I had to tell my son about his uncle passing. I explained it as he went to heaven. We all are here and one day now or years from now we will go to heaven. He understood. I explained that death means people/animals are not with us anymore. He got it right away and understood

Does your LO know anything about death? My daughter knows a little. When her fish started dying before we realized the filter was done I told her that the fish went to a fish party to be with other fish who had passed away lol. Now we have gone into deeper detail as since then her aunt, her great great grandma, a family friend and her grandparents dog have all died...but at the time the fish party seemed to make her happy to hear.

Almost a year ago, our cat had become severely ill and I had to bring her to the emergency animal hospital. Unfortunately, there was nothing that could be done to make her better, so I had to have euthanized that day. I brought her body back home because I wanted my children to see that our cat was actually dead and not just staying somewhere else. My children were 6, 3 and 1 at the time. I laid her body out on the garage floor and let my kids see her and pet her. I told them that she was so sick and died at the vet's office...which was true, but I left out the part about putting her to sleep, at the vet's suggestion. He said that young children often find that term confusing and sometimes think that THEY too will die if they go to sleep.
My oldest daughter was very upset because she understood that death is a permanent thing. My son (who was 3) didn't really get it and just made some comment about how we could get a new cat someday. He does still talk about her from time to time, so I know that he misses her a little bit, even though we adopted a new cat a few months ago. My youngest daughter was completely oblivious to the situation, which was what I expected.

THank you all for the advice. I told her about 4 days later when she mentioned we had two kitties. I told her we only have one now and then later that evening I read her a book from the library that dealt with a pet dying. She is so young so she didn't really understand what I was telling her. But the next day she did say she only had one kitty. Our kitty had been sick for a year and so she knew that much - it was pretty much a daily thing to mention how the kitty was sick... very sad. WE have some wonderful pictures of her playing with our kitty so we are glad for those memories.