Lie is perhaps a harsh word to use here. Perhaps deception is better suited. I believe most parents do not intentionally lie to their children, but we all at some point deceive.
Please don’t get your hopes up. This piece will not provide any answers. It won’t even reassure you that always telling the truth or sometimes fibbing (depending on what camp you belong to) is OK. I hardly know myself anymore.
Are there any sweets in the house? Where do babies come from? Can you really tell I need to go to the toilet just by looking at my eyes? Chances are, as a parent, you would’ve responded untruthfully to at least one of these and myriads of other questions.
I always thought it perfectly acceptable to colour the truth somewhat when dealing with my son. To the question where do babies come from, I told my five year old that they came from mummy’s tummy. And stopped. I didn’t elaborate and he seemed satisfied for the time being. I’m expecting him to ask ‘How’ any day now, and I’m not sure if I’m brave enough to go there. But I’ll do my best.
I thought the baby question was going to be challenging! Ha! Like with everything else you can rely on a child to throw you a curve ball when you least expect it.
If you believe in god, stop reading now. You will not understand my dilemma and will just me as a parent. I don’t really care, but I don’t want to cause anyone grief.
I consider myself pretty much an atheist. I feel that I’m not sceptical enough to be a true, fundamentalist atheist, but I’m up there. I discussed religion with my son in the past. I explained the function of places of worship, the various beliefs and the many faces of god. He seemed to have embraced my explanation and would often shrug his shoulders and announce that god did not exist.
Then came the obsession with death (sorry, this story is going somewhere I promise). My son started getting increasingly distressed by the idea of death. Especially his own and mine.
The line between innocent deception and betrayal of one’s principles became blurred when my son asked me about a ‘lifecycle of a human’ (!) and wondered what will happen to him and to me when we die. This is when I crossed the line.
Without insisting that it’s true and pre-empting with ‘some people believe that’, I told my son about souls and that in some religions souls continue to exist after the body is gone.
He seemed happy and I felt uneasy and confused. What am I doing by trying to protect my son from the idea that we simply disappear when we die? Is it a harmless fairytale to ease his worries or am I framing ideas in a way that will influence his spirituality and ideology?
I don’t know, but I’m beginning to feel an ever increasing load of responsibility. Giving kids food and shelter, teaching them to read, write and count – that’s easy! Shaping their minds and helping them discover their own set of values and ethics is a completely different ball game. And what are the true consequences of “small” deceptions?
