Imaginary Friend

[fblake]

Hi

Does anyone have experience of their DC having an imaginary friend? My DS who is 4 has told me he has one and I would appreciate some insight please as I'm not sure what to make of it.

Thank you 😊

It’s completely normal, healthy and a good way to develop imagination and explore different scenarios.
Not sure you need to handle it really, he’ll grow out of it eventually.

My dd had one called 'big brother ant' aged 3 to 4 ish. Still makes me smile thinking about how she developed this idea. One day I asked her how he was and she said 'he's dead'. Never mentioned him again.

Thanks both, that's reassuring.

I had one for a while when I was little. Think I just outgrew it but it was a way to play and use my imagination I guess.

I have very vague memories of having an imaginary dog friend when I was young - I am now a qualified dog trainer and own my own dog. Who knew 😂😂

My sister had three that went everywhere with her. She is now GP, so you might have a clever cookie on your hands!

My DD when about 4-5 , used to talk about the fun things she did with " the grandfather". She had three grandfathers but it wasn't any of them - he was just a nice man who would play with her at the park, or do a spot of cooking with her. She had a perfectly happy and busy life , friends and family, so " the grandfather" wasn't filling a gap in her life. He was just " there" for a few years. He disappeared when she was about 6, never to be heard of again.

My DD when she was three had an imaginary friend called mouse. Interestingly
mouse was regularly blamed for any untoward behaviour and DD advised me that mouse was now living with her gran now. She spent many a time chatting away to mouse! My DS who is 4 has had an imaginary friend called Eric since he was 3. Although he has also informed me that we are his new family and that his real mum and dad were killed in the forest!

You don’t have to do anything. Just make sure you never sit on him. And if possible restrict him to imaginary food. I speak from bitter experience.

BertrandRussell haha agree. I nearly sat on mouse and my DH was standing in the way of Eric! I didn’t make much deal out of the imaginary friends and let them get on with it

My dd had one called Amanda for a while. She's 17 now and remembers nothing about it.

DD's imaginary friend was called Sophie (I think after listening to The Tiger Who Came To Tea) many times. It was very cute.

Then along came 'The Boys', who she used mostly as an excuse to run away in shops "No, come back boys, naughty boys!"

She grew out of it. Is about to go off to uni. She vaguely remembers Sophie.

In my classroom once, I pulled a y5 boy up for talking when he should have been listening. When I asked who he was talking to, he didn't say anything. His classmates told me he was talking to his imaginary friend.

None of mine had imaginary friends. Bit disappointing. I didn't have one I don't think, but used to talk at length about the 'life I had before' and my 'other parents'.

One of mine had a mouse which went to school in her pocket. She was called Christina, and she was an immense help to dd when she was struggling. As soon as she wasn’t needed any more, she was graphically killed and eaten by a cat. I was really upset!