Joanna Fortune: How can I help my children get over their grandad's angry outbursts? 

Though he died a year ago, they still get upset when talking about him. What can I do to help them heal the past? They are now eight and 10 years old.

To love someone and, at the same time, to be afraid or nervous around them due to their unpredictability is very difficult. 

It also makes for very complicated grief, which is what you seem to be describing. 

You are not only grieving your dad, but you are also grieving the loss of hope that the relationship could heal or improve; the loss of promise that things would get better or perhaps that he would get help and be kinder to you; loss of the object of your anger without resolution; loss of the grandad he was, including the good experiences. 

Connecting with a mental health professional who can support you through grief like this is a worthwhile investment in yourself and your children.

The better you cope with this loss, the better they will also cope with it.

Rainbows is a peer-support group programme for children who are dealing with loss. You can check www.rainbowsireland.ie for a list of groups running in your area. 

Holding space for your children to emotionally exhale some of their mixed-up feelings about their grandad would also be helpful. 

You could build a memory jar at home and tell your children that they can write, draw, or colour notes to represent memories of him. This should include positive and negative memories, as all are valid and part of him. 

The different notes can be scrunched and put into a jar. 

You don’t have to open each one and go through them together, but you can. 

Whether or not to do this depends on your capacity to hear and talk about all those memories together. 

If that sounds too much, leave them in the jar, and when it is full, you can bury it in the garden or empty it and safely burn the bits of paper as a release.

Speaking ill of the dead is something that is rarely encouraged in our society. 

But actually, and especially in your instance, it is essential that we are empowered to speak authentically of the dead so that we openly acknowledge who they were and the role they played in our lives.

Validate that grandad couldn’t always openly express his love for family and struggled a lot with his mental ill-health, making him a difficult person to be around sometimes. 

Tell them that when they think of him, they will likely feel a mix of feelings, and that is OK and nothing to feel bad about.

I suggest gathering photos of more positive times with him, sharing stories of those times, or sticking them into a scrapbook you can refer to. 

Go gently with yourself as you negotiate his passing. You all deserve to be supported through this complex grief.

• If you have a question for child psychotherapist Dr Joanna Fortune, please send it to parenting@examiner.ie