To consider telling my 2yo the truth about Father Christmas?

[owmn]

Basically, looking for a bit of advice and other’s experiences!

DD has just turned 2, and so has no concept as yet of Father Christmas, aside from some decorations we have that feature him.

I’ve been thinking about being honest with her from the get go, largely because the idea of her finding out we’ve lied to her for so long, years down the line, makes me a bit sad! But will she be missing out on part of the magic of Christmas? The tradition of writing a letter, leaving out mince pies and carrots, etc.

I also can’t figure out how to ensure she knows she’s very lucky to receive presents, and recognises her privilege, if she believes in Father Christmas. Do we tell her we’re lucky enough to be able to pay him?!

We won’t be telling her she has to behave for presents, only her stocking will come from him, and we’ll be making sure her letter asks him for things for others too, if we do go ahead.

If you have been honest with your LO, what have you replaced those kind of traditions with?

Genuinely never thought I’d have to give it this much consideration! 😂

But the Gruffalo isn’t part of British traditions like Santa.

It is up to you but I've never known a child feel betrayed by being lied to. I think a lot of children actually feel really happy to have had a magical experience and they appreciate what their parents did for them so they could believe in the magic. It's also a really bonding shared experience for little children who are so excited by Christmas.

It's the drama of the 'magic' which seems strange to me on this thread.

We have traditions just no dramatic magic. It is a joyful occasion.

I was also never allowed any kind of santa and Christmas was entirely religious coercion. I've steered a path avoiding all of that. Enjoying the lights, (small) gifts at solstice , occaisional paper chains, gingerbread - whatever they have wanted or I have felt like doing. It's always fun. A big tradition is a morning walk on Christmas day whilst everyone is in actual church or consumerist church of gifts.

"This is the reason that I am considering telling my hypothetical future child that Father Christmas isn’t real. I remember being quite young when I realised that there were millions of children in the world who weren’t visited by ‘Father Christmas’ and wondering why that was. I think that if you combine that with Father Christmas only visiting ‘good’ children then you get a quite nasty undercurrent of poor=bad. I might be overthinking it though, who knows."

Santa doesn't like good children he likes rich ones. The richer the child the more and better pressies he gives. That's just how it should be.

They should drop the naughty and nice list and have a rich and poor list and poor children can learn that they should have chosen much richer parents and it's their own fault they're getting so few and such crappy gifts every Christmas.

"Spoil the magic - no way . Took mine to Lapland ( big kid that I am with Grandma and Grandad when she was 3 ) - we all loved it . Eventually she said to me ( aged @ 8 I think ) " Mummy I know Santa doesn't really exist " so they all realise the truth eventually . I just replied yes , but its a lovely story ."

I'm so jealous, I've always wanted to go to Lapland for Christmas but have never been able to justify the expense. One day maybe.

It’s really up to you to decide... plus you will need to deal with the parents of the kids who have been told by your kid that santa isn’t real?
If I had to 'deal' with a parent then my response would be something similar to'that's nice dear' and quietly make a note that the parent was a bit of a waffy one.

There are children of all faiths and none, a range of cultural backgrounds and families with a range of traditions. Anyone who was so fragile that they expect the world to perpetuate their make believe is exactly the sort of person who posts on mumsnet beside themselves that their 11 year old might find out at secondary school.

What’s wrong with you? It’s not lying, it’s a lovely fairytale to believe.

My husbands mum told him very early there was no Father Christmas because she wanted to get the credit for giving the gifts. Makes me sad.

recognises her privilege
Poor kid. She’s 2. Heaven forbid if she isn’t sufficiently grateful.

Sounds like a laugh a minute in your house OP.

@Kokosrieksts that is so sad; some people are so selfish. It should be enough sending the dc faces; no credit needed! She could have been told him Santa brought the presents but she bought them if it made her feel better but was no need to ruin things!

My younger son never really believed in Santa but just went along with it with a knowing grin.

Reading some of your comments makes me really glad that my children are grown. This trend for treating children like adults makes me really sad. Let them believe in magic, fairytales, Father Christmas. At least my children won’t have to have doubts about FC planted in their heads at an early age like some of your children may do to others. They have loved the magic and so did I when I was a child. My family for generations have only ever done the stocking from FC. I think it’s strange for every present to be from FC but each to their own. Still better than ruining it. I wasn’t upset when I found out the truth but I was very upset when I was really young and believed that Paddington was real. I wrote to him but it was returned to sender by the post office. Let your kids be kids and don’t take away that innocent belief so young 😢

Preparefortheflaming
The thing is some parents aren't content with Santa being a nice story and then they work it out and the parents share the truth. It has to be pushed as long as possible, probably to meet an emotional need of the parent.

Most.of my friends at school had doubts in year 2/3 and knew the truth by year 4. It was good fun and then our parents taught us about the Christmas spirit and that the magic comes from being kind to people and sharing time and gifts and making others feel special. We still put the plates out and enjoyed the santa story but it was all make believe.

From what my mum was telling me there weren't parents cooking up evidence because they were worried they their children were going to find out the truth aged 9, and there were no mass panics that DC was going to have to be told the truth before secondary school, no hysterical 'but won't somebody think of the children!'

People acting like the magic is ruined if parents don't do everything to pretend santa exists clearly haven't spent time with a class of 14 year olds. Nobody can say a bad word about santa and if you're the child who says he's not real then you'll find the group voice is firmly that 'of course Santa's real'.

I wasn't making a judgement although it might have seemed that way. I wasn't sure if you had negative feelings towards Christmas or simply indifference.

I'm happier without it. There is no way I could "tailor it to a more individual approach" that would be of any additional benefit over the holidays I choose to celebrate that I've already done that with. I'm not bitter that I have no positive memories anymore than being bitter that I don't really have any for having gone to DisneyWorld as a kid. It happened, my memory is as it is, there is nothing to be bitter about. My only annoyance is with people who assume I should find their idea of fun, fun and my lack of interest must be only because I had a bad experience. Plenty of people have shitty Christmas who keep doing it, and plenty of people have lovely traditions as children that they don't feel connected to and choose not to continue.

There is a difference between the thousands of holidays and Christmas because of its much larger cultural significance. It's like not taking part in Diwali in any form in India.

Yes, there are social systems that encourage the celebration of Christmas, Easter (which I also don't do), among a few other holidays - some of them even have questions on the Life in the UK test. It does make some things harder, people feel they have the right to accuse me of child abuse and that I shouldn't have been allowed to immigrant because I don't celebrate it. That doesn't mean that it's always positive for everyone who celebrates or those who don't should be encouraged to find ways to do so or worry about our kids being left out.

There being social systems that encourage it doesn't explain why the assumption of my not celebrating it is being bitter, annoyed, or my not recognizing I can change holiday traditions. I chose not to. I chose to home educate my kids for primary. I chose to immigrate. I choose to not move out of an area with UKIP/Brexit/Reform councillors. I choose a lot of things that make my life harder at times. It's generally to make my life better in other ways -- and the last maybe a pinch of spite.

I don't see anything better being made by a toddler having someone go on about the truth of any type of fiction, but many of the ideas on this thread of it's use as a game/story (especially with the nice/naughty and 'if you don't believe you don't get presents ideas dropped) work far better, but all of it is a range of options that people connect with. Life's too short for holidays and traditions we don't connect with, no matter what cultural roots we come from or around us.

Maybe it would be better if Christmas was really like Yule, fluctuating around the calendar depending on resources & other factors. It was celebrated as early as November and sometimes well into January. We could have had it early in this low resource year & we could be onto the angst over thoughtless presents and bad dinners threads already.

I’m 50+
As a child Father Christmas was always sold to us as a kind of delivery guy - the presents still came from family and friends - but were brought by Santa

"Maybe it would be better if Christmas was really like Yule, fluctuating around the calendar depending on resources & other factors. It was celebrated as early as November and sometimes well into January. We could have had it early in this low resource year & we could be onto the angst over thoughtless presents and bad dinners threads already."

Do you have any reference for Yule fluctuating or being celebrated as early as November? The origins are somewhat lost in time but I've never seen a reference to Yule as early as that or being very flexible in date even though it went by the lunar calendar.

Yule as a month in the pagan Germanic calendar was two months being roughly our December and January, split in the middle with the solstice (which was the 25th at one point in the Julian calendar) and called Ærra Geola, before Yule and Æftera Geola, after Yule.

I never wanted to do Santa with ds but dh absolutely insisted. At 5 some kid in his class told him it was fake and he asked me and I told him the truth. He did feel like we lied to him, but when he was older I told him I never wanted to bring Santa into it to begin with but I was overruled. He’s 19 now and hasn’t shown any ill effects and (I think) has forgiven us for ‘lying’ to him. I’d wait for awhile. Oh and he was old enough to understand he was not to tell anyone.

I don’t anyone who has a lack of trust in their parents ‘because they lied about Father Christmas’. You are over thinking it.

Make it a bit of fun rather than a huge thing and they won't mind so much when they find out it's not real.

Well... the replies to what I thought was a fairly innocuous question have certainly been a ride 😂 It’s AIBU so I suppose I should’ve anticipated it!

I genuinely can’t fathom how I’m getting responses calling me an idiot, asking why I bothered to have children, and pitying my daughter though, come on. No need for quite that much anger!

Is it really such an offensive idea that we might not go all out with having her believe in him? I honestly didn’t think so. Not for a second have I suggested that we’re not going to celebrate and make it special for her. Do all those suggesting I’m robbing her of her the magic and her childhood really think that she must be told he’s a real person making her presents up in the North Pole to have a lovely Christmas? We’d still have Christmas Eve traditions, a tree, gifts, the excitement of the day. I don’t see that they absolutely have to coexist.

Perhaps I should’ve worded my OP slightly differently to say we’re not planning on sitting her down next week and telling her the truth as such, moreso we’re wondering whether to begin perpetuating the idea and answering her questions about Father Christmas with the story of him making presents, delivering on Christmas Eve, etc.

To address a few points, I can appreciate it may seem I’m overthinking when she’s so young, but she’s an inquisitive child who’s asking questions, so start as we mean to go on, is how we see it, in terms of what we commit to saying.

In regards to ensuring she knows she’s privileged, I really can’t see why that’s rubbed so many people the wrong way! She may be very young, but what harm can there be in making sure she knows she’s very lucky to receive gifts when others aren’t as fortunate? Surely being appreciative for what she has is something that should be instilled in her growing up, whether it be in this situation, or any other.

I see no reason doing that would mean she wouldn’t enjoy her gifts and feel they/the day was special. And is nothing to do with me wishing to take credit for her gifts! I don’t know what I said to give that impression to be honest.

As a genuine question on that point, all those who think me a horrible old grinch for suggesting she know her gifts under the tree come from us and wider family, how do you tackle the issue of kids asking for something you can’t afford, them seeing friends either with very little, or with what they wanted and weren’t given? What about children that don’t receive any gifts at all?

As for her potentially telling another child, that’s one thing giving me pause as it may be tricky, but she’s a clever little thing, and I’m sure would understand in years to come if we told her that some believe and some don’t, and she should respect that by not discussing it. As some have pointed out, there’ll be plenty of children from different backgrounds, cultures, and faiths that don’t celebrate or believe, so I don’t think she’d be the only risk!

It may seem I’ve got a case of PFB, or am a miserable old cow apparently, but to me, giving her literal answers and painting it all as the absolute truth, to tell her years down the line only when she’s figured it out herself, that we weren’t honest, does make me think about how that may come across to her. I suppose I say that as someone who always hated finding my parents in a white lie, so perhaps that colours it, but evidently there are some that have sadly experienced real disappointment in being lied to, so I think it’s a fair concern.

Thank you though for those who have replied detailing how they ‘do’ Santa slightly differently, there’s some great ideas on how we might be able to find a middle ground! And I’m pleased to hear there’s some children out there who aren’t traumatised and still have lovely Christmases, if we do decide not to tell her! 😂

but to me, giving her literal answers and painting it all as the absolute truth, to tell her years down the line only when she’s figured it out herself, that we weren’t honest, does make me think about how that may come across to her.

So, are we to take from that that you intend to always tell her the literal, absolute truth? Is that wise?

Really? Think about that before you answer.

how do you tackle the issue of kids asking for something you can’t afford, them seeing friends either with very little, or with what they wanted and weren’t given?

I can’t say it’s very difficult. Santa doesn’t like greedy children and is always better disposed when you are reasonable in your requests.

Children don’t actually have as strong understanding of what X got, but again, simple. Santa knows you got lots for your birthday/ from grandma/are so lucky to live near the park/got a lot last year/whatever.

I just told mine from young a gift list is a wish list not an order form.
Santa can't bring everything as he has to sort out all the kids.
He brings the stocking and mum and dad do the rest.
Very young they were told 'that's too expensive' and 'you need to save for it'....

There is also a lot of 'what do you think?' - when they ask questions....so technically I'm not lying.

As I said earlier....in our house there is room for some 'magic' if they choose to believe. But we don't go overboard. (This is just my opinion....)

My kids have never asked why XYZ got a PS5 from santa when they didn't. I don't think my kids were ever that gullible.

No keating That isn’t it.

But we tell our children incredible, remarkable, almost unbelievable things all the time, good and bad.

Literal truth with a question like ‘how did I get here’ doesn’t mean you’d tell your three year old about your sex life, but a version that’s fairly close to the truth, usually something about mummy and daddy loving one another very much

If you go down the stork / cabbage patch route, that’s a lie. And confusing for the child when they do find out about sex.

There are certain analogies there with Santa.

We play "the Santa game" in our house. Rule #1: don't talk about the Santa game. We didn't do Santa until my eldest was about 4 & he asked. I explained it's a game that some people like to play but that the most important rule when you're playing the game is to pretend that it's real. He said he wanted to play, so we do.