To wonder if people share too much bad news with small DC?

[Rainallnight]

I’ve seen some stuff on social media lately about friends and acquaintances with kids aged about 3 or 4 who are very worried about coronavirus and the violence on the streets of London yesterday.

Am I wrong in thinking that the parents exposed them to too much detail and they wouldn’t be so worried if they knew less? And that knowing less is fine and totally appropriate for that age?

I’ve kept the coronavirus info very minimal with my small DC and on a need-to-know basis only. ‘There’s a bug going round, we need to wash our hands, some stuff is closed, they’re looking for a medicine to fix it’. And I wouldn’t dream of letting them see the ugly scenes in London yesterday.

That’s not to say I shield them from all harsh realities - they’re adopted and have an age-appropriate understanding of why they had to be removed from their birth parents. And we’ve had two major deaths in the family in the past two years and we’ve been honest about what’s happened. But I feel these are things that have more directly intruded into their lives and so they need to know.

Any thoughts?

sorry should say - massive difference between children learning about it and hearing it on the radio, and TV news which is graphic

We do the same as @Frlrlrubert. My DS is four, he knows there is a nasty bug which can make some people very poorly, and this is why we have to stay away from people we don’t live with and wash our hands. As he’s not at school, DP is working from home, we’re not seeing extended family, and lots of the things we normally do (eg playgrounds) are closed, he has needed age appropriate explanations. We don’t have TV news on when he’s awake. And we don’t usually make him aware of news which doesn’t directly affect his life, eg BLM, terror attacks, etc.

Sorry, I should have said “which don’t immediately affect his day to day life” - don’t want to imply the issues raised by BLM or terror attacks won’t affect him, more that it doesn’t affect whether or not we can go to the park of a Saturday morning. Hopefully you get what I mean despite clumsy wording.

I was exposed to a lot of TV news as a child and think it contributed a lot to anxiety. Hence I’m keen to be cautious.

For the under 14s, I think the best way is to be led by them. When covid closed the schools and we went into lockdown, my ds 11, took it in his stride. I asked him if he was worried and he said no, he’s too young to get ill and I’m female and too skinny (his words) so there was nothing to worry about.

It was a bit simplistic but he’d clearly thought about it and decided everything would be ok. I wasn’t about to worry him any further.

I’ve mentioned that I might lose my job and his response was “ we’ll be ok” . Must be lovely to be that assured. I want him to hang on to that as long as possible.

My 3 year old knows that "there's a silly flu bug going around that's making people sick so the schools, shops, park and soft play are shut for cleaning, we need to keep our distance from our friends and we need to wash our hands lots".

She needs to know something because she knows that she's not at school and not doing her usual stuff. She doesn't need to know the death toll etc.