnosed NT-ish - when she was younger she used to have some of the same "autie" behaviors as my 2 boys that are diagnosed with ASD, but milder, and they have mostly disappeared. Still quite naive though, and gets very sad about sad things (just recently we talked about bullying after we both witnessed an incident between some kids on the street - she became very sad)

I'm afraid she'll take it hard. I know I am.
I'm even more afraid that my wife will insist we tell her some "white lie" along the lines of, this person died but we don't know how/why. No way. Two options are acceptable for me:
1. tell my daughter all I know
2. tell her only that this person has died and if she asks, be open about the fact that we're not telling her all the details
In any case my daughter will come to me when my wife is not around, and pump me for info. I can deal with that if we go for option 1 or 2, but if I let my wife talk me into white-lie-land it will just add another load of pain on top of all the pain I'm already feeling - and I frankly don't think it would do our daughter any good. She's not stupid, she can tell.

I would appreciate your thoughts on this.

If you'd tell me that the person died but that your not telling me everything, i would have the wildest and worst fantasies about it. I'd make up stuff that's 10 times worse than the truth.

So you would recommend option 1?

Not sure what could be 10 times worse than something that makes a person commit suicide - on second thoughts I don't think I want to know.

We went through this when my BIL took his head off with a rifle.

My daughter is a NT, and was 4 at the time. In our family, all children participate in the funeral etc. There is no leaving anyone at home.

We just told her uncle died. That was enough at the time. Later on she asked, and we told her the more at age 7.

Uncle killed himself. I don't know why (which is true, I knew he was depressed but plenty of depressed people don't kill themselves).

She would ask questions, and I would answer her honestly. I did not go into all the gruesome details from the get go. One reason being kids do not separate reality vs fantasty. My friend's brother hung himself, and all the kids got the gory details. A 5 year cousin tried to hang himself, because he wanted to see what heaven was like. The child wasn't depressed, but knew if I could get to heaven I would see Uncle Biff and check out heaven.

I would check around the survivors of suicide websites. I know they will.have information on how to handle this situation.

Sorry about your loss.

How about telling her something like "He/She had an illness in his brain (or mind) and he/she died."?

I would be careful with the wording of "illness in the brain" if she might somehow think that her brothers (who's brains work differently), might suffer the same fate.

I don't think I would lie to her. I would just keep the truth as factual as possible. And answer only the questions she asks. Offer her lots of reassurance and let her know that most people, no matter how bad they feel, do not choose to end their own lives. Let her know that you feel sad about this, too, and that you wish you had a better explanation for her, but that you don't really understand it either. Tell her if she needs to talk to someone or can't stop thinking about it, to let you know.

Perhaps you could just say he died initially and not explain how unless she asks. If you do say he killed himself, she may ask why and you will want to be careful about saying because he was depressed as you don't want her to think every depressed person is suicidal.

I am generally truthful though may omit aspects and details I feel are too much for my child. However kids hear a lot from adults and each other. Probably, your wife will agree it's best you as parents explain this before your child overhears something that is confusing without you there if you are clear you want the information coming from you two. I would be calm, and keep it low key, emphasize what your family is doing for the survivors or any religious aspects that seem appropriate if you want, too.

I think you should be honest, especially if you think that there is any possibility she may overhear someone else talking about it.

In my opinion, saying that the person had an illness in their mind or brain is better than not really explaining it (but, I also can't think of another way to explain it). Yes, she may worry that it could happen to her brothers whose minds work differently, but you can answer (if/ when she expresses this), that it was an entirely different situation. Also, I think this sort of thing happens a lot, example: as a kid, you hear of someone who died of Asthma, yet your friend also has asthma, then it is explained to you that it is unlikely that your friend is also going to die because she always has her medication and that her Asthma is well controlled. Plus, in my experience with my kids, they will be concerned about the same sort of thing happening to them/ someone they love no matter what caused it. My kid's friend died of cancer two years ago. They immediately thought either they would also get cancer or their brother would. I told them (when they asked)that it is very, very rare that someone so young would get cancer. I had to reassure them about it a lot, initially. I also told them that he had different genes than them, and it will not happen to them (because they kept asking why he got it, worried it would happen to them).

I had no choice but to tell my kids all the details of their friend's death (although they knew he was sick), because we are close to the family, and my kids are friends with the boy's brother. But, I agree that in your case you should keep it really simple (just say they died), and only provide answers (and only to the exact question asked) if asked for more details.

I haven't had to explain suicide but have had to explain attempts to one child, the other did not want to know anything and I respected she was not ready for the information.

I said that the person was deeply unhappy and did not have or could not see any support was available.

The terrifying fact is as kids get older many do consider suicide especially kids on the spectrum so I felt I needed to plant that message that if someone feels that unhappy and desperate we should not judge them; but in our family, they will always have support and don't ever need to go there. That made me feel better anyway.

Firrst off, I would like to say that I am terribly sorry for your loss.

I think you should be honest with her, the most important way I believe that a parent can be there for their children is to keep an open, non-judgmental dialogue between them and their kids, and honesty and trust is vital for this to work. I would tell her that that person completed suicide(not committed). I would explain that sometimes the mind can get sick just like any other organ of the body, and sometimes that can leave a person feeling really hopeless. Tell her that sometimes the person may FEEL their pain is so unbearable that the person may believe that ending their own life is the only way out but it doesn't have to be that way.

Tell her that if she ever feels this way or if she is sad or for any reason that she can always come to you and whatever the problem is that she is facing, you can ALWAYS work together and find a solution so that she will never have to resort to hurting herself, and that she won't ever have to go it alone no matter what. Tell her that she can come to you for help, that there is no problem too big or too small that she can talk to you about and that you love her.

When you build a relationship on trust and honesty, and god forbid that she ever gets to a point in her life where she felt as your family member did, she will reach out to you, instead of just saying "I'm fine, I had a good day at school" to you when you ask her how she is doing in that moment, when deep inside, she is feeling severely depressed and hopeless. You don't want that to ever happen.

I hope this helps.

Thanks all.
Unfortunately I can't report back yet. So much other sh*t has been hitting the fan in my life recently that the topic of my relative's suicide has not even come up. Wish me luck.
The good news is that not wanting to end up as desperate as this person who died is a great motivator

I believe your daughter wouldn't understand the whole reason if you choose to tell her the truth, you can tell her that he/she died because of suicide, but on the other hand you should tell her how bad suicide is, and that god prohibited any one to kill him/her self and he god will not accept him/her in heaven... and you always should encourage your daughter and kids, in general, to do good at their lives so god take them to heaven!

you don't know this for a fact, and it's negative as it would make the kids think someone they loved might be in hell. this is hateful.

if your daughter is a sensitive person , i think you need to consult a professional experts about this question . because we wouldn't understand kids very well . and sometimes there are something very important for them but we don't know . so for your daughter good . think before you leap...

Did you mean we don't understand the OPs child? Many of us understand kids reasonably well compared to what's typical.

This reflects the typical American self-righteous shaming of suicide. That doesn't mean it's not a tragedy when it happens. After all, suicidal individuals manage to conquer one of the strongest fears in all living beings: fear of death. (Although a more advanced brain causes humans to feel emotional pain far more acutely than lower animals do.)

What's sadder still is that most suicidal individuals don't fear going to hell. As far as they're concerned, life already put them there, so the Christian scare tactics can't be that much worse. Heck, I first had suicidal thoughts at age 5, and hell was the last of my worries. Disagree with me if you must, but life can be more unpleasant than fire and brimstone.

In fact, when I first learned about the Christian hell---my family is Jewish, which has no concept of hell---I found the visual quite comedic. After it was described to me, the visual I got resembled an big, ugly male figure with horns, casually watching over giant cauldrons, with a lit burner underneath each one. (I extrapolated the latter part from looking at a gas stove.) Presumably, there were sinners inside, but the cauldrons were closed when I visualized them.

To return to a more serious note, my condolences to the OP. While a suicidal person may feel relief while carrying out the act, their family feels the opposite. Unfortunately, I don't have any suggestions to give you or your daughter.