Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy
 

My stepdaughter just lost her first tooth at her mother's house. When I asked her if the tooth fairy came, she just sort of looked at me sadly and said, "Well, I think that's maybe just a game that some parents like to play..." which is to say, her mother didn't play said game.

I don't see the harm in it--she lost a second one just yesterday while she was with us, and the tooth fairy came to our house, much to my stepdaughter's delight. Her mother's excuse is supposedly religion, fairies are the devil's work or somesuch. She doesn't do Santa Claus either, but frankly, neither do we, not seriously anyway. We "play the game," but the kids know he's not real, because I figure it's not worth the heartache. I couldn't have cared less when I found out, but I've had friends tell me they were utterly devastated to learn their parents had been lying to them about Santa Claus.

So how did you feel when you were a kid? Did you tell your kids Santa Claus is real? And if they've since learned the truth, how did they handle it?

We did the Santa Claus thing & Tooth Fairy thing with our kids. Our daughter figured it out shortly after she turned 8. It didn't bother me that much when I figured it out at about the same age--but then my parents didn't go to heroic lengths to explain it away after I started to get skeptical, and neither did we.

When I was 5 I think, after losing a tooth I told my mom I didn't believe in the tooth fairy. Her reply, I don't exactly remember, but it was something implying that if I didn't believe then maybe she wouldn't be able to visit.

I went to bed that night confident in my belief that my mother would be in shortly to deposit a gift under my pillow. I awoke at about 2 AM and was horrified to discover the tooth still there. I ran crying to my mother's room, professing my very deep and hearfelt belief in the Tooth Fairy. She calmed me and explained that the Tooth Fairy was probably running late but that I was most assuredly on the list. She tucked me back in, sang me a song and left the room. I closed my eyes and did my best to fall asleep. About five minutes later I heard the door open and after a moment felt a hand slip under my pillow. I could also vaguely smell my mother's perfume, but I kept my eyes closed the whole time in what I'm sure was a poor impression of being asleep.

After the door closed, I tucked my hand under the pillow and found the "Tooth Fairy" had left not only a quarter, but a sticker book with stickers.

That night I learned a couple important lessons. First of all, I knew for a fact that the Tooth Fairy didn't exist. Second of all, I gained a slightly better understanding of just how much my mother loved me.

Shortly after Jamey was born, I remembered this incident, and learned a harsher lesson. The falsehoods we are taught as children are often more important than the truths. Fantasy is part of growing up, and there is no easy way of letting that go. And so you really shouldn't. I think the best you can do is allow children to have that fantasy. Without tearing it away from them, show them the truth while at the same time reaffirming the idea that fantasy is and important and a precious part of being a child.

I've mentioned it before in the Santa Claus thread somewhere, but my plan is to make sure Jamey gets the experience of Santa Claus and the like. But I intend to treat it as a fun game of pretend to enhance the true experiences.

Edit: I might have the age wrong, all I really remember is that I wasn't in school (may have been summer break) and that the Transformers were hugely popular.

Well belive what you want , i KNOW santa is real !!! One winter our pipes froze , all i wanted for xmas was for those damn pipes to un freeze , they did on xmas morning . The tooth fairy can be fun , i had a friend that had a bad wreck looseing most of his teeth , the nurses retrived them for his mom and as he laid in a hospitol bed only semi concus they put his teeth under his pillow and the tooth fairy came and left him some loot , money and activity books . It made his day !!! :D

A friend of mine has decided that the Tooth Fairy has more than enough business to attend to, and has arranged that a FOTF (Friend of the Tooth Fairy) attends personally to her children.

The "Mousies" come to visit whenever a tooth is lost. The tooth is carefully placed in a porcelain box purchased for each child on the occasion of the first tooth loss.

Along with the tooth and a note to the mousies a cookie is placed next to the box. This is to teach the children that it is as important to give as to receive. The Mousies write a reply to the letter, as well as leaving a gift (not always cash) in exchange for the cookie and the tooth.

Both sets of grandparents are on board with respect to the Mousies in the event that tooth loss occurs during an overnight visit.

Intentionaly deceiving children without a good reason is horribly wrong. When kids eventually find out their parents have been perpetuating a fantasy and fucking with their heads, I think some measure of respect and trust in the parents is lost.

But of course it depends on the degree to which the truth was covered up. If kids know the truth and participate in the fantasy anyway, then there's no harm in that.

Losing trust in your parents and gaining it in yourself is an important part of growing up. Hopefully learning Santa isn't "real" is the worst thing that happens to your kids.

but there IS a good reason. it's FUN to believe in Santa. Dont tell me you didnt enjoy christmas eve more than anything you could imagine.

think of it. You're 6, and you're wearing your footy pajamas. there's a fire. The pine from the tree and the smell from the fire combine to create a smell that you will forever associate with christmas, and joy, and comfort. you've been stringing popcorn, and drinking hot chocolate while watching the 'Santa Claus is Coming to Town' old school cartoon (you kow the one; with burl Ives as frosty) Mom has a batch of cookies going to leave out for Santa, and you suddenly remember the reindeer, and dash to the fridge to get a carrot for Rudolph. While the cookies bake, you all pile onto the couch and Mom or Dad reads "T'was the Night Before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse."

damn, i got chiils!

It's all built up around Santa coming, and Magic, and anticipation! AS a kid, this is the biggest night of the whole year. and a year is a long damn time when you're 6.

or you can just tell your kids that exchanging gifts is a tradition, and no, you can't open any of them until December 25th. now get your soggy little ass off my carpet with those shoes. "Honey! Dinner's ready!"

Everything here can also be true of a 6 year old who knows Santa isn't real. I don't necessarily think kids need to be deceived for the above to be true.

But, you know, my kid is only 8 months old. So, take heart in the fact that eventually my ideology will crash into reality and perhaps be forced to reevaluate itself. :)

It is? Wouldn't it be better to be able to trust your parents and yourself?

juju is right, my 5 almost 6 year old daughter knows that father christmas and the tooth faries don't exist, we used to play along for the fun but when she asks (and they ask questions REPEATEDLY at this age ) directly we just tell her it they are just stories. That doesn't stop her from playing along with the fun when she wants or from her making believe that they exist, although this year for Christmas she wanted to be the one who dressed up as Santa.

Other mythical figures we have to deal with are god and "menino Jesus", I have tried to be a little bit more open in this, we don't speak about them but Portugal is culturally catholic and her kindergarden teachers will talk to her about religion etc, I tell her that I don't believe in god or Jesus and why. But that many people do and she should respect their beliefs whatever she finally decides to believe. I tell her that Jesus spoke of compassion for the poor and warned that we should right our own faults before we should try to right the faults of others, but I also tell that that doesn't make him a god. She understands this but then she also talks about "menino Jesus" up in the sky helping people, it is not worth fighting, kids are quite able to keep inconsistancies alive in their heads at that age (many continue to keep such inconsistancies)

I had to explain the story of "Noah's Ark" the other day to her, very hard to keep a neutral tone...I mean come on, God decides to kill everybody because he wasn't happy with what he made????

-edited because of my even worse than english Portuguese spelling skills

My 5 year old daughter hears from lots of other people about Santa Claus. I might read her a book about him, but I have never said anything to her to lend weight to the idea that he is real. She has asked me before if Santa is real, and I have said that I have heard of him, but never seen him. When we have presents under the tree, every tag on a present says who the present is from. There is nothing from "Santa."

I don't want to come right out and tell her that Santa is a lie, because I see that she enjoys it. But I also am trying to give her a dose of healthy scepticism, so she won't be crushed. I think the seed has been planted in her mind.

I remember being disillusioned when I figured out Santa wasn't real. I had friends who beleived in Santa long after other kids had figured it out, and had even told them. Their parents went to absurd lengths to keep the fantasy alive. That's just wrong.

why is that wrong? does a belief in santa or the easter bunny injure the child in any way? children enjoy the mystery surrounding thesekind hearted souls who only come when they are sleeping, and i enjoy seeing the wonder in my son's eyes during those holidays.

i don't judge you for not participating, but i do ask why? where is the harm?

edit: there is plenty of time in their adult lives for cynicism and skepticism. childhood is for pure enjoyment.

Because, if I were ignorant, I would not want someone to tell me lies. I'd want to know the truth.

Just think if you were deceived. What if the Moon landing were a myth? There is in fact no Space Program. There never was! It was all a farce by the government to keep our spirits up. Ha ha, they really put one over on you! Wasn't the fantasy of it all worth it, though?

I'd really rather know the truth than be deceived. One can still fantasize and be filled with wonder while knowing the truth.

I'm absolutely with Juju on this one. I heard it said on some show on NPR, may have been Prairie Home Companion, "A father should never lie, especially to his children". Regardless of your *intent* when you tell your children that Santa Claus is real, it's still a lie. You really cannot argue this point. And when they do discover the truth, it's going to be painful on a lot of levels. It may or may not be permanent damage, but as for me, I would rather not deal with it.

Sometimes in life a little white lie may be appropriate, but I cannot imagine any situation in which it is appropriate to lie to your children and risk any kind of erosion of trust. My son relies on me completely and will for many years to come. It is imperative to me that he always know he can trust his dad.

Maybe I'm the exception, but I wasn't at all traumatized by finding out about Santa, the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny too. The Easter Bunny was the last one I found out about, mainly because I could never understand how he(she/it?) would get into my room, past my alarms and traps. (I wanted to take its picture :rolleyes: ) If anything, finding out about these stories made me want to learn more about mythology and where those stories came from and their origins, then the origins of that soceity and the people...in short, it helped kick off my love of learning more than it caused me to not trust my parents or feel I'm not loved or feel I've been lied to, etc. I'm a total myth and legend junkie now and I'm glad my parents got me interested in stories and myths like that and I fully intend to do the same with my kids...if I have any kids.

Perhaps its possible to let kids live with these stories and, when they find out, use that experience to introduce children to myths and legends from all over the world? So much of our soceity is built on characters, places and events of myths (Nike, for example, wasn't originally a sneaker and the concept of the 26 mile marathon came from the same place). If nothing else, it'll help them later on when they want to do crossword puzzles :D

But the thing is, you can nurture an interest in mythology without letting your children believe a lie (it may be harsh to call it a lie, but let's call a spade a spade). Mythology is fascinating and almost always entertaining, I'm quite partial to Nordic and Irish mythology. Again, I think it's best, in my case, to allow my child to live the fantasy, but make sure he knows it's fantasy. I'm not going to dupe my kid.

And I'm not sure how Nike and the 26 mile marathon are related. Nike was, if I remember correctly the Greek Goddess of Victory, and the 26 mile marathon came from, what, when Phillipides (sp?) ran from Athens to Sparta (a distance of about 26 miles) to request help.

Oh, I getcha. both Greek. Duh. :)

anyone ever go on a 'snipe hunt'?

I searched for, and sent people to search for, left handed smokeshifters and skyhooks.

I worked at KMart for a while in high school, and sent a new employee to the basement to find the tire chains for the shopping carts once when it started snowing.

when i was a mason, i was asked to look in the truck for a left handed block stretcher. i didnt fall for it.

i used to send new students down "by the pool" for whatever classroom they were looking for. there was no pool

Of course, you can nuture interest in mythology in other ways. My point is, that 'dupe' is how I got interested in it. All fictional stories are lies in the same way magic shows lie to the audience. How they affect people depends on how they are applied and what kind of understanding the reader/listener has. If a child asked where Spongebob Squarepants lived, would it be better to tell the child "Oh he doesn't really exist, but everyone pretends he lives under the sea." Heck, with the fervor Squarepants has created, you might find some full fledged adults who would refuse to be believe you out of fandom :lol:

Heh, pulling the Spongebob argument is below the belt. :)

Okay, so I was raised by parents who let me believe in Santa Claus (And yeah, I was devastated to find out. Bias revealed. Nothing to see here, move along). However, had I expressed a fervent belief in the existence of Lion-O or Optimus Prime, I like to think they would have corrected me. I'm not sure how to put this into words, but what I'm getting at is that while characters like Spongebob are culturally iconic on a scale similar to that of Santa Claus, there is a difference. I'm not sure if the difference is based on longevity, close relationship to a major holiday or life event, or something else entirely. So in my mind we're comparing apples and oranges.

But I do agree that it is *possible* to expose a child to the truth without causing (much) harm, and your experience is evidence of that. I guess what I don't understand is why a parent would think that way. "Oh it's okay to let them think that now, I'll break it to them easy one day". Well, what if you fuck that up? I'd rather tell the truth from the start than have to fess up to a lie later on. It still boils down to whether a person should lie to the people that trust them most in the world. And I think the answer to that should always be "no".

i know! i think i was on my 3rd therapist when i found out all of my life's problems could be attributed to my parents allowing me to believe in santa as a young child.

party poopers. you wait until your kids are a little older. you'll be lying your natural ass off to them. mark my words.....MARK THEM, I SAY!

I doubt it, but I will acquiesce to your greater experience in the fileld of child-rearing and say "maybe, but I hope not". :D

I know the psychological harm is minimal at best. To me, it's the principle of the matter. If I want to treat my kids with respect, then I should be consitent. Otherwise, I'm not respecting them at all.

All too often, I see parents lying to their children (over non-holiday things) just because they don't know any different.

For example, my mom and I used to go to the mall. Whenever I'd ask her if I could have a toy, she'd usually just say that she didn't have any money. How can you argue with that? If she's broke, she's broke. Well, one day she told me this, and not 30 minutes later, she opened her purse to buy something for herself, and there was a sea of money in there. What a lying bitch! I realized then that she had been telling me that she was broke all this time because she knew that I would believe anything. She never respected me. She loved me, but she didn't respect me.

I can't think of any other examples right now, but I know there are lots and lots. Parents are ALWAYS lying to their kids because it's convenient and they don't know any better. If it's about sex or something to do with their own safety, then that's different. But some people take it way too far.

Yes, the Santa thing is peanuts. But like I said, if I pledge to treat my child like a real human being, then I should go all the way and be consistent with it. Otherwise, I'm violating my principles.

Hey, Perth, I was just looking at an old quotes file on my hard drive (which I didn't even know I had), and I came across this quote attributed to you:

<blockquote><i>im not sure that was a conscious intent, his intent was to instill respect. either way, its still the wrong way to go about it. basilbrush said respect breeds respect, and i think thats true. my father never understood that. i was his son, so dammit, i owe him respect. well, i dont know about respect, but sometimes i feel like i owe him a good asskicking.</i></blockquote>

Kinda neat that I came across this by chance.

I always had good results sending new mess attendants to the armory for the biscuit gun.

Oh, and I once got a junior officer one afternoon by noting that he was flying the fair weather flag in the rain. He sent up to the sig shack for the foul weather ensign. Gotcha! LOL

My answer to the Santa thing
 

Same thing my parents told me.

No Santa, the guy in a red suit, does not exist.

But, Santa as a concept, as a metaphor for goodwill and generosity to others, THAT is real as long as people keep that idea alive. It can never die, unless legislated out of existance.

Thus, to me, Santa does exist. Except in New Jersey. And BWI traffic.

Brian

I think I worked it ou at about 5 or so, I think my parents knew I knew but we all just played along, tad odd but it worked. I did have an odd childhood however, excuse me while I curl up in the fetal position for a while.

Did anyone here ever get told to go to bed and stay there or the 'thing in the closet' or 'thing under the bed' would get you? :weird: How about the bogeyman?

Oh hell no! I was already a big old wuss when it came to the dark and what may or may not lurk in it. :D

I spent my childhood being on good speaking terms with the thing under the bed. I only interacted with the thing in the closet on UTB's days off.

My parents never really did the bogeyman thing when I was little but they didn't need to. The quartersized spider I came face to face with while spelunking under my bed was plenty and that was VERY real.

Hey! From back in my "Capitalisation? What the fuck is that?" phase. Thanks for bringing this back to mind, I still owe him that asskicking. :)

hey! that's the phase i'm in

My parents had an odd twist on the Santa thing. I remember My Dad being the last one after myself and my sister still believing. We both (at 6 & 8) felt so horrible having to tell him that it was just a story for kids.

What do you do when your kid becomes ostracized by his/her peers for telling them you said there's no Santa? :confused:

Juju will have to let us know when the time comes.

I deal with that before it happens. I make sure he realises it's not his place to correct his peers attitides regarding things like that. I said it a bit more eloquently in another thread around here somewhere.

There's a bumper sticker I like that says "God is Santa Claus for grown-ups."

Now THERE's a thread derailer. ;) (Rerouting to the Philosophy forum as necessary.)

That's funny. No in the real world, what will you do?


I've told my kids that the idea of the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus are symbolic for the spirit of giving, which is why the myth is different in different cultures.

For the last couple of years they've lost that spirit of giving and went more commercialistic, but this year it's gonna be all about giving thoughtful (home made) gifts, and not the latest trend. I'm taking them to Michael's and walmart to pick items to make for family members.

:p

Steal your idea.

I think thats a great way of going about it. And if I do find out that he was going around telling kids Santa isn't real after being told it's inappropriate, he will be punished appropriately and made to apologise. Not sure whether this will change as he gets older, but he does know that when I tell him a certain action carries certain consequences, he's pretty good about doing the right thing. Hopefully the trend will continue.

Please do!

I know that a GREAT gift idea (specially for mom, step moms, grandmas and perhaps some more feminine lifestyled males) can be found at michaels, its in the klutz series (which are ABSOLUTELY phenomenal!) and it's the tissue paper flowers book. The book has pipe cleaners and 70 sheets of tissue paper to get you started, and I can say after going through the book that they really make great gifts. and you can mail them.

Another idea is also at michaels. It's a book on how to make your own cards. It runs $25 and has some paper, templates, a paper scorer and lots of ideas in it, and instructions. (You can make your own christmas cards and save OODLES.)

Also, the little $3 cross stitch projects are great for beginners, give a sense of accomplishment, and if you buy the little magnetic frames for $2 you're in with just about anyone! (and that's a great springboard for larger cross stitch projects, like bookmarks. Something else EVERYONE likes.)

What I generally do is go to Michael's for the ideas and materials list, then go to walmart and buy what materials they have, (at 1/3 the cost) then go back to michaels and pick up what walmart doesn't have.

Once you really get into something, it's all about the internet. Oooh yeah.

And the time to start is NOW, because you'll want to do a few projects to warm up and get used to it (the first one is usually the worst). That way you have most everything done by December 15th and then you can take all those brown paper shopping bags you've been saving up and let the kids make WRAPPING PAPER!

(Stay tuned for more "Christmas on the cheep" :D )

I agree. Kids like this kind of stuff, and there's no reason that they shouldn't believe in them as long as possible. Santa, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny ARE real....they just happen to work through parents--so technically, there is no lie involved. I plan to take up the mantles of all three when Ash is old enough to care.


Sidhe

Um. What? They aren't real. They're fictional characters. The only one that you could even begin to make the case for is Santa Claus, but even then the best you can claim is that he's based (loosely) on a historical figure.

Somewhere along the line they're going to figure out that there is no fat man living at the North Pole who delivers presents once a year. And when they do, you can try to spin it like that. And maybe they'll buy it. More power to you. I can't say I've ever met anyone who was "fucked up" by their parents telling them or at least letting them believe that there was a Santa Claus. My feeling is that telling my son that the gifts under the tree are from Santa is a big, gigantic, humungous lie. And I won't do that.

Coming in late to this thread. Sorry. The above is exactly what my dad and step mom did to my little sister. She asked them point blank if Santa was real a number of times and they said yes. She got teased at school because she insisted that Santa was real and every time she came home crying they would insist the children at school were wrong. They even had some book serious they were reading to her at the time and one of the books dealt with finding out Santa wasn't real. I shit you not my step mom skipped over huge sections of the book just so my sister wouldn't find out. Their reason was they didn't want to ruin the fantasy for her. I am sorry but if she is getting teased at school over it, all you are doing is creating distrust and resentment in her when she finds out that all that teasing was based on a lie you didn't want to fess up to. I remember them threatening me with grounding that year if I told her otherwise should she ask. It put me in a shitty position because I didn't want to lie to her, but I knew if I didn't I would get punished and they would just tell her I was lying to her to be mean. I think after watching that crap first hand I would be more apt to not lie to my kids, but then again we don't have any yet so I cant really say for sure.

See, now that's just wrong. I would never insist to my child that these beings were real if she straight-out asked me. I'd tell her the story behind them, and explain that we carry on the tradition. Hell, TS still gets presents from Santa. Once one learns they're not "real," it doesn't make it any less fun to participate in the illusion, IMO.




Sidhe

Admittedly, I've only got 3 Christmases and Easters under my belt with my son, so my experience is limited. But I can't really imagine how thinking that the presents were dropped down the chimney by an elf with a gland problem or that the eggs were hidden by a monstrous rabbit would add to the fun. The kid already gets spoiled rotten on these days with more toys than he could play with in a year and more candy than a grown adult should be able to manage. I just don't understand where along the line someone decided we, as adults, should treat a make-believe character as honest-to-goodness fact. It doesn't add to the fantasy any more than if I actually believed Gandalf and Frodo and all those other guys actually took an actual evil ring to an actual Mount Doom and threw it in (apologies to anyone who believed that was real).

So. My kid has books about Santa Claus, and even books about the Easter Bunny. It's not like I'm denying him the fantasy, because I'm not. But it's deception to treat Santa as anything more than a fantasy.

And I've been thinking about it. There are certain things I will never bring up with my son, and if asked about it, I will lie. This situation is pretty much exclusively reserved for questions regarding my and Case's divorce. There are things he *never* needs to know, and will only prove to be detrimental to him to know. But there is NO REASON WHATSOEVER to tell your child a make-believe character exists in the real world.

Ok, is it just me (probably is), but is this being taken a little too seriously? Santa, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy are NOT the kinds of things that will fuck up your kid if you enjoy the holidays with any of the three. It's not like telling your kid they're yours if they're really adopted, or anything major. It's all in good fun. Kids like to play make-believe--being able to play make-believe, as a matter of fact, is an essential part of a child's mental and emotional development.

I'm not understanding the hoohah over it.


Sidhe

There's no hoohah over enhancing the holidays with traditional fantasy stories. The problem comes when parents go to extreme lengths to continue the lie long after the children are old enough to be let in on the secret.

Make-believe only works as a developmental tool when the children know it's make-believe. Otherwise it confuses them. If you tell your child that she's a real, honest-to-goodness princess, and keep the story going for years on end, it will be crushing to her when she finally figures out she's just an average kid, and she can't afford her own stable of horses, and she can't have servants do all her chores. But if she knows she's a normal person and that it's a game to pretend to be a princess, she will enjoy it.

I personally think it's just as damaging to constantly remind the child that there is no Santa Claus and not allow them to relish the games. As long as they know it's all in fun, there's no harm.

Hey, I did find out I was adopted, when I was 15. And you know what? Finding out there wasn't a Santa Claus at 7 years old was far more traumatic than discovering the guy I had always called dad wasn't mine biologically. Know why? Because after I found out, I still had a dad.

Yeah, maybe I do take it a bit too seriously. And I apologise if my vehemence seems like venom, that's not my intent (reading back it kind of looks like I was attacking Sidhe, I didn't mean to). But I was lied to a lot as a kid, as I'm sure many others were. I already know for a fact that one day I'm going to end up lying to my son about certain things. So the best I can do is minimise that as much as possible.
Clodfobble, I agree. You expressed it far better than I ever could have.

Katkeeper didn't maintain any such lies as far back as I can remember, and at one point said that she regretted it as it left me with no imagination. I disregarded her comment as blankly irrelevant and went about my automatonic day.

I dunno, I think a strong case can be made for your abundance of imagination based solely on the nick "Undertoad". I found it to be particularly clever when I first arrived.

I see no reason to encourage adults, much less children, in such things as the fiscally driven holidays.

The tooth fairy is a self-solving problem, hopefully.

Imaginary friends are inexpensive and can last a lifetime if really necessary.

I'm going to do my best to discourage Little Sidhe from non-secular holidays for the same reason I'm going to discourage her from religion in the first place. I'm also going to discourage her from any secular holidays unless they are for people or ideas that are sound.

Lady Sidhe will of course vehemently oppose such a Scroogian attitude. :vader1:

Yup, you're right.

TS hates the holidays. Too much traffic, and everything's closed. Massive inconvenience. I can understand not liking the BS that goes along with the holidays, but the holidays themselves can be fun, especially if you have a child to vicariously enjoy them through.

As to religion, I think that the fact that I'm Pagan and TS is Agnostic will be good for her. It'll give her a good questioning attitude. I intend to raise her pagan, with all our groovy holidays, though.

And I wasn't feeling attacked...I can completely understand telling your kids the truth if they ask. But if they don't ask, why take the fun away? When my daughter asks if they're real, I'll explain to her where they come from. I won't lie to her. But I'm going to let her anticipate and have fun for as long as I can.

Bah, humbug n' stuff--

Sidhe

So something interesting happened to me last night.

I've looked back through my comments in this thread, and I know the following will come off as hypocrisy, because it probably IS.

I took Jamey to the mall to find a nice outfit for his Christmas pictures. We happened to pass by Santa's little outpost, and Jamey went *nuts* over seeing Santa. I had never seen him that thrilled about anything, and what made it stranger is that I've made a point of not making "Santa" a big thing. He asked if he could tell Santa what he wanted, and I found I just didn't have it in me to say no. But more than that, I was excited at the chance to get pictures of him with Santa.

We got in the (mercifully short) line and when his turn arrived, he practically bolted to the guy in the suit, hopped up and started telling him what a good boy he was. He grinned from ear-to-ear for the picture, and talked about it for the rest of the evening.

So I really don't know how I feel about it anymore. I think a lot of factors are involved here, but I just don't find myself inclined to actively discourage belief in Santa anymore. That's not to say I'm going to encourage it, and when he asks me, I'm going to be honest about it. But the pure joy I saw in his face last night taught me something important. Sometimes what's called for is a little less "dad" and a little more "friend".

There's no shame in changing your mind based on how it affects your child. That's not hypocrisy; it's adjusting your parenting to fit the child. If someday you are faced with another child who happens to be terrified of Santa, you will be able to actively reassure that child from the beginning that Santa isn't real, and it won't be hypocrisy then either. You can never know for sure what's best for each child until they get there.

Its good to play with your kids. Santa is fun. He is play and make believe. He's hope and anticipation and suspense and delight. No wonder hes a popular dude. Go with it in the spirit of play. Dont use santa for serious blackmail, maybe only to get kids to bed on time. ;)