Help needed - tooth fairy

It’s fine to tell your children that these things are not true but how did you prevent them from taking the magic away from their friends? Everyone needs a little magic in their lives and it does no harm.

Do they? One of my children would get deeeply upset about bad events, however trivial, in children's books, even though they knew it was a story. The fact that the author had invented a person meant they existed and suffered.

I have yet to hear of a single person whose life was damaged by believing in Father Christmas and the tooth fairy as a child. I speak only of those two fictitious people, so do not extend that argument to other lies parents tell children.

Well, as a child who was only 4 years old, and was told by her nightmare of an older sister that Father Christmas didn't exist, I can assure you that I was devastated and it completely took the magic out of Christmas for me! And when my oldest son no longer believed, (think he was about 8) I told him under no circumstances should he tell his younger brother; bless him, he then proceeded to go right over the top, "oh, I can hear Santa, he's on the roof " etc. Magical days.

When children read books (or are read to) they know this is a story and made up. It is entirely different.

Having been interested in Greek, Roman and Norse (and now Maori) mythology most of my life, I see no good reason to pick on just a few harmless traditions and say they are lies.

No such thing as magic?
So don't read Peter Pan or Alice in Wonderland, in fact ban children's fiction altogether if you want to stick strictly to truth. All cultures have myths and legends and there are good reasons for that.

The modern world runs on lies and myths, one look at any newspaper or TV proves that and if advertisers didn't lie, they'd hardly sell anything, nor politician be voted in.

By all means, when they are old enough, tell them about the Bishop of Myra (ewhat little is known of him) and explain the reason behind Coca-Cola's advertising gimmicks but to sweep all the magic away somehow makes children grow up too quickly and takes the sparkle out of special occasions.

Oh momb how I agree. We never told our children these tales especially about Christmas. We didn’t tell them outright what a load of nonsense Father Christmas is but we just didn’t go along with it either. They also received gifts and had a joyous time at Christmas too.

Callistemon- yes and Father Christmas as well. We feel the reasons for Christmas are wonderful enough without the need to tell children about Father Christmas. Our kids always knew FC was a story. They still had presents etc. We felt it was important to tell our children the truth. My parents were horrified by our approach !!

Just had a conversation with my 10 year old granddaughter who told me that her mum had 'sat her down' and told her there was no such thing as the tooth fairy, or Santa, or the Easter Bunny. I then chatted with her about how difficult it is to describe love, kindness and generosity to young children so that is how the stories have grown to help them understand. Love, kindness and generosity still exist so in a way so does the tooth fairy, Santa and the Easter Bunny even for grown ups. She was happy with this and also quite pleased to have joined the world of grown ups.

Many years ago my youngest came downstairs very grumpy one morning.
"What's the matter with you?" I asked.
"Huh. Still not been I see," he huffed.
"Who's not been?"
"Tooth fairy. Three nights now it's been under my pillow and she's still not been."
"I didn't know you'd lost a tooth, you never said."
"What's it got to do with you?" he asked, still cross.

I snuck upstairs while he ate his breakfast and hid the 20p inside his pillowcase, and told him it must have been there all the time.
Thinking back he must have been of an age to make his own bed and brush his teeth himself for me not to have noticed. I was just amazed he actually still believed ?

And Father Christmas momb?

I'm afraid I think it is awful to tell children untruths about tooth fairies!

Well, if she wakes up and finds the money AND the tooth, you could say that you forgot to leave the lamp/night light/light on for the fairy so she could see where the tooth was; so maybe she couldn't find it, but left the money anyway, as she knew that your granddaughter had lost a tooth! Sorry, but it's all I can think of!

If your DGD finds the tooth, just say the tooth fairy must have dropped it and you will put it on chest of drawers, or mantelpiece where she can get it tomorrow night. then make sure you remove it and dispose of it then.