Helping Siblings Cope

Guidance from Nancy Frumer-Styron, Psychologist and

Grief Counselor Content Director for COURAGEOUS PARENTS NETWORK

With tips from fellow parents

It’s important to talk from the very beginning about the other children.

The minute one child gets diagnosed, all the focus, all the attention, all the learning ends up on that particular child and on that situation. Sometimes, though never intentional. but almost to the neglect of the other children. Parents become absorbed by the logistics of the sick child’s needs, but need to keep in mind that the other children still have to go to school, still have to get dressed, still have to eat, need to be picked up or need to be taken somewhere. It becomes about figuring out how we’re going attend to the practical pieces and the emotional pieces.