Imaginary friends

[claudeekishi]

If your toddler had/has an imaginary friend, how did you 'interact' with him/her? Our toddler has one (it has a name, and she uses her right hand to make it 'talk' a bit like the kid in the Shining ) and she bosses it around natters away to it a lot, when playing or going to sleep. Am I right in thinking we should be sort of benignly ignoring it rather than asking her questions? I sort of feel that if we make too much of it it could turn into a bigger thing and frighten her -- she's still very young, turned 2 last week.

I'd leave her to it, it's her friend after all!

If she talks about it, don't ignore it (say things like "oh, that's nice" etc), but it's best if she figures things out rather than you "steering" her imagination.

does that make sense?

and happy birthday to her!

I recently saw a psychologist for various reasons of my own.

He asked me if I had imaginary friends when I was young. Yes, yes I did I had several & I played happily with them

Statistics state that children who have imaginary friends grow up as very capable, stable, secure adults as they have used imaginary friends as a tool to cope & handle life (trust me I was amazed at this!)

My point is, it's a positive! Don't make a thing of it either way IMO.

I can even remember their names & what they looked like ..... now how is that for imagination

I had an imaginary friend who lived in the hoover when I was small. I chatted to him loads, he had a name. My mum used to think it was odd! I am perfectly normal now though! Albeit slightly silly and love making up stuff about fluffy creatures being real etc for my DC. Sure it'll be fine. Shows great imagination in my opinion. I would go along with it and ask how imaginary friend is and what they've been doing etc.

I really don't see the harm in going along with it, my mum used to set a place at the table for my sisters friend (a squirrel).

I miss DD's pack of imaginary dogs. We used to have fu wait for her to gather them all up on walks and then they'd all run off again. Sometimes she'd get upset when they wouldn't obey her.

They left us the day her baby brother was born. 18 months later, she doesn't remember their names!

Your DD sounds lovely. I like the talking hand!

Thanks all!

Yes Zing, my only slight concern was that we would end up 'steering' the development of the imaginary friend and we don't want to do that. It is funny to hear her though! The stories are all great, love the squirrel and the pack of dogs :)

My DD2's imaginary animals and friends used to accompany us everywhere. I didn't used to tell her they didn't exist but I also didn't put their seatbelts on or set them places at the table which made me a very nasty person in her eyes because I wanted to help her keep tabs on the boundary between fantasy and reality.

I had one. He was ace