To feel awful I’ve broken my kids heart?!

[TotalRecall]

The good old Santa debate.

I love the magic of Santa. I loved it when I was a child. My kids love it. My youngest especially REALLY loves Santa. He writes letters, talks to the Elves, regales me with stories about all the times he “heard Santa filling his stocking and pretended to be asleep” 😂 I could go on..

I have no recollection of being traumatised when I found out Santa wasn’t real. My eldest wasn’t traumatised in the slightest, and even joined in on making it magical for her brother etc.

So, 10 year old came into my room this morning and flat out asked me if Santa is real, because all his friends had told him it’s your parents, blah blah. He asked me to just tell him the truth please... so I did. He’s 10, I kinda assumed he really knew deep down, and he’s at an age where I don’t really want him to be made fun of for believing.

He was GUTTED. Like honestly gutted. Was really angry at me for lying to him, asked about the 27492025 incidences over the years where he had written letters or left milk and cookies or left things for the elves to take to Santa.. etc etc
He was actually devastated.

I feel awful! I don’t know any child who has had such a strong reaction to being told the truth so never really imagined that he would. I actually feel like I’ve ruined his childhood by doing the whole Santa thing in the first place!

Should I have told him the truth years ago?!
I guess on the bright side he said I don’t have to do stockings anymore...

I still carry on as if he is real (because he is!) and mine are 20, 18 and 13. There is no reason to change things even if they know it's not flying reindeer that bring their gifts. I even send my kids round the block to "walk the dog" before setting off to my parents so I could fill the boot with their presents to keep up the pretence. They would look at the luggage in the boot and wonder loudly why it was so much fuller than it should be. The magic is still there :)

We still do a sack of presents and a stocking and my kids are teens now. I think just saying "oh ok he knows now" and then just sticking them under the tree will make it all even sadder for him tbh after he's discovered this. It's still ok to make a big exciting fuss even if it isn't a man in a red suit delivering the presents.

caledonia I am welling up, lovely story, the magic of Christmas is seeing the better part of human nature come to the fore en masse.

It's laughable that people lie to their children that Santa is real because the corporate machine has told them to do so to have a 'magical' Christmas. And then get surprised when their children are devastated that he doesn't exist.

It's even more laughable when Atheists do this, making Santa a quasi-god.

Stop lying to your children! You can have a perfectly wonderful Christmas without the Santa lie.

OP, your job is to show him how much joy there is in using your imagination and doing magic for fun, as a joyful game you play together, rather than as a belief system. In my country, Santa appears physically (dad dressed up) which means nobody beyond the age of 4 can possible BELIEVE-believe. But great big 12yos can still enjoy a fun thing with their parents. I'm 56 and I still feel the same thrill when Santa knocks on the door.
You can help him move away from the idea of something being spoiled and introduce him to the idea of suspending disbelief because it's fun. A lovely ritual as someone put it further up-thread.
Like watching a film or something: you KNOW-know the hero will fall off that cliff onto a blue bouncing mat and that his heart isn't really broken by the heroine because you've read his bio and he's actually a happily married gay man, but in that moment you believe and it's enjoyable.

Mine are 21 & 22, still at home & we still put a stocking outside their doors & presents under the tree while they're in bed.

First one up still shouts "he's been"!

I am 39 my parents still do me and my sister a stocking when we visit at Xmas, I still do one for my 18 yr old DS it's a little bit of Xmas that I still Iove.

With my two I made a biggish deal of how fantastic it was that they were now old enough to be trusted with the secret, and how all of us 'in the know' worked together to keep the magic alive for the little children. So while they were a little sad that the jolly fat man didn't come into the house, they also felt very important and grown up and took their 'duties' very seriously.

However the stockings still continue They get left on the bedroom door handles and surprisingly both of them still make sure they go to bed before I do!

Mine asked me when she was nine. I told her the truth, she seemed fine with it. I think you did the right thing. They cant go to secondary school still believing, as they'll get laughed at (which happened to a friends daughter at age 12/13).

My DD found out Father Christmas was just us parents via mumsnet. She googled ‘is Santa real’ on my iPad at 8 years old and a mumsnet thread told her all she needed to know
We still do stockings though, and we still put presents from immediate family under the tree when they’ve gone to bed on Xmas eve. So the anticipation and excitement is still alive and well even though the magic has left.

I'd be pretty firm on this one. I've heard of children getting furious with their parents for lying about Santa and i honestly don't think you need to feel guilty at all. Comfort him and then tell him it's a white lie. Explain what white lies are. Normal lies are bad and cruel and done to advantage the liar. White lies are kind and done to advantage the person they're told to, to increase their fun or to bolster their confidence. Everyone in the world tells white lies at some point.

It's a traditional make believe game that adults play on children for their enjoyment. And him finding out in no way wrecks the enjoyment the game gave him over the years. Explain that all cultures have traditions like this which are built on fables and make believe.

Stop lying to your children!

99% of the population lies to their children about all sorts of things.

I don't remember ever really believing in Father Christmas but it didn't spoil anything for me. My nearly 10 year old asked me the other day and I asked her if it would upset her if he wasn't real. She said yes so I advised her not to ask me. Really I gave her the answer there but she chose to ignore it... Still she doesn't believe in the tooth fairy anymore so it's not long. I think you did the right thing, he asked you outright so you didn't have another choice.

He sounds like a sensitive soul.
But don’t stop doing stockings now, he can still have the magic without the myth.
I didn’t have Santa served up to me as a truth, just a nice story. I knew it was my mum, but it was totally magical and my favourite part of Christmas.
Don’t make him lose everything in one go.

Initially I used “if you don’t believe then you don’t get presents” and fended off questions from DS when younger sisters were near.

Then one summer he came to me alone and told me he knew FC didn’t exist. We discussed St Nicholas and the spirit of Christmas, and then i told him that now he didn’t believe in the magic of Christmas, he had moved to being a part of keeping the magic for those that do believe.

He was brilliant at this.

Then DD1 came to me, I gave her the sam3 talk.

DD2 is now 9, hasn’t come out either way yet this year, but did roll her eyes at me when 8 told her FC is watching her when she is naughty!

DS is 11 he’s been on the cusp for years, asking harder and harder question and let me tell you trying to answer them has been a test for me. He hasn’t flat out asked and with his autism doesn’t talk about stuff like that with his friends thank god. Last year I was really mad because dd was 6 and came home to tell me someone in her class said santa wasn’t real, 6, imo is far to early to take away the Magic. I wish parents would make sure their kids don’t ruin for others.
Op your not alone, a family friend told her son when he was 13, he was so mad he didn’t talk to her for a week. Some kids really buy into the magic

Stop lying to your children!

Thanks for the tip on how to bring up our children.

I'm sure the majority can make their own decisions.

I have never said Santa was real or presents come from a man in red who breaks in etc but have spoken about the spirit of Santa and of him as a representation of an idea of humanity.

I've always done stockings as a surprise from me. I think my family do too at all ages. Keep some magic OP!

At 10 he's a year off going to secondary school? I think that whilst he might feel a bit sad (and probably a bit silly after his friends had to tell him), I don't think it would have been a good idea to keep it going for much longer without him getting bullied.

I think parents these days are so invested in the idea of keeping the pretence going and there's so much more now with FC experiences that kids are much older when they eventually work it out. I have taken my preschool dc to these more expensive FC experiences at NT places etc and been surprised at how many older kids there are there still doing this.

I remember being 7 or 8 when I knew, I remember it being this age as I had a friend who had gone on holiday to lapland to see Father Christmas and I thought it was weird that they still thought it was real.

You've obviously done a great job in making it magical and convincing but whilst it's tough now I think you've done him a favour in terms of with his peer group relationships.

PS I still got a Christmas stocking from my parents til my mid twenties, and I made them one too. I won't be stopping stockings for my kids til they move out 😁

My DC are 18, 21 and 24 and Father Christmas still comes to this house. DD1 believed for a LONG time. She obviously had doubts, but still wanted to believe. We never had the "Is he real" conversation. We she was 15 (!) she asked me to confirm he wasn't real, in case she had kids one day and left out mince pies and expected it to just happen!

@diddl - yes first one up in our house Xmas day shouts "He's Been"

I had the same conversation last year with my then 8 yr old. I asked her what she thought of it and why she was doubting the whole thing. TBH she was quite relieved. We have double whammy being half Dutch half British so also had Sinterklaas to deal with!

I don't know why you;'re all saying Santa isn't real. I met him in Lapland when I was 18.

I wonder if really he knew and now he feels humiliated that all his friends knew before him and that he’d probably stuck up for Santa during playground chit chat.

Too late now, but when my dcs asked me I used to say yes, then when they said oh go on so and sos mum says he isn't, id say well maybe so and so has been naughty

They are in their teens now but I've said if he's not real, they won't hear it from me.