to ask my sister not to explain violent news items to my 3 year old

[assumetheposition]

DS1 just asked me about a violent news story that was on the news earlier in the week (not the Bulger one).

Apparently it had been on the news when he was at my sisters and they had been discussing it in front of him.

Now, we talk about things on the news with him, the earthquake in Haiti etc. We have talked about death with him and what it measns.

But I really don't want to answer his questions on why people murder eachother.

My sister just said that it's because he's very sharp and that we can't shield him from these things but AIBU to think that we should at least try for a bit.

Or am I being a bit precious.

I think that, at three years old, he deserves a bit more of his childhood before he gets weighed down with some of the more unpleasant news stories out there. He has plenty of time to learn about the world, and for now, he needs to be able to play in peace, Young children often work things out of proportion - how does your sister know he won't get nightmares from that sort o thing?

YANBU. Three is way too young to be burdening him with that.

Thank you Tott, that's what I think.

My sister is one of those people who almost delight in tragedy (from a distance obviously). She's always ringing me to tell me about something terrible happening to someone.

I can imagine how the conversation around the dinner table went

YABU. If he asked questions, what is your sister meant to do? Lie to him?

My 3yo is around when my older children are asking questions about 'big' things - if she can't cope with it, she switches off or goes off and plays. Children are way better than we realise at regulating the information they are exposed to.

My DDs (6 and 5), for instance, initiated a big conversation about Hitler recently. It got quite deep - onto the reasons for the Holocaust, although not the atrocities themselves. I only answered questions - didn't give them any more information. They abruptly and skillfully then showed me very clearly they'd had enough information to cope with at the time by asking what I meant by 'evil' when I described Hitler. I said 'like wicked'. They knew I'd been talking about killing people just because you didn't like them (although not in those words...can't remember exactly what was said, but it was honest and no euphemisms) but the 5yo said 'wicked like cutting down all the trees so we wouldn't be able to climb them' and the 6yo said 'and then there'd be no apples or oranges, and there'd be nowhere for the little squirrels to scamper about'. They'd brought the conversation skillfully into their own frame of reference, being ready for the big stuff, but only to a limit. They were in charge.

This isn't the only example I've had of them showing me what they can cope with, and it's pretty big stuff - surprisingly big stuff.

I'm fine with her answering his questions. It was them bringing it up as conversation when he was their for dinner that I object to.

and also there's a world of difference between 5 and 3 in terms of fear and understanding.

However your dds do sound great

YANBU

Bloody hell your DS had years ahead of depressing news stories and knowing the world is actually, a dark place in many ways.

Let him have a few years of blissful ignorance.

I know there's a difference between 5 and 3, but there's no difference when it comes to the ability to self-regulate things.

Maybe I came down to hard - but you know I sometimes feel it's a bit insulting to the billions of children who've had to live through horrific things that we like to try to shield our precious, priveleged, lucky children from what actually goes on in the world. Shit happens and children do need to know that. If it's too much information for him, then he'll switch off. If he gets scared, let him talk about it, or draw it, or whatever. He needs to make sense of it and your job, as a parent, is to help him do that.

Yes, you could ask your sister not to talk about big things in front of him, and I did once ask a children's centre to take down a poster in their loos about rape because children use them, but I do think that you just can't control everything he sees/hears. He might hear it on the radio when you're in the car, or in a shop. Better he learns about these things in the safety of his loving family, than alone and confused.

At 3 MrsWobble? Really?

I really don't think at 3 children need to know 'shit happens'

No they don't 'need' to know it, but you just can't hide it from them completely, so you do what you can to make it cope-able with.

I haven't announced to my DDs about WW2 but they've asked about it through rambling conversations, and have heard/read about it in other ways. I even home educate them so you'd think I'd be able to control even more the information they have, but I can't and I don't think I should.

I don't think I should spell it out to them either, but I'm going to answer questions honestly, and my 3yo is inevitably around when we have these conversations. I trust that she'll either take it in, or switch off if it's too much. Sometimes I hear her singing to herself if we're having a big converstaion in the car.

I think what I'm trying to say is, if the OP tells her sister off, she's going to annoy her. If her sister stops talking about 'big' things around her DS, she still can't stop her DS hearing about 'big' things from other sources, so why risk the upset?