''He is a child, he does not understand. We don't reveal anything to him. We often hear sentences like "He'll forget anyway" around us. So, do we really forget the events we experienced as children?
Adolescents enter a brand new process that we generally do not know the answer to, and that especially parents and many adults cannot understand. Nothing that has been experienced is left behind, unfinished business always follows us, and with adolescence many things become more meaningful...
Adolescents are affected to varying degrees by events that cause negative changes in their lives. Some people are more affected by the same event and some are less affected by many reasons. Among these reasons, in addition to factors such as age, distance to the event, personality structure, and support systems, the young person's perception and comments about the event are also very important. These comments include, "I am a bad person, I am unreliable, I am weak, I am guilty, I am incompetent..."
Since these beliefs are directed towards the adolescent himself, his subsequent behaviors are also in this direction. may affect. For example, children who have felt guilty since childhood will be constantly restless with adolescence, will try to please those around them, and will also be angry.
In adolescence, there may be differences between the behaviors exhibited by children at different ages. For example, differences can be observed between early adolescence and middle adolescence. The traumatic event or situation triggered during adolescence is much more complex and more intense and severe. The way of experiencing and reacting to past pain in adolescence varies from person to person.
A wide variety of trauma-related behaviors can be observed in adolescence. Among these; sleep disorders, nightmares, flashbacks in sleep or daily life (such as incontinence), being fidgety, restless, sleepy, dull, wanting to be alone, crying at every opportunity, excessive attachment to familiar objects, difficulty in coping with change, difficulty with parents differences in relationships, being overly demanding or completely withdrawn, more negative relationships with siblings, increased quarrels, traumatic event Developing obsessive thoughts about the event, worrying that the event will repeat itself, caring excessively about the needs of others, decrease in school success, decrease/deterioration in attention, being insatiable, overreacting to small events...
Grief Reactions in Adolescence and Their Feelings of Guilt
While any loss that was not mourned during childhood causes intense feelings of anger and guilt in adolescence, the adolescent may also feel very vulnerable and helpless due to the effects of physiological and biological changes...
When children lose a loved one or a loved one, they often experience great turmoil inside, even though they seem unaffected from the outside.
Just like adults, they also want to be given the chance to say "goodbye" to the person they lost. they want. For this reason, it is very important to have a "farewell ceremony" at home, among the family, or to attend a funeral ceremony if the child's age and position are appropriate. The mourning process that was not experienced during childhood also causes different reactions and behaviors during adolescence.
Every loss that was not mourned during childhood causes intense feelings of anger and guilt with adolescence, and on the other hand, under the influence of physiological and biological changes. The teenager may feel very vulnerable and helpless. The feeling that needs to be paid most attention to during adolescence is the feeling of guilt. During this period when identity development begins, the child's self-perception will be negatively affected as the child will develop false beliefs. For these reasons, the feeling of guilt is an emotion that needs to be taken into consideration and taken seriously.
The stages of grief generally observed in adolescence are as follows:
Rejection:
The adolescent does not want to think that he will never see his lost relative again; cannot accept. He may dream about the person he lost and hope that he will come back again.
Anger:
After the person realizes that the event he experienced is irreversible and his life begins to be structured in a different way, He begins to feel anger towards the situation and the person he lost.
Sadness:
The person feels great sadness for his loss. He starts to hear sounds. This sadness is both for the person he lost and for the deficiency he experienced in himself.
Getting used to it and moving forward:
The young child has now internalized his loss and is trying to structure his life without that person. has started. His thoughts are more oriented towards the future.
It is not right to think that a young teenager, regardless of his age, will go through these stages in a certain period of time and in a certain order. While some can go through these stages in a very short time, others can stay in a certain stage for a longer time and even experience flashbacks from time to time. Sometimes, young people may not show any reaction for a while and then start to show grief reactions. It is up to adults to monitor their children closely and give them the support they need.
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