Child lost soft toy. Should I get another and fake it?

[Teddybear87]

My DS is almost seven. This summer, he lost his beloved jellycat soft toy. I’m considering getting a new one, and faking it. I would need to take its arm off and stitch it back on again a bit wonky and put it through the wash a lot of times to make it look “loved”!

I don’t know if that’s not a good thing to do. It’s lying, isn’t it?

And what if he can tell the difference?

He’s still devastated about it, and I’m heartbroken for him so am v tempted to do it. Because maybe he really needs that soft toy?

What would you do?

It just seems a bit too complex for a lie. If you just had to replace it wholesale, OK, white lie and kids can cope with white lies even after they find out. But to stitch the arm back on wonky etc – if as a child I somehow found out / suspected the truth, I might get worried about the lengths my parents went to lie to me and start secretly questioning everything in my life. I was a somewhat anxious/overthinking child though so I guess it depends on your DC.

This is like how adult humans cope with grief. I comfort myself like that about my recently lost loved one still doing their lovely favourite things in the afterlife, or somewhere up there looking down at me, even when I partially know that’s probably made up.

Personally I wouldn’t. He’s 7 not a baby so you run the risk of him noticing quite quickly that it is, in fact, not his original toy, and knowing you’re lying to him. There’s no benefit in that situation but there are quite a few negatives! One of the solutions already on here for giving him a new toy would be better really imo.
don’t blame your husband for crying @Spencer0220 i just welled up reading that. How absolutely precious of your mother.

In my experience he will 100% know it's not the same one whatever you do to it. My niece at 2 years old could distinguish between her beloved snuggly and the back up version even though to the adults it looked identical.
Edit: I've just seen you said it's the black and white dog. Coincidentally my 3 year old has that too. Her baby brother took a liking to it so we bought another 'identical' one to see if one of them would accept the new one. The difference is stark, I'm not sure if they have changed them slightly or ours is just very worn out but the new one is so so fluffy, I don't remember the original ever been like that! So I really do think he'll instantly know unfortunately. I think all you can so is reassure him that teddy is ok wherever he is and eventually he'll move on, very sad I know 😢
Probably a long shot but if you've any idea where he was lost check local Facebook pages, I often see teddy found posts on there, or put a post on yourself x

Maybe you could get a new one and take pictures of it in various set-ups to look like his old one's been on holiday or been to hospital to get his arm fixed or something along those lines and that's why he's come back all fixed up and clean? I've seen a few hotels find toys and do things like that and it always makes me smile!

I lost my favourite teddy at the same age… I remember it like it was yesterday (I’m 51!)… I was horribly sad. My well meaning Mum tried to trick me into a replacement… I knew immediately that it wasn’t the original and hated it. Eventually I chose another teddy to love (it was important that I chose it) who still sits on my daughter’s bed now. The worst bit was worrying about what had happened to my lost teddy, so spinning a story for your DS about the teddy going on holidays/meeting new friends/looking after a sad child etc etc is a good idea… anything that will make your empathetic DS believe that teddy is fine and happy and not alone in the cold somewhere!

I’m no psychologist, but to me buying into his sadness and confirming to him “yes it is sad” isn’t going to help him.

I’m terrible for never throwing things out because I can come up with either a reason to keep it, or an emotional attachment to it, eg piece of clothing I’ll never wear but my mum bought it me, or similar.

I find it much more comforting when my mum rationalises things a bit for me, showing me it doesn’t matter if something breaks, it’s not bad to throw things out, it’s normal and useful etc. it takes away some of that heavy irrationality that I’ve created.

Perhaps doing that here would help? “We all lose things sometimes, it’s ok” “it’s just a teddy, it won’t be sad” or something similar? Put more of a positive spin on it, show him it’s not a “bad” thing, just one of those things.

just an idea based on my own experiences