A house fire can be one of the worst things to ever happen to your family, even if everyone gets out safely. Such an event can lead to a significant amount of upheaval as you look to find a new place to live and begin the painful process of replacing your lost possessions. It's important to remember that a house fire can leave emotional wounds, especially to your children. Even though you'll be busy with a long list of post-fire tasks, you should seriously consider arranging trauma counseling for your child with a therapist who specializes in childhood trauma. Here are some issues that your child may face after the fire.

Fear Of The Dark

If the fire happened at night, you can expect that your child will be afraid when the sun goes down. This can be doubly challenging for some families, as lots of children are already uncomfortable in the dark. A child may associate nighttime with the trauma of the house fire and may be afraid that a fire will take place each night. Even if you emphasize that this belief isn't true, it can be difficult for a child to shift his or her perspective. Counseling sessions, however, can be valuable in helping the child to disassociate nighttime with fires.

Fear Of Being Alone

One of the worst things about a house fire is that your children may be aware of the fire but alone before you can get to them. For a person of age any, being afraid is worse during isolated moments, and this can especially be traumatic for a child. Even with the fire days and weeks in the past, your child may act in an especially clingy manner — afraid to spend time by himself or herself because of fears that a fire may arise.

Fear Of Losing A Family Member

As children get older, they begin to more fully understand the importance of their family members. A child who has been through a fire knows that such an event could have taken a family member away, and this can be an extremely difficult concept to process. You may notice that your child frequently expresses fear about something happening to you. For example, when you have to go to work, the child may be upset that you won't come back. The emotional wounds of such a traumatizing event are something that your child may carry for years, but early intervention from a child therapy professional can help.