to think you shouldn't talk to 3yo about zombies?

[TurnipIsTaken]

Ds said something about zombies today. I asked him what he said. He said "Daddy has a zombie on his t-shirt." so I asked him, "what's a zombie?" and he said "It's half dead and half a boy."

(He has speech delay so it's hard to understand him but it was something like that.) I didn't pursue it any more.

Ex has a history of saying inappropriate things to ds (worse than this). I used to pull him up on it when we were together but now obviously I don't know what he says during contact.

Am I over-reacting? Does anyone think this is an okay thing to say to a 3yo?

3yos love zombies. They are on Scooby Doo.

Meh! It wouldn't have bothered my kids

Yours sounds pretty matter of fact about it too, from what you've said.

It wasn't a Scooby Doo t-shirt, it was Evil Dead.

it wouldn't of bothered my lot at three either they were all big fans of the plants vs zombies game and dc1's favorite film was nightmare before christmas

Ok seems I am overreacting. Glad I asked before sending him a pissed off email about it!

I find it hard to separate the truly bad things he has done (dv) from the just slightly dumb parenting that I, and every other parent, am also guilty of.

Maybe he's been playing Plants vs Zombies on someone's phone?

The year ones at the school where I work play zombie related games. I think yabu. They are no more than ghosts.

We play the zombie game with our 2.5 yo. She loves being chased for brains...

However, if its another thing in a long line of things then maybe its not that unreasonable to worry

No he doesn't know how to do anything like that (neither do I!). We don't get mobile reception here (neither does ex) so only have cheapo PAYG to use occasionally.

Ex does have a zombie t-shirt because he's still a 20yo working in a record shop not a man approaching 40 so I think he's telling the truth.

my 16 month old does a cracking zombie impression. In this case I do rather think you are worrying about nothing.

My ds has known all about zombies, werewolves and vampires since the age of about 3.

He knows the exact kill methods too, silver bullets, heads chopped off, garlic. The lot.

How else am I going to be protected during the zombie apocolypse?

He adores monsters. His new subjects for study this week are Frankenstein and Trolls.

and he asks complicated questions that I cant answer so thats where horror film loving dh comes in handy

On a bit of a different note, I found it helpful to chat and joke about these things to my kids, because laughing about them made them instantly non scary.

I wouldn't worry if all he's done is explain what they are, and that it's just a silly ghost story.

But I know of a 3yo who is allowed to watch The Walking Dead with her mum because she's told her 'it's not real and just pretend'. From that she goes around pretending to smash brains and stab you with things, it's very alarming.

DS knows the process of mummification, and will explain with all seriousness that you have to mush up the brain with the hook first, or it won't come out of the nostrils...

Dd2 is 3 and has talked about zombies for quite a while now. She loves them, she and dp play with her Happyland house and have zombies coming in so the people have to man the sentries. I'm sure she likes playing with daddy more than me because he plays more imaginative games with her.

I wasn't impressed when she was scared about zombies coming to eat her, but we've even managed to change that around, she now eats the zombies , so I have a 3yo running round the house chomping the air and claiming it was a yummy zombie.

Is your ds scared or disturbed by the zombies or is it a happy game for him? That would be the clincher for me about whether it's appropriate or not.

I say YANBU. Why in earth give them more fodder for their fertile imaginations to scare themselves silly with?

(I have a 3 year old. I also have an incredibly over ds five imagination and cannot watch horror films as a result. As a kid I had awful nightmares from sesame street )

Agree with above... Halloween soon, there'll be Zombies everywhere!

All you can do is answer their questions, tell them it's not real, occasionally enjoy the conversations.

My boys talk about Zombies a lot. The discuss the methods for killing Zombies, my youngest often gets it wrong and my eldest will say "Nah that's VAMPIRES that hate silver" and which point I usually chip in and say "You're both wrong, it's Werewolves that hate silver, it's the only thing that'll stop them".

Then I return to the standard "It's not real" and try to move the discussion onto something else.

I don't think you'll stop your ex from saying inappropriate things to your DS, I do think you can accept this and adjust how you deal with it.

If you have an aversion to all things 'monster' YANBU to worry, you can be calm and explain your feelings about your child without getting angry, use it as an excuse to really talk with your DS about reality/fantasy, life/death, good/bad and everything in between, they're wonderful chats to have and sometimes I don't do it enough.

My FIL is having a difficult time with Alzheimer's at the moment and my boys have witnessed things I wouldn't wish for them to see, but they have seen it and can't unsee it so we talk a lot. My children are older (5 and 9) so the conversations are more complex. Try not to worry.

*over active not over ds five bloody autocorrect or was it a zombie?

My son is only 14 weeks old and he already knows about zombies. He's forever trying to chomp on my shoulder and I keep calling him Zombie-Baby.

Good point about reality/fantasy. I have talked about things just being pretend before so I will take that tack if he mentions it again.

He was just stating it as a fact really, not playing a game. He likes to repeat things he's been told or from books or tv. Ex did say he had a nightmare at his, not normal for him, but it might be a bit much to blame that on the zombie, could have been anything.

Creature, me too, only it was Fraggle Rock!