French Toast Sundays shows the week of mourning through the eyes of a child.
Kids Talk Grief is a series of interviews and guest blog posts from children or young people all of whom have had to deal with the loss of someone close to them. (Some of the names and personal details have been changed to protect their privacy.)
David was 12 years old, when one of his best friends died in an accident.
I said goodbye to one of my best friends on a sunny Sunday afternoon. As I waved goodbye, neither of us had any idea it would be the final time. Later that day, my friend Henry was struck and killed while crossing the street.
News traveled much more slowly than it does today, so I did not learn what happened until the next day. The nightmares and grief that followed is not something I can put into words. For me though, the biggest trauma was the way that Henry fell out of my life. Nobody talked about him or shared memories. It was as if he never existed. The silence began to take a terrible toll on me. I began to get in trouble at school. In fact, the way I acted was completely opposite of the way I had been.
At some point, my mother realized what was going on. She sat me down, just the two of us, and we began to talk of Henry. It was as if a dam suddenly broke and I began to cry and truly mourn my loss. Things began to return to normal after that. My mother somehow knew the cure. She helped me through a very dark hour and brought me back from a place of despair.