To think it harsh to tell your child there's no Santa

I think it’s wrong to lie to children, wrong to insist that Santa, fairies etc are real when they clearly aren’t. I then get accused of “ruining the magic” and having spoilt my kids childhood because I never taught them Santa was real.
And yet….my dad is 21 and still behaves as if Santa is real, still looks out for his reindeer. Actually we had a 30 minute conversation this evening about her favourite book character and his adventures as if he is real. He’s an anthropomorphic bear! Obviously she knows he isn’t actually real but she loves him! Magic lost - totally not!
Far far better to encourage a child’s imagination than to teach them to believe a lie.

I think it's ok to white lie to your kids at a young age, but if it's a full on please tell me mum moment then you have to tell the truth. I think the easiest is a shrug and say you think he only comes to believers. When dc started asking specific questions about Santa I'd always say 'well how would I know' and they wouldn't pursue it.

On balance I'd rather a child figured out early than was too stupid to figure it out at all. I think it shows a very low curiosity and a gullibility to not question the story. My friends recently told their 13 year old, they were worried she might get teased. I was shocked they let her get to 13. I said I thought she was only playing them too, she probably didn't believe for years but my friend said the child genuinely believed and had never questioned any of it. This kid has a smart phone can you imagine who vulnerable she is to conspiracy theories.

There is no wrong or right way OP. Do what is right for you.

My youngest and his friend worked out that it wasn't possible in year 1. The logic just didn't work out. My other two had it figured out by the start of juniors. I'm always a bit 🤔 when I read on here about people with kids about to start secondary school who supposedly still believe in Santa.

We have never done Santa with the kids and certainly when they have outright asked we have told them the truth. I still say things to them like ‘Santa doesn’t come if your room is untidy’ but they know full well that’s just me wanting them to tidy their rooms!

Both the (older) boys have thanked me for not being the only kid in class still believing in year 6 or so. Beyond a certain point I think it’s more for the parents than the kids. We manage to have a magical Christmas without Santa!

We still believe in our house and our DC are all adults! They humour us.

You can keep the magic going - it doesn’t have to that big of a deal. We used to say “well, if you don’t believe, he doesn’t come and bring presents…” with a wink. They knew which side of the bread they like buttered - whatever their mates said at school.

I think she's probably the one playing along to keep you happy!

My son is now 13 and we've still never had any discussions if Santa is real or not haha. He of course knows hes not by the little comments here and there he makes but hes never when younger questioned it. I think its a lovely thing to believe in and cant understand why anyone would think otherwise personally. I would have done the same as you OP and said of course hes real!

Sorry but santa evolved from father winter/ father time not saint nicolas as much as the church might otherwise

Well I wouldn’t have said he was definitely real, I would have told them they can decide if they want to believe.

But I’m one of those parents who hasn’t encouraged nor discouraged the Santa thing (I say it’s a wonderful story), but my child believes in it anyway.

We always told our kids from a very young age that Santa is a myth, but other children like to believe in him so we taught them to be respectful of that and not spoil it for them

No not harsh it's sensible.
Christmas is the biggest load of crap ever peddled.

I was like your Dd1... only I told my mum in case she didn't know (my logical thinking obviously hadn't extended as far as to think about who actually did do it all 😂)

I never believed in FC as a child, hence I never tried to make my own children believe either. We enjoy Christmas, but don’t make a massive deal out of it.

There’s a brilliant book that pokes fun at the weird ways Santa might get into houses. My two think it’s hilarious

https://amzn.eu/d/fri3IN2

I had a friend with no dc who was keen to know if my dc “believed” every Christmas! DD1 worked it out at around 5 or 6 and stated she knew exactly where the presents came from! We put love from mummy and daddy of them. She could read. It didn’t matter and we just had a bit of fun regarding FC squeezing down the chimney. Dd than wanted to know how he got into the room as we had a log burner. You just cannot keep lying when dc are savvy!

You just have to be a bit pragmatic. You can go with “well, what do you believe? you don’t have to believe in the same things as everyone else does, it’s up to you.”

It’s always going to be a tricky one because even in “believing” families, every family has different traditions: for some of your child’s peers, Father Christmas will only bring stocking presents and family buy the rest, whilst for others he will bring all of the presents. Likewise, some of your children’s peers will be celebrating the birth of God’s son Jesus this Christmas, but if you aren’t Christian you probably won’t feel as though you should pretend to your own children that the nativity is a real, true story just to protect other children’s faith.

Santa does exist. He is in most shopping malls. I have seen him on the telly too, and in films. One of his elves was stacking shelves at my local supermarket yesterday … although her ears did look a bit like they were made from felt.

The scientifically minded kids figure it out for themselves in reception. It tends to be bright, logical kids who conclude themselves that fairy stories are fairy stories rather than humourless parents whispering brutal truths to them. I don’t think my dc enjoyed Christmas any less for not believing - ds2 was relieved, I think, as he didn’t like the idea of a stranger being able to get into his room in the night, and the fact it didn’t make sense.

I was surprised at how I felt about lying to the kids too, I am was pleased when they stopped believing at quite a young age. Probably around 9 for both of them maybe earlier. I too don't get the big deal people put into christmas though, we are a close family all year round and whilst we are not currently wealthy the kids don't want for anything. I hate this huge consumer thing Christmas has turned into.

My dc was 8 years old when he figured it out but I told him to keep it to himself so those who hadn't yet could still enjoy believing until they figured it out. I give him a gentle reminder each Christmas and he’s actually very sweet and really plays along for his younger sibling and cousins who still believe. I think i’d have been a bit disappointed if he found out from a peer at 7. Not the end of the world, but his coming to his own conclusions was my preference. So I get you feeling a bit disappointed.

I actually read a good article from a child psychologist about this who said that believing he’s actually real isn’t the important thing, it’s the sense of make-believe and play around it. I need to find it again.

Personal preference.

Before kids, I sort of scoffed when anyone said Santa stuff was lying to kids. I thought that was totally OTT.

But then I had DD1, an incredibly logical, sceptical, curious child, and I very quickly became uncomfortable with the amount of lying I would have to do to keep the Santa thing alive. If it had all remained very vague and non-specific I would have felt okay about it but she is ruthless. When she was 4, she first raised doubts about it. And by last Christmas, when she was 5, she was relentless with questions and eventually asked outright if he was real. I asked if she wanted to really know or if she just wanted to believe whatever she wanted and she said she wanted to know. I told her and she was totally unbothered, just said ‘I knew it!’ and then everything carried on as normal. We still do all the traditions and putting the cookies out etc, but I do admit to being slightly relieved I don’t have to have an ethical crisis about waffling on about magic keys and the like.

DD2 (3) does believe as far as I can tell but we are very vague about it so I don’t know how long she will. DD1 is very careful to keep her knowledge to herself!