Afraid of Dying

That is exacly what I did when I was young, it was constantly on my mind especially at bed time. I used to refuse to go to bed at night because I new where my thoughts would lead me. Mabye if you installed some form of incertanty in what actally happens when you die she may think differently. The fact is that noone really knows. I'm not religous myself but you could mabye give her information or tell her religouse stories. It is very inportant you do not force her or make it look forced cause then she'll automatically think, "well why is she trying to not make me think of this"

i hope this helps

I am an 18 year old and have had similiar experiences growing up. Yet my parents' "kind words" were not enough to simmer my nerves. I expect this may be the case for your child as well. She has been through a lot and may be suffering from a variety of different conditions (post traumatic stress and/or depression are the first to come to mind) and should be evaluated by a professional. Good luck!

I am 20 years old and have been doing this for a long time. I always think I am going to die like of a heart attack b/c I do have the symptoms, but I just found out those same symptoms are caused by anxiety and anxiety disorders. I don't know what triggered my anxiety, but now I have symptoms similar to those of a heart attack and I am constantly fearing myself and my family dying. I constantly worry about my family's safety and everything else. They say this often happens when you've experienced some kind of trauma or a lot of stress or even just a busy mind, so abuse from her father would maybe be the trauma she experienced and the fear of death could be anxiety disorder related. I never got any help for it b/c I never told anyone until recently, and now I finally am going to because i've begun experiencing intense panic attacks. Maybe get her a stress test or something...Trust me anxiety ruins your life so if that's what it is it would be at least worth checking out now before she gets too bad.

I too was like this when I were younger I am now 27 and still am petrified of death but not as "full on worried as I were"

I think about death a lot aswell, and have done from an early age, like if my fiance is 5 minutes late, I imagine hes been killed in a car crash, I imagine myself dying every time I get a new symptom to worry about, it really does take over your life!!

Well my nan passed away on new years eve and that really shook me up !!! I saw her right till the very end struggling to breath it was horrible... Now all my fears of death have worsened :cry:

I have spent a lot of time being manickly afraid of death, my own and others. Through therapy, I have discovered this to be a natural fear for someone who has either dealt with the death of a loved one (especially at an early age) or for someone who was neglected, abandoned, or separated from or by someone they loved and trusted (like a parent, spouse, child, or sibling).

Therapy, I believe, is the best way to conquer this, but if this is not an option for you or for your daughter, I recommend doing two things: 1) helping your daughter desensitize and 2) helping her learn to focus on life while she's alive rather than anticipating death before it even arrives. To further explain, desensitizing involves facing your fear in order to become less sensitive to it. In this case, your daugher's afraid of death so you may slowly consider discussing it with her, sharing books with her, showing her movies where someone dies, and eventually maybe taking her to the grave site of a loved one, etc. This should be an extremely gradual process. Don't rush it or it may throw her into more panic. She should be a little uncomfortable, maybe even very uncomfortable, but not freaked out.

After some desensitizing has taken place or even concurrently, it is important to gently remind her that we will all die, but for the time being we are alive. Since none of us know how long we will be alive and since we can't control it (often a fear of death is about wanting to control death or stop it from coming), our time is better spent making the most of every day, being happy, loving life, smiling, being healthy, doing good things for ourselves and others, etc., and above all, realizing that our life is of great value or else we wouldn't have been granted a life at all. Besides, we are alive and until we die, let's not waste our time worrying about dying. Doing that is allowing death to defeat us and more importantly, compulsively worrying about death causes undo stress and depression which brings death (the thing we're fearing the most) even closer, so 1) desensitize/understand and 2) live it up.