cremation services offered in Phoenix, AZ

Coping with the Loss of a Sibling

Some of the cremations as part of cremation services offered in Phoenix, AZ are for brothers and sisters of brothers and sisters who survive them. They may be very young. They may be teenagers. They may be young adults. They may be middle-aged. They may be elderly.

The ages of siblings when a sibling dies determines the response to that death to some degree. Very young children who lose a brother or a sister may not really understand what’s going on. In fact, they may be so young that they don’t remember their sibling and they don’t remember their sibling’s death. They know about their sibling and their sibling’s death only because they’ve been told or have heard about it.

By the time children are teenagers, though, the death of a sibling becomes a big deal. Teenagers know they’ve lost a playmate when they were younger, a friend or a rival as they got older, but someone they loved like their own life, no matter how many squabbles or fights they had over the years.

If other siblings were involved in the incident that killed one sibling, there are likely feelings of guilt, regret (even if none of them caused the incident), or blame. There can also be a lot of anger at the sibling that died, especially if the cause of death was preventable and they had been warned about it.

And out of all this mixture of emotion and feelings that don’t coincide or fit together with each other, teenagers can become confused, depressed, and suicidal. It’s important for parents to be actively involved with teenage siblings after a sibling death.

Parents need to make sure that they are always not just available in person, but emotionally available, and the children need to know that they have a safe place where their feelings and emotions can be honestly expressed.

Young adults who lose a sibling have their first glimpse of their own mortality, and that can be jarring because it destroys the myth of invincibility that goes along with being young without any real life behind you yet.

Young adults often react to sibling deaths in one of two ways. They either begin to have an unhealthy obsession and fear of death, including their own, or they avoid thinking about the death at all, refusing to talk about it, and pretending it never happen.

Neither of these is healthy and parents, other siblings, and friends should be there to help intervene and help. Professional counseling may be beneficial for these young adults because they may feel more comfortable talking about what’s discomfiting them with a professional than with their parents, siblings, and friends.

When middle-aged people lose siblings, mortality slaps them in the face. Usually there’s either an equal side of life on either side of the surviving middle-aged siblings or there’s more life behind them than ahead of them. It’s a real wakeup call that makes death suddenly very personal and very real. They may not think about mortality every day, but it’s knocking on their brain with increasing frequency.

When elderly people lose siblings, they are not usually surprised. But their response is to question how long they have left and whether they will be the next to die. Mortality is very immediate for them.

To learn more about cremation services in Phoenix, AZ, our compassionate and experienced team at Simply Cremation & Funeral Arrangements can assist you. You can come to our funeral home at 16952 W. Bell Rd., #303, Surprise, AZ, 85374, or you can contact us today at (623) 975-9393.

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