to feel so sad that DD is discovering awful things about the world? From Rolf Harris?

[IHeartKingThistle]

It is silly, but I AM sad.

DD is 5.5. I always sing her a song at bedtime and for the last few nights she has asked for 'Two Little Boys'. For the life of me I can't remember how on earth she knows this song, but anyway. Lots of questions about soldiers, and battles, and war.

I have explained as clearly and gently as I can. She was not upset, just curious and interested.

But I feel sad. It feels like the beginning of her finding out how evil the world can be. I don't want her to know .

Is banning Rolf Harris the answer?

If that's the only awful thing about the World that RH has taught her then she's got away lightly, thankfully........

Lovely post Oaty.

Cory your ds sounds lovely, thankyou for sharing that story.

That's the weird thing, Thistle. My son is quite matter-of-fact about eating animals for dinner, dying, war and guns. He knows all about how to make an Egyptian mummy, about the possibility of an asteroid wiping out the Earth, about volcanoes, tsunamis and earthquakes, and he faces all these things with equanimity. But run over a slug with a pram and - oh boy! - the tears and accusations follow, I am a bad and evil mother who should have noticed the poor little bag of slime that is now woefully and irrevocably stuck in the wheels of the buggy board.

He has high-functioning autism - I presume that this is just another one of his quirks. (You should have heard the screams when I sang him the song about squashing up a baby bumblebee. Now we have to sing about cuddling and kissing the baby bumblebee instead. So much for autistic children lacking empathy!)

Gosh, I missed a whole page of posts there. Sorry!

I think we are lucky in this country to be able to choose - by and large - how and when our children learn about real life.

However, sometimes that choice is taken from us by circumstances such as death or illness in a family or by the myriad of things that can come out of the blue. We didn't have the luxury of waiting for a suitable moment to explain war and injury to our children - my husband has served in Afghanistan several times. It's not an easy thing to tell a two year old that Daddy has gone away and won't be back for several months.