Hi ladies,
My husband and I have been trying to decide if we will do the whole Santa thing with our kiddo. I read an article awhile ago that stated it's bad to do Santa because it's lying to your children. I can see that. I too initially thought I wouldn't do Santa at all. I'm now reconsidering it because I love the magical spirit it can bring. Plus is a special part of childhood. We are Christian's and do believe Jesus is the main focal point of Christmas. However, I don't want to be those boring parents that took the fun out of it either.
How do you guys feel about it? Would love to hear both sides. Was it personally scarring when you found out Santa wasn't real? Or do you wish your parents did the Santa thing? Should we try to focus more on Jesus instead?
Thanks!! (: š
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26 Replies
Wowā¦ I have the most wonderful memories of Xmas And Santa. Never cared that it was a lieā¦ it is the thought and that magic so Iām grateful to my parents.
I'm glad to hear you had a good experience with it and it wasn't scarring.
My mom never did the Santa thing with me personally, so I have no idea what that is like.
I don't remember how I knew Santa wasn't real, I think it was from school but by 6 I knew Santa wasn't real. I didn't tell my parents, I loved my presents from Santa so I let that play out as long as I could lol. Never have I been angry or upset about my parents "lying" about Santa. I am 41 and when I remember my childhood the magic of Christmas morning is always there, I can remember how excited I was.
I have 2 adult kids and I have always done Santa with them. They have never been angry about it. I'm not sure why anyone would be?
I am not religious but know plenty of people who are and they've never had a problem celebrating religious traditions and Santa at the same time. The two don't contradict each other which is why so many non religious people can celebrate the Santa side of Christmas.
That's amazing that you remember it as a wonderful/magical thing. I love that it's still something you hold dear to your heart ā„ļø
I agree, I don't think they contradict either. I meant that more as if I should skip Santa, and put more effort into making it about Jesus instead.
Thank you for the feedback!
I was 6 or 7 when I found out for sure that Santa wasn't real, I had my suspicions earlier than that though. I was just one of those annoyingly logical kids that didn't take "magic" as a reasonable explanation to perfectly valid questions like "How exactly do reindeer fly without wings?" or "How does Santa have time to go to every kids house?" and "How come that thing Santa left under the Christmas tree was in the car boot 3 weeks ago?"
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In all seriousness though, I have some issues with my parents. Let's just say there's a lot of childhood trauma I'm working through...
Being lied to about Santa isn't even something that occurred to me to be mad about.
I did Santa with my own children, mine were much more willing to simply believe than I was lol - none of them felt betrayed or anything like that when they eventually put two and two together. They actually love being in on the secret for their little cousins now.
I don't think you'd find too many people that hold some resentment or grew to mistrust their parents because they chose to participate in this fairy tale type of tradition.
Santa!!!! Let them have magic when they're so young and believe in it. Don't force it. Don't make it a huge thing. Let Christmas be all of your own traditions. A gift / stocking from Santa is all you need to do and watch him do the rest, it's so fun and cute.
If you are Christian, teach your children about St Nich and how he was such a wonderful man, his kind actions lived on and became immortalised with the story of Santa. It's true, doesn't undermine your religious beliefs and still allows for Santa to be wonderous and fun. My kids looove Santa and the magic of Christmas. They've never believed Santa was actually real. In fact, the only thing my eldest doesn't like about Christmas is hearing kids get sad because they wish they were 'gooder so Santa gave them good gifts like other kids' when in fact they're just not as wealthy or not as spoilt.
My sister in law was raised to believe Santa was real. When she found out it was a lie she was so distressed she had to be sent home from school and then ran away from home. She then hated Christmas for years. I always found that so sad and can't for the life of me understand why she is so adamant her kids don't find out. Why not just make it a fun story from the beginning? Gosh, it's not like we go out of our way to trick our kids into thinking the Easter bunny is real, or that the dead really come back on Halloween!
I wish I never did Santa for my children. They have just as much fun opening up gifts from mum & dad!
My children havenāt found out yet but if I could turn back time I wouldnāt have started it. We only did Santa because it was the done thing in all our families.
I can remember feeling embarrassed when I found out he wasnāt real at 9 years old. I couldnāt believe my parents had tricked me and I had believed stories like my brother seeing reindeer on the roof. My older siblings were apparently very upset when they found out. Of course we all got over though, and still enjoyed Christmas.
But having kids of my own has made me feel very uncomfortable about lying. I canāt find joy in their excitement about Santa because I feel very guilty and know one day I will have to tell them the truth and let down their sweet little hearts.
My husband and I try not to mention Santa very much at all. Most presents are from us and Santa only brings a few. We never say āSanta is comingā. We always say Christmas is coming. We really just try not to mention Santa unless the kids do.
We werenāt going to do the whole Santa thing after reading similar articles.
However, seeing the way my kids react to seeing Santa in the shops and Christmas decorations has 100% changed my view. They believe in the magic of it and it brings them SO much joy.
We explain that the Santa at the shops is just someone who helps him and pretends he is Santa but isnāt really.
When I found out Santa wasnāt real I didnāt care at all, it wasnāt about the presents āheā gave and was all about the time we spent at Christmas time enjoying it. I looked so forward to Christmas Day where we spent time with our extended family!
Thank you for this! Glad to hear someone else had similar struggles with deciding whether or not to do it. I think my mind is made on doing Santa for at least a couple years for her! I think it will be fun and we just won't play it up so much that she's hurt when she finds out.
We had made our mind up and werenāt doing Santa at all š but the kids had other plans. Itās made it so magical, my eldest is 4 and he was SO excited for Christmas all year, heās been counting it down and asking every day about it. Heās asked questions about how Santa will get into our house, how he knows whether heās been bad or good and I try to answer them in a way that makes us help him - we will open the door for him when the kids are asleep, we are in charge of keeping an eye on them to know whether theyāve been bad or good etc. so I am not giving Santa a heap of credit.
So are you not going to let them see a magic show cause itās a lie?
Watch a movie? Nope canāt watch it because itās not real.
No dress ups for you.
I certainly wasnāt crushed by the fact Santa wasnāt real. Itās a beautiful fun, make believe.
As a tween I enjoyed the privilege of playing along so younger children got the magical experience.
I think a lot depends on how you handle Santa. My parents did the Santa thing, but never forced he is real upon us. If we questioned why there were so many Santaās we were encouraged to explore thoughts on that, not shut down. If we questioned how he could deliver parcels everywhere, we were encouraged to think that through.
So while we believed in Santa, we were encouraged to think critically.
We were never told if we didnāt believe we wouldnāt receive.
Oooh I love that! That's a great idea. Takes away the need to lie too, which is something I have a hard time coming to terms with!! I love that they had you think for yourself!!
It's good to keep traditions.
If you have birthday parties and consider hiring a magician... are you going to stand and tell all the kids "he is lying, that bunny was in his hat the whole time, he didn't just pull it out of thin air" and ruin it for all the guests just because you don't want to lie to your child?
Having traditions keeps cultures a live. My mother use to put 2$ coins in our stockings with an orange. The Irish were broke and oranges with a gold coin meant wealth. Oranges were a treat and pretty hard to get especially before you has refrigerated transport. Chocolate gold coins replaced actual coins given. It all describes origins of stockings and this sort of thing online.
Santa is also St Nicholas who was known for his kindness and generosity. Before you started paying 50$ per package to sit on the lap of a shopping centre Santa, St Nicholas was the patron saint of children and sailors just like St Christopher was the patron saint of travellers.
These are essentially dying traditions which of course you have the right to decide what to do with. But pick your battles and consequences. There's lying and then there's lying.
I just feel like that's comparing apples to oranges. Kids don't typically ask "is this magic trick real?" And then the parents lie for years that it is, they usually just believe it. Also, I think the reason why some kids take finding out about Santa so badly is because they become attached to Santa, and the idea that someone out there loves them so much they remember to bring toys every year. I don't like the idea of lying to my kids because I want them to always trust me and the things I say. That is where the concern comes from. Could I be a little extreme, of course and I do think we'll do Santa for at least a few years, but once she starts really investigating I'm not going to go to the extremes to make her believe in it.
I have a relative who's kids believed in Santa well into their teens, the reason for that is because my relative went to extreme (and in my opinion, damaging) measures to keep that belief alive.
I'm talking things like photo shopping Santa into pictures of their living room, shaping snowy footprints on the floor, having someone call them on the phone as Santa and other similar things to create proof of his existence whenever their belief was faltering.
I recall it causing those kids quite a bit of grief at school because everyone else knew what was up and kept trying to explain it to them but they felt like that was a sick joke because they'd seen proof so it had to be real. That must've been so confusing!
That level of Santa is unhealthy and traumatic, the humiliation they went through will probably stay with them for life.
Having said that, I think there's a way to incorporate Santa as a make believe or imaginary construct, similar to mermaids and unicorns and dragons. Sort of in a way that you know they aren't real but it's fun to pretend anyway. You could do that by teaching her about the origin story of St Nick and how grown ups like to carry that tradition on by pretending to be Santa to share the love to children etc.
Your own small traditions may come about that way too, traditions that can stay into her adult years if you wanted to. My nan still gives me a little treat from Santa, it always makes me smile.
My kids have all outgrown that stage now but if I were ever to have more kids, that's probably the route I'd take.
Oh my goodness! That's wild! I can't believe your relative went to such great lengths to do so. I'm sure it was hard on the kids when they looked back on all the times they had defended Santa, not knowing they had been fooledš¢.
I love what you mentioned as how I can keep it magical while also keeping it at a distant. That's a great point. I agree that traditions are super important to carry on. I will be keeping that in mind, thank you for sharing!!(:
I've done all that with my kids because there is an app lol. Nice and simple. Those footprints? Just flour or fake snow š¤£ I can guarantee that the older kids would completely said that they believed in Santa to get presents. I did the same with my mum abd now as a 40yo, we just laugh about crazy old days.
My 9 yo caught on to Santa but is keeping the magic alive for 4yo. Its fun and games and I'm not even Christian š¤£š¤£ for us Christmas has nothing to do with religion at all as we are a multicultural family and just get together one day to see each other and have fun. My kids have no idea who Jesus is apart from being some guy from long ago š¤·āāļø.
There wouldn't be one person out there that is mad at their parents for lying to them about Santa.
I also can't see how it would hurt them in any way? Apart from maybe disappointment when they find out he's not real.
Just enjoy the magic and joy it brings.
If you go through the replies in this comment section, you might be surprised. I personally know a couple kids that were absolutely heartbroken by it.
Yep. Lots of adults still refer to it as traumatic. My mum included. So Santa was always just a fun story for us, not real. I still loooved him and continue to find Christmas magical. I personally think trying to trick kids is cruel and stupid. The magic of Christmas is only affected by deception. If you don't lie in the first place, the hype and delight is never impacted. I even wrote letters asking to be an elf knowing he wasn't real
We do Santa. My eldest son has mentioned that some of his friends no longer believe. I donāt lie to him by saying heās real. Instead I say that its up to him wether or not he believes. He says that he still believes and I tell him thatās ok. When he comes to me and says he no longer believes then Iāll share the magic with him. To us itās a bit of magic which my kids enjoy. Both of my boys understand that Christmas is still an expensive time of the year and that we, as parents pay for a lot of the presents and that Santa doesnāt pay for them all. You can create your own traditions around Santa, if you choose to do it š
Weāre also not religious but my boys understand that Christmas is actually based around religion technically. You can focus around Jesus and still do Santa š
I always asked my kids when they asked if santa was real, "do you want to believe in Santa" if they said yes, then we kept going. Neither have hated me, in fact my older daughter goes absolutely overboard with christmas spirit, she was the one moving the elf, and making sure the cookies and carrot and milk were out. And thats AFTER she decided santa wasn't real, because "Santa is real in the magic of christmas"
OP- I'm not sure why many felt very angered by my question (mainly on FB)... plus the few people that felt the need to demean my religion was gross & wrong. This should be a safe place to share or ask questions-
I didn't think anything I said was rude or wrong. I also wasn't trying to say people were "lying" to their kids by doing Santa. I was simply repeating what the article said.
Both of our parents didn't do Santa so we didn't know how it felt as a child to experience Santa. I personally have heard of some kids getting very hurt and sad, when finding out Santa wasn't real. So We wanted to hear other parent's experiences on it, and if it was something they were glad they did. To say "I've never heard of anyone getting traumatized finding out Santa" doesn't mean it never happens...