To wonder if my 6 year old thinks in a strange way

Honestly OP I'd be very proud of my daughter if she was like this so it is a bit hard to relate to your concerns.

I also loved Christmas as a child despite not believing. I guess I don't know what the alternative would be like but for me it didn't feel not magical or not special. Analytical people are just built that way, in my experience, and can't - and often don't want to - just turn it off so they can fit in. What is difficult is being made to feel like a troublemaker for thinking about the world in this way, so just try to make sure you support and love her for who she is.

DS didn't believe at 5, I had to talk him into it (I know some people will think I'm evil on here!) I just couldn't believe he didn't believe that young! I also knew he'd tell all the other kids and point it out to his teacher.

He then happily believed until around 10 when everyone at school was discussing it after one of them caught their parent out. I was happy for him to know the truth at that point!

He was diagnosed with ASD not long after. He is super bright and extremely logical. I think research shows there are actually brain differences between people who tend to 'believe' in stuff - ie people who are devoutly religious - and non believers.

Your daughter seems like a very bright, perceptive little girl, you shouldn't lie to her when she asks you a direct question. Given her ability to see things for what they really are it's likely she'll guess you're lying to her and that will harm the trust between you.

Hi op,
I just wanted to say, that like a few pp, I was just like this as a child. I thought it was a wonderful make believe game that people played. I loved playing it. I don't remember ever believing in Father Christmas for real. My elder sister did, and when we were older she told me she'd realised he wasn't real because she'd seen mum doing our stockings. I had always known this, but just played along. My Christmas always felt magical and wonderful to me still. The game itself was absolutely magical. Imagination games are extremely important to children. Christmas was then, and still is, my absolute favourite time of year.

Also, just to say that like others, I am probably ND. However my children who are actually diagnosed with autism, DO believe in santa (unless they're playing along like I did... But if so, they are VERY good actors!), so it certainly isn't a diagnostic tool!

I have a logical kid like this, he's incredibly switched on - he's also the youngest. He's 7 and knows Santa and the tooth fairy aren't real, my eldest is 9 and he might have suspicions but he's never come out and said I don't think that's real. He enjoys the fantasy of it all but the younger is actually quite disturbed by that and would like to deal in reality thankyouverymuchmother! Just different kids, as long as she's happy that's all that matters.

Don't worry about the magic, for some of us the magic is working out the puzzle.

Absolutely. Feed her curiosity - that will give her a lifetime of wonder, not just a few Xmases.

Sometimes children just see through stuff very easily. Your child sounds very clever.

This was me as a child (and an adult) I couldn't be doing with make believe/fantasy/play (and still don't like it) I only ever dealt with facts. I was happy enough and no ASD or SEN.,

This is interesting, I am the same. I genuinely don’t see the point in gifts unless the person has gone out of their way to almost read your mind and get you exactly what you want/ need. My family members are the same, they don’t give cards as they don’t see the point and almost get annoyed if you send them one. I have adhd so I don’t know if there’s a link there with the way I think.

You are fine I was just wondering if my cat had got on here. Two strapping lads here.

The best bits of your exoectation of childhood. Not all children are the same. I remember being 6 and discussing with a friend if it was more plausible that our parents bought all the stocking presents or whether Father Christmas was real. DS told me at 5 he knew it was us and was delighted with himself. He's not fussed about "magic". He announced at a similar time he isn't a Christian because he believes in science and started telling me about the big bang.

Don't feel sad that she likes different things to you. That isn't fair to her to put that expectation on her. She sounds bright and observant and great.

She sounds pretty switched on, to be honest. I don’t think it’s sad at all, you could have them talked about how they film films, follow your child’s need for logic and reasoning.

Absolutely this. Respect your children enough to tell them the truth when they ask a question.

The comment about the Home Alone camera operator is brilliant 👏 never thought of that myself in 50 years!

She is obviously intelligent and an imaginative thinker. Teach her chess and sudoku, get her painting, help her use her talents 😀

It does sound as if you want her to
have your childhood.

I was like your daughter. Bright, curious and imaginative. I’d certainly seen through the whole Santa schtick by six or seven. But it wasn’t lack of imagination or any literal rejection of magic. My imagination has been a major component of my career, actually.

Thing is, though, kids tend to ask specific questions to which they want to know the answer, but adults often leap in with a whole general explanation, which hasn’t been asked for yet.

My mother says that when I was little, I asked her where babies came from. She sat me down, took a deep breath and began at the beginning.

When she was about two paragraphs in, I held up my hand and said, “Alright. That’s enough. I’m only eight.”

It was a good two years before I went back for the rest of it.

@Andsoitgoeshey
This was for you.
I sent it to the wrong person by mistake 🤦‍♀️🤣

🤣🤣 oops my mistake! Sorry x

I really don't get all these posters on here who think the magic of Christmas is limited to believing in Santa.

I never believed in Santa but still had those lovely magical Christmas feelings. I even enjoyed lying in bed thinking of Santa going through the sky even though I did not believe in him, and knew mum got the presents as I found them each year hidden in her wardrobe. Still loved opening the presents on Christmas day. Christmas just has that lovely otherly magical out of the ordinary special feeling as a child whether or not you believe literally in specific Christmas characters.

Even as an adult I am a total rationalist with no supernatural beliefs yet still enjoy spiritual events and walk through woods imagining all the spirits and other-world creatures, even though I do not believe in them. Humans are perfectly capable of holding two thoughts in their head at once.

I love the way your daughter thinks. Enjoy her for who she is and let her enjoy Christmas in her own way.

Yes, my kids are like this. I think kids are just more switched on these days and they have access to far more information than we did. It's not a bad thing, just embrace it, they are their own people and that's ok

I think that's a mistake. If she asks you an outright question she deserves an honest answer. I feel the same about people who tell their children nonsense about 'where babies come from', if they ask, they get an age appropriate answer. Don't tell lies you will have to recind later.

Em I think you referenced the wrong poster. Unless my cat has some opinion 🐈‍⬛🤣

Some of my favourite memories of Xmas are the first year I got to 'be' Father Christmas (aged not quite 4) and dragged the presents into the living room on my toboggan, wearing a cotton wool beard, and the first year I was able to choose and buy presents myself (aged 8) and took my saved pocket money to the shop by myself to get a genuine surprise for my parents (a set of 6 tumblers from BHS).

And I always loved the sparkle and ritual of the season. Unpacking and putting up the decorations. The music. The lights. The parties - dressing up, games and special food like a whole fortnight of birthday party. Learning about the physics that made the foil spirals hung above the airvents twist, then working out the best placement to get maximum movement from the different sizes. The RI Christmas lectures, with Professor Heinz Wolf explaining why helium makes your voice squeaky.

And the best part about the magic of those last 2 is that it wasn't confined to Xmas. There was the same joy and wonder throughout the year, when my parents woke me in the night to see a lunar eclipse, or a hedgehog, or a particularly good lightning storm. In trying to work out why adding clear water to pale pink custard powder resulted in bright yellow custard. In learning that combining different paint colours didn't give the same results as combining different light colours - and an extended discussion with my DM about why shining a torch through green tissue paper gave green light, shining it through red paper gave red light, but shining it through black paper didn't give black light. In prisms, and pinhole cameras, and leaning that my eyes see everything upside down and my brain then has to turn it over! In the incredible genetic and cell division mechanisms that cause coat colours and patterns in cats.

The world is brimming over with wonder, and it never stops. Most of that list is from when I was 6 or under, but I didn't learn the cat one until university -it gave me.just the same thrill.

Same. I found magic in other things, I still had a massive sense of wonder, and now nostalgia about it.
It was magic for me that I had an amazing relationship with all our family pets (hamster, guinea pigs, dog, budgie) and the cat next door. I learnt all their body language and sounds and understood them all really well.

I loved things like morning dew on spiders webs and the fact that I could see kids playing football on a hard surface a field away and I would see the ball bounce then hear it slightly later, loved stuff like that.

Edited to add, that I still enjoyed the pretend and going along with the fun, just didn't think it was real. It was still a lovely bonding family tradition.