The Santa Myth

One Mom Shares Her Views on Santa

By Kelly Burgess

This Christmas will be our last with Santa. Anyway, since my son will be 9 this year, the age my oldest two quit believing, I hope it is the last. If I had it to do all over again, there would have been no Santa in the first place. I never would have perpetuated the myth, because, quite frankly, in the 14 or so years I've had to deal with Santa, he has turned out to be more trouble than he was worth.

For example, last year my son asked for a roller coaster building set. I told him no, explaining that we simply didn't have enough room. He insisted that he didn't mind it in his room, even if it meant his room would be incredibly cramped and finally had the last word when he told me, "Well, then I'll just ask for it from Santa."

This was not the first time I've had to deal with the "Well, I'll ask for it from Santa" reply. My daughter used it when she was younger as well, back in the days when she decided our cozy little suburban home simply wasn't complete without a pony in the backyard.

Fortunately, the excitement of Christmas was always sufficient to squelch any possible disappointment. However, avoiding disappointment and disillusionment, either at Christmas or later, when the child finds out there's no Santa, some experts say, is one reason not to encourage the Santa myth in the first place.

If I did have it to do over, I would have done what my friend Kathleen Ganster did. She told her kids from the very beginning that Santa was a nice myth and nothing more. She's gotten some flack from it, but also a surprising amount of support.

In her case, the decision to nix Santa was part religious – she wanted to keep the focus of Christmas on Christ's birth – and part practical – she didn't want to have to face the type of "Santa will bring me that pony" dilemmas that every parent faces eventually. But she also wanted to avoid the inevitable disappointment that her children would face when they found out she had "lied" to them.

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