December 22, 2025 • 41 mins
In this throwback episode, Jon takes on the Santa question: the moment every parent eventually faces when wonder collides with honesty. Framed around the tension between magic and trust, he explores how Santa works in a child’s developing brain and why the real issue isn’t whether Santa is “real,” but how we show up when kids ask big questions. Parents will walk away with clarity, compassion, and practical ways to navigate Santa conversations in a way that protects imagination, emotional safety, and the parent-child relationship.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_05 (00:01):
Welcome to the Whole Parent Podcast.
This is John.
Before we get started today, Iwanted to give you a quick note.
This episode is a rerun.
We first aired it last yearduring the holidays, and it's
about Santa Claus and thesurprisingly complicated
questions that he brings withhim.
I decided to replay it becauseevery year around this time, the
(00:23):
same moment keeps happening inhomes everywhere.
It's a quiet room, a parentmid-thought, a child asking a
question that sounds simple, butit really isn't.
Is Santa real?
This episode really isn't aboutSanta.
It's about trust andimagination, about what kids are
really asking when they ask thebig questions and what it costs
(00:46):
us as parents to answer themhonestly and carefully at the
same time.
If you're listening with littleones around, just a heads up,
this episode talks openly aboutSanta.
And so you may want to save itto listen yourself later.
And another couple of things,first or second, or maybe third
(01:07):
at this point.
The episode is recorded before Ihad the equipment that I have
now.
So the audio is a little iffy.
I also back then tended to makethe music a little loud, so it
might help to listen onheadphones.
Again, it's about Santa, somaybe it's a good idea to listen
about on headphones anyway.
But yeah, I hope you enjoy it.
(01:29):
Here it is.
The Santa controversy from theWhole Parent podcast.
It's a crisp December evening,and you're sitting by the fire
with your kids.
The tree is twinkling, thestockings are hanging neatly.
We have six this year.
It's a lot.
Your kids are carefully settingout cookies for Santa because
it's Christmas Eve.
(01:50):
There's that magic feeling inthe air, the kind of magic that
all makes us feel like kidsagain.
And then, from across the room,you hear the words that you have
been dreading since your childwas born.
Is Santa real?
In that moment, time freezes.
You glance at your partner,you're caught in this silent
parental game of chicken.
(02:11):
Who's gonna take this one?
For generations, the story ofSanta has been this pillar of a
magical childhood.
The idea of this jolly old elfwho travels the whole world
every single Christmas, fueledby cookies and goodwill.
But the magic also comes withquestions.
What do we do when our kidsstart wondering if it's true?
(02:31):
What happens when theirwide-eyed wonder gives way to
skepticism?
How do we strike a balancebetween nurturing an imagination
and a childhood and staying trueto values?
Today on the Whole ParentPodcast, we're diving into the
great Santa controversy.
Is it okay to lie to your kidsabout Santa?
We'll explore the psychology ofwhy kids believe the moment they
(02:52):
start to doubt, and how younavigate those tricky questions
in a way that honors theirwonder without compromising
their trust.
Because at the end of the day,it's not really about Santa,
it's about how we show up forour kids.
When the questions are big, whenthe answers aren't easy, and the
stakes feel impossibly high.
I'm John.
Today we're talking about SantaClaus, why he matters, how we
(03:14):
can talk about him, and why hisstory, like parenting itself, is
more about a journey than anydestination.
So this year so far, we've beenwatching some Christmas movies,
maybe fewer than in years past.
I think we got kind of burnedout on them, but we did watch
(03:34):
The Santa Claus with my oldest.
It's a story about a guy namedScott Calvin.
He's this workaholic toyexecutive, he's played by Tim
Allen, and he is doing the bareminimum parenting for his son
Charlie.
He reluctantly takes him onChristmas Eve, and everything
just goes terribly.
He burns the turkey, they haveto go out to eat.
He doesn't know how to talk toCharlie when they're sitting
(03:56):
there, it's awkward.
There's this general vibe oflike when is this gonna be over?
And then something trulyunexpected happens.
Scott accidentally kills SantaClaus in front of his son.
I'm paraphrasing, but that'swhat happens, right?
He yells at Santa when he's onhis roof, Santa falls off his
roof and plunges to his doom.
(04:17):
Now you might think as a logicaladult that maybe Scott, this
very grown-up, very matureexecutive, is going to call 911,
maybe check to see if Santa'sokay, but no, not Scott Calvin.
He is going to put on the suitof the man that he has just
killed, because apparently whenyou kill Santa, that is what you
are expected to do.
(04:39):
What Scott doesn't realize isthat this small act is going to
have massive implications forhim.
You see, there is a clause, aSanta clause, get it
C-L-A-U-S-E, and it's written inmicroscopic legal language that
binds him to being Santa as hisjob for the rest of his life.
Because that's the real powerand magic of a well-written
(05:01):
contract.
Charlie and Scott spend the restof the night delivering
presents, doing Santa's job.
Eventually they wind up at theNorth Pole where they learn the
extent of this contract,including that Scott is now
officially Santa.
It's a fun movie.
I found myself enjoying it likeI did probably when I was a
little kid.
But I really found myself doingsomething that I'd never done
before, which is empathize withthe villain of the movie, the
(05:23):
antagonist.
His name is Neil.
He's Charlie's stepdad.
He's a psychiatrist who wearsthese horrible sweaters and
whose primary fault seems to bethe fact that he is deeply
troubled that Charlie's beliefsin Santa go way beyond what's
normal.
Charlie doesn't just believe inSanta, he said that his dad is
the real Santa.
And if we take this outside thecontext of the movie, you can
(05:45):
see how a psychiatrist wouldprobably be pretty unnerved by
this.
Neil is even more concerned thatScott, a man who Neil has been
nothing but nice to so far inthe movie, although a little
patronizing, if we'll admit, isfeeding into this delusion.
For context, the magic of thiscontract is transforming Scott
into Santa.
(06:05):
But what Neil sees is this adultthat's going to these extreme
lengths, putting on hundreds ofpounds, growing this massive
beard, changing his hair colorto manipulate this vulnerable
and confused child of divorce.
I have to admit, like I have areally hard time hating Neil.
And for that matter, you know,Charlie's mom.
I could keep going on aboutthis, but really what they seem
(06:28):
to be struggling with issomething that I very much so
empathize with, which is how dowe talk to our kids about these
sort of magical things?
What do we tell our kids aboutSanta?
Let's start by acknowledging theelephant in the room that Santa
is a really big deal.
For many families, Santa is thisfigure who represents joy and
magic and the spirit of giving.
(06:49):
And for others, the idea ofSanta feels just kind of
dishonest.
Just I can't lie to my kids thatway.
And I've walked that struggle,right?
Like it feels kind of at oddswith your values of trying to
instill honesty and transparencywith your kids, perpetuating
this myth.
And that kind of leads us to thereality, which is the reason
Santa is so controversial isthat it's really hard to take a
(07:12):
neutral approach to Santa.
Kids are going to ask you reallypointed questions, and at
different times it can be reallyhard to know what to say.
How does Santa get to everyhouse in one night?
Why does Santa have differenthandwriting or use different
wrapping paper at one friend'shouse or another?
Why did my friend get thislarger, bigger thing than my
other friend who has less money?
(07:32):
Doesn't Santa, you know, haveunlimited resources to be able
to give every kid what they areasking for?
And eventually it leads to thiskind of fundamental question,
that one that I talked about inthat setting of the scene on
Christmas Eve, and that's thebig one, you know, is Santa
real?
So how do we answer thesequestions without crushing the
magic or compromising our kids'childhood or anything like that,
(07:55):
or our integrity as parents?
First, I think it's reallyimportant that we answer the
question or at least ask thequestion why kids are so drawn
to Santa?
Why are parents so drawn toSanta?
Why do kids find it so easy tobelieve this?
And if you're going to askchildhood development
(08:16):
specialists, they're going tohighlight that before about the
age of seven, kids live in whatwe might think of as this kind
of magical way of seeing theworld.
Just take, for example, youknow, when we think about magic
and ask these fundamentalquestions, we are doing so from
a place where we understand howthings work.
(08:37):
And so when something like SantaClaus, which clearly doesn't
work, comes up, it competes withour views of other things that
do work.
Whereas for our kids, they livein a world that they don't
really fundamentally understandbefore the age of seven.
They don't know how an elevator,you know, doors open and how
it's hydraulically or whatever,pulley system to move it up and
(08:59):
down.
I don't even know really howelevators work.
I just know that they kind ofdo.
They don't really understand howcars work.
They just kind of, you know, youpress a pedal and then they
move.
They don't understand internalcombustion engines or electric
engines or whatever.
And so because of this, they arejust kind of wired to be open to
magic and wonder andimagination.
(09:20):
So they're not just believing inSanta because we tell them to.
They're believing because italigns with the way that they're
really processing everything inthe world.
Santa's story for them just kindof feels normal.
It feeds into their sense ofwonder that they're experiencing
all over the place, and it givesthem some frameworks for some
positive considerations.
Concepts like generosity andkindness and even delayed
(09:44):
gratification.
And that's that's the positiveside of Santa, if we're being
honest.
Waiting for Christmas morningteaches patience, it teaches
tolerance of emotions.
Writing letters to Santa is thisreflective process.
It allows us to even participatein some gratitude.
(10:06):
You're leaving out cookies,that's a lesson in hospitality
and generosity and doingsomething for others.
And so Santa's not all bad.
In fact, during this 2016interview that I was able to
find with the Wall StreetJournal, developmental
psychologist and best-sellingparenting author, also podcast
host of my favorite parentingpodcast, Raising Good Humans,
(10:26):
Aliza Pressman, who, by the way,herself is Jewish, so she has no
vested interest in this Santaquestion, said to the Wall
Street Journal that it's notonly acceptable for us to
perpetuate the myth of Santa inkids under the age of seven, it
actually can be beneficial tohelping them develop this rich
imaginary life.
She goes on to talk about howkids are learning all the time
(10:48):
through imagination.
This is how they're doingperspective taking and
developing moral reasoning.
It's something I talk aboutextensively in my book, that we
utilize and leverage theirimagination to teach them the
life skills.
And that traditions have beendoing this forever, not just the
Santa Claus tradition, buttraditions going back to
indigenous communities forthousands of years.
So participating in the Santamyth with your four-year-old is
(11:11):
probably not as harmful as someof the people who are on the
extreme, I will never lie to mykids' side, are maybe forwarding
that it is.
But it also can depend on thekid, and that's an important
consideration.
And really what this all bringsus to is the central question
that we have to ask ourselveswhen we're considering this
whole Santa thing, which isreally the central question that
(11:33):
we have to ask ourselveswhenever we're talking to our
kids.
And it's why are we doing whatwe're doing?
What are we getting out of it?
Is it for our kids?
Is it only for our kids?
Is it for both us and our kids?
Who is this Santa myth actuallyfor?
It's complicated.
(11:58):
I think one thing that kind ofgets to this is this interesting
phenomenon where kids pretend,and I don't know the statistics
on this, but I have heard thisin multiple different interviews
with parents.
I watched so many interviews,read so many interviews about
Santa from developmental childexperts.
And one of the things that oftenthey will point to, again, I
(12:20):
don't know the percentage ofkids who do this, is that at
some point kids will actuallylearn that Santa's not real from
school or from a friend, ormaybe they will just, you know,
kind of logic it out forthemselves and they'll stop
believing, or maybe they, youknow, saw it on a show or
something.
And they will actually lie andpretend to believe that Santa's
(12:43):
real for the benefit of theirparents.
And when they're asked aboutthis, you know, it's not just
like they're saying, oh yeah,well, I like the presents.
I'm gonna keep pretending sothat I can keep getting the
presents.
These kids will actually comeright out and say, no, you know,
my mom or my dad really lovesthis Santa thing.
They love that I believe in it.
And so like I just kind of do itfor them.
And so I think we often tellourselves that Santa is only for
(13:06):
our kids.
It's to keep their childhoodmagical.
I think the truth is often morecomplicated.
And I think our kids evensometimes will know that.
And then there's the other kindof issues with Santa that we
often don't really consider,that are really not for the
benefit of our kids.
I think about specificallySanta's omnipotence, and now he
(13:30):
has spies to assist in thatomnipotence.
Um, we call them the elves onthe shelf, right?
And they're the the these aretools of behavior modification
for parents and have been fordecades.
The holidays, the winter break,like these are dysregulating
times for kids.
We have holiday parties andfamily gatherings.
(13:50):
Parents can, you know, that canbring up some childhood stuff
for us.
We we don't often parent ourbest in front of our families.
Obviously, there's someuncomfortable clothing, itchy
sweaters, all of that, at leastfor my childhood, and just
generally way too much sugar.
We're missing bedtime, we're outafter dark.
And this just means that kidsare out of routine during this
time of year.
(14:10):
And so it's nice for manyparents to have a way of sort of
mitigating those tantrums andthose meltdowns.
And that's, I think, the kind ofuncomfortable part of Santa that
that we do need to touch onbefore we keep going with just
the do we believe, do we notbelieve?
And that's the part of the Santamyth where Santa becomes the
(14:32):
bribe or the threat that keepskids doing what we want them to
do rather than, you know, doingthe things we don't want them to
do, misbehaving, havingtantrums, meltdowns, whatever,
when they're in less than idealscenarios.
I have a story about this.
It actually just happened to meyesterday.
I'm recording this in Decemberof 2024.
(14:53):
And we went to the library, butnot our local library because
it's currently underconstruction.
We went to the one in the town,the next town over, and I go
there often with my middle kids.
So I have a four-year-old, Ihave an almost three-year-old,
and then I have aneight-year-old and a
two-month-old.
And the four-year-old and thethree-year-old are the ones who
(15:13):
are with me in the morning whiletheir brother is at forest
school.
And we go to this local libraryand we're playing in their play
area, and they both reach forthe same place piece at the same
time.
They're playing with the libraryLegos.
And they both reach for the samepiece, and then they both
proceeded to kind of let eachother know that they wanted it.
(15:33):
Now, nobody laid hands on eachother, but they both expressed
their displeasure, let's say, toone another.
And this is totally normal,right?
Sharing is difficult, especiallywith siblings.
And a librarian walked over andsaid to them, she intervened,
which was a little strangebecause I was sitting right
there.
Usually you don't see adults dothis, but she felt empowered to
(15:56):
come over and say, you know, weneed to share and we need to be
nice to each other at thelibrary, especially this time of
year.
And this, in my view, is justlike the highlight of, and I
don't mean to, you know, thislibrarian was had the best of
intentions, and she's justoperating from her worldview
too.
Like I'm not knocking her atall.
But this is the gross underbellyof the Santa myth, right?
(16:18):
The way that we use kids' senseof magic and wonder to gain
compliance and to try andincentivize good behavior.
You're being watched.
You know, he knows when you'resleeping, he knows when you're
awake.
You better be good.
And I would argue that if we aregoing to choose to participate
in this Santa myth with ourkids, at the very least, that
(16:38):
part of it, what I call thenaughty and nice list part of
it, we should deconstruct andget rid of.
Now, I don't think you have toget rid of the entire myth then.
I'm saying that the part of themyth that is used primarily as
behavior modification isproblematic no matter how old
your kids are and how you'reutilizing that.
(17:00):
And the reason I say this isbecause home really needs to be
a safe place for kids to expresstheir big feelings when they
have bad days.
And it cannot be a place wherethere are elves narking on them
because they got too hungry, orbecause they had trouble
sharing, or because they had abad day at school and they just
let off some steam.
And that kind of goes, and evenif you don't do the elves, you
know, the narking elves, youalso need to yourself be a safe
(17:25):
person.
The number of times I've been inthe grocery store or or we've
been walking by the toy aisle,and you've you hear a parent say
something like, Well, I'm gonnatell Santa that you are X, Y, Z
right now.
We need to be safe too.
And our kids need to know thatwe can be people who they can
bring their problems to.
The world is not a place whereour mess, our kids' mess, is
(17:46):
always going to be welcome.
And so that it needs to bewelcome in our home.
Like that's the basis of secureattachment.
As Eli Harwood, attachmentexpert, says, uh, you have to
give kids a safe home base.
Like when you're playing tag andthere's like a home base where a
kid can go and be safe frombeing tagged, like that has to
be home.
And you can't have that place bea place where they're constantly
(18:10):
being watched and assessed andmonitored.
And immediately, by the way,this was my son's, my oldest's
aversion to Santa and Elf on ashelf.
Like, immediately he was like,What do you mean this thing is
watching me?
I am not okay with that.
(20:34):
And even if it's not theremoval, by the way, of
presents, like, oh, if youaren't good, I'm gonna you're
gonna not gonna get anypresents.
Even if it's the reward side,the other side of this coin, we
still have the question (20:47):
should we be using rewards like
presents from Santa andChristmas to incentivize good
behavior?
I actually have a snippet herethat I'm gonna play from an
interview that I did for anupcoming episode of the podcast.
It'll be later on in thisseason, from Alfie Cohn, who
wrote a book called Punished byRewards.
But anyway, this is this is histake on rewards with kids.
SPEAKER_00 (21:11):
Studies have continued to show that children
who are frequently rewarded orpraised by their parents tend to
be less generous and caring thanother kids.
You might lose the behavior ofgetting them to do something.
(21:32):
But now the point is to see thatactivity as a means to an end.
SPEAKER_05 (21:41):
I want to stop here for a moment and ask you if
you're enjoying this episode ofthe Whole Parent Podcast, to
subscribe wherever you'relistening, to rate this episode
and review the podcast.
I read every single reviewmyself.
They are what keep me going.
And I I want you to go and doone extra thing for me here, and
that's to share it with at leastthree friends in your life.
(22:02):
Uh, you can share it on socialmedia, I think that that's
great, but I want you toactually send this episode to
three people in your life.
Who have kids between the agesof three and ten and say, hey,
check this out, especially yourfriends maybe who have already
talked about this.
Are we doing Santa?
Are you not doing Santa?
And send it to them.
You have no idea how much ithelps, not only me to grow the
(22:24):
podcast, to get more listeners,to keep us going, doing this
thing, but also how it how ithelps people.
You don't know what's helping.
And you can just point to thisepisode, this part in the
episode, after you share it withthem.
And if they say, you know, wait,do you think I'm a bad parent?
Why are you sharing this withme?
You just say, no, no, no.
He just told me I had to shareit, and so I'm just doing what
I'm supposed to do it, you know.
(22:44):
And if you don't do it, I wantyou to know Santa Claus is
watching you, and you're gonnaget coal in your stocking for
Christmas if you don't sharethis with three people.
Also, if you're looking to startthe new year off parenting
better, consider pre-ordering mybook, Punishment Free Parenting,
The Brain-based Way to RaiseKids Without Raising Your Voice.
It's available at the link inthe description, as well as
wherever books are sold.
And it's also available onaudiobook.
(23:06):
So if you like this episode,where I'm kind of doing episodes
a little differently, if youdidn't know that this season,
I'm doing them more similarly tothe way that I wrote the book
and the audiobook.
So chances are if you like thisepisode, you're gonna love the
book.
Okay, speaking of the episode,let's get back to it.
How do you handle thatinevitable moment when your kid
(23:27):
looks you in the eye and asksyou for real, you know, is Santa
real?
I'm gonna give you threeapproaches that I think you can
take depending on your child'sage and personality.
The first one is kind of theclassic way of talking to kids
about Santa, and that's to frameSanta as a symbol.
This works better for olderkids, you know, seven or older.
(23:48):
And this is where you saysomething to the extent of like,
Santa is real in the sense thathe represents the spirit of
Christmas or giving or kindness,and grown-ups get to take on
that role to keep that magicalive for kids.
Now you're old enough, you getto be part of that tradition
too.
You get to be Santa.
And this approach does somethingthat's really cool.
(24:09):
It empowers kids to graduateinto the role of Santa, which
we're going to talk about herein a moment, is a really helpful
balancing point for thatdisappointment that Santa is not
real.
And especially with oldersiblings, it can help them feel
more empowered, like they'recontributing to these acts of
kindness, helping the youngersiblings.
The second way to answer this isto answer the question with a
(24:31):
question this is what I woulduse with younger kids.
So if your child's asking youabout Santa, but you think you
know they really want you tojust validate that, you know,
Santa is real, you just respondby saying, Well, what do you
think?
And this gives them a windowinto their own thought processes
and allows you to kind of gaugehow much information they're
(24:51):
ready for.
This can often just lead them totell you everything that they
think about Santa Claus, whichmight be the reason that they
were asking you in the firstplace, is just to kind of bounce
it off of you.
And at the end, you can you canvalidate that.
You don't have to then say,like, you know, oh, well, that's
not true.
Like you can just kind of say,oh, that's that's really cool.
Thank you for telling me that.
(25:12):
Uh the last way is what I usefor more logical kids.
And this is just to give themit's uh what I call the it's
pretend answer.
And it goes something like this: you say, Santa is not a person (25:22):
undefined
who lives at the North Pole.
This is for the kids who areasking all of the technical
questions, you know, about timetravel.
If you're if you're getting intoquantum mechanics to explain
Santa Claus, like at this point,we're probably past the point
where we should have had theit's pretend conversation.
So you say, you know, Santa isnot a person who lives at the
(25:44):
North Pole, but the story ofSanta is something that
families, as grown-ups, like topretend.
And it's fun to pretendsometimes.
And so you can pretend alongwith us.
And this last approach, the it'spretend approach, is the one
that Fred Rogers used in hisvery infamous 1973 episode of
(26:06):
Mr.
Rogers Neighborhood called IsSanta Claus Real?
It's hard to imagine now thatthat that show was ever
considered controversial, butthere are actually a handful of
episodes of Mr.
Rogers Neighborhood that wereincredibly controversial.
Some of them so much so that youcan't even watch them.
I can't find them anywhere.
There's a whole week in the1980s where he talks about
(26:28):
nuclear weapons and disarmament.
I mean, like he Fred really uhwas pretty radical in many
respects.
But in this, you know, 1973 isSanta Claus Real episode, he
effectively tells kids at theend, no, Santa is is just
pretend.
And it's remembered for thatmoment when he admits that at
(26:49):
the end, and then he sings thissong about pretending.
But it also features what Ithink is one of the best
children's most poignant uhconversations about Santa in the
make-believe world.
So in make believe world, ifyou're familiar with the show,
this is where Daniel Tigerlives, this is where the puppets
live, and uh Daniel Tiger inthis case is is concerned.
SPEAKER_02 (27:11):
Santa Claus is coming to the neighborhood of
make-believe.
Santa Claus?
What's he gonna do to us?
Oh, well, I imagine it will besomething good.
Oh, I try to be good, but I'mnot always good.
I think I'm afraid of SantaClaus.
I wish he weren't coming here.
SPEAKER_05 (27:31):
Daniel basically says, like, he doesn't want
Santa to come because Santa iswatching him while he's
sleeping, and Daniel knows hehasn't always been good.
To which Santa, who is beingplayed by one of the kind of
regulars on the show, somethingthat Mr.
Rogers is going to point outlater when they talk about the
land of make-believe, that itwas just a person in a costume.
(27:53):
Santa says, you know, I I'm noteven always good.
SPEAKER_02 (27:57):
I am Daniel Striper Tiger, and I'm not always good.
SPEAKER_01 (28:01):
Well, I'm Santa Claus, and I'm not always good
either.
SPEAKER_05 (28:05):
And that he Santa has this line.
I I can just imagine Fredwriting it.
SPEAKER_01 (28:10):
You aren't?
Of course not.
Good people aren't always good.
They just try to be.
SPEAKER_05 (28:16):
By the end of the episode, I think it's kind of
inescapable that Fred is gonnahas kind of put on a masterclass
in how you can effectively andethically talk to kids about
Santa.
But I'm telling you, parents in1973, according to people who
have researched Fred in hislife, they were not, they were
not happy.
They did not feel this way.
(28:37):
They felt like the man that theyhad trusted to teach their kids
about emotions had just hurtthem.
So I think it's important topoint out that the reason they
felt that way, I think, isbecause one of the biggest
reasons that parents will keepup the Santa charade is because
we're afraid of how kids aregonna respond to the truth and
react.
So the next kind of point herethat I want to make is to ask
the question (28:59):
is that fear that our kids are going to be
absolutely devastated bylearning that Santa is not real
grounded in reality for us?
And according to Dr.
Eileen Kennedy Moore, who's thisPhD host of this Kids Ask Doctor
Friendastic podcast, which I hadnever heard of until researching
(29:19):
for this episode, she's shesays, you know, yes, there's
disappointment, but actuallyit's okay.
She's she's phenomenal in thissegment that I that I watched.
She says, Yeah, you know what,there is going to be
disappointment, but it'sactually okay.
Because if they're act at thisage where they're really looking
for answers, then they actuallyneed the honesty.
And that that if they're at theright age to learn this, which
(29:40):
by the way, the right age is notold enough.
It's not too old.
If they're young enough to learnthis, they'll recover quickly.
The disappointment is actuallyalso gonna be balanced out,
according to her, and this iskind of what we were talking
about in that first response, bythe sense of growth and pride of
being trusted with this adultconcept that Santa's not real.
(30:01):
But but what is very clear isthat that happens if you are
able to express that Santa isnot real young enough.
On the other hand, kids who aregonna, you know, by some
miracle, make it to middleschool and still believe in
Santa, they have a much harderroad coming ahead of them.
(30:21):
They face a much biggerbetrayal.
And there are socialimplications.
At some point, it stops beingnaive and imaginative to believe
in this immortal elf who useshis flying reindeer to break
into millions of houses aroundthe world to deliver gifts and
you know, satiate his seeminglybottomless appetite for cookies
and milk.
Uh, at some point it just getsweird.
(30:43):
Like if you have a 12 or13-year-old who believes this,
their friends are not going tosee that as like an endearing
quirk.
They are going to experiencesome social blowback as a result
of expressing that belief topeople in their life.
And finding out about Santa toolate doesn't you're not going to
(31:05):
get the benefit of that pride orthe sense of maturity.
It becomes a point of shame.
So that leads us to kind of thefinal point in this episode,
which is when is the right timeto spill the beans?
And in the view of some parents,some of my listeners, I'm sure,
murder your child's sense ofinnocence and Christmas magic.
I think every parent has toanswer this for themselves.
It can't be too late, as we'vejust highlighted.
(31:27):
But it doesn't, you don't haveto do it when they're four
either.
I think it depends on the kids.
For some kids, Santa is justnever going to work.
And I think parents who press itwhen it doesn't work actually
wind up going to more harm.
This is kind of what happened toDaniel Tiger.
The thought of a person cominginto your house in the middle of
the night, regardless of whatthey're bringing you, can be
(31:48):
unnerving, especially for highlysensitive kids.
For other kids, it's it's someit's that kind of underbelly of
the tradition, the, you know, heknows when you're sleeping, he
knows when you're awake, heknows if you've been bad or
good, so be good for goodnesssake.
That is going to bother a lot ofkids.
And if you are unable to divorcethat from the myth itself, you
may have to kind of end the mythearlier than you might like,
(32:09):
because that's a reallydifficult piece, and a lot of
kids have trouble with that.
That was the piece for my son.
Once he had heard that, he waslike, no way, no ho, no way,
Jose.
For some kids, the tradition isfun and whimsical, and later,
once their brain develops, thefacts catch up with Saint Nick,
and you know, it's a prettynatural, oh yeah, that was just
(32:33):
a for fun thing.
And yes, for for some, you'regonna have to have a hard
conversation that they may notwant to have, but for them, it
is the kinder option thanallowing them to kind of keep
perpetuating in this way.
And one last note on the winhere.
It's not always a clear line forour kids or for us.
(32:55):
Kids often reflect later thatthey knew but they chose to keep
up the charade, but that mightnot even have been a conscious
choice.
For them, the magic was justkind of worth perpetuating.
So, with that in mind, I want toend this episode a little bit
differently.
In our house, we have three boyswho have very different views on
Santa.
I interviewed two of them, andI'm gonna play that for you now.
(33:17):
Okay.
You can start by saying yourname, and yeah, just for people
who are listening, say your nameand say how old you are.
SPEAKER_03 (33:28):
My name is Matt, and I am eight.
SPEAKER_05 (33:31):
Okay, Matt, I have called you here with a really
important set of questions.
My first one, uh, I've alreadykind of told you what we're
gonna talk about, but my firstone is what do you think about
Santa Claus?
SPEAKER_03 (33:45):
Um, I think that I don't think he's real because I
don't like the idea of someonejust sneaking to our house every
year.
SPEAKER_05 (33:55):
What is what do the kids at your school think about
Santa?
SPEAKER_03 (33:58):
Most of him, yes.
About like two percent of themthink that Santa isn't real.
SPEAKER_05 (34:07):
So you're in the minority.
There's not very many people whothink what you think.
SPEAKER_03 (34:12):
Yes.
SPEAKER_05 (34:13):
Uh what do you think about your brothers?
Do you think that your brothersbelieve in Santa, or do you
think that they don't believe inSanta?
SPEAKER_03 (34:19):
I've never asked them.
SPEAKER_05 (34:21):
If you had to guess.
SPEAKER_03 (34:22):
Probably Liam believes in, and Ollie's like,
not so sure.
SPEAKER_05 (34:28):
Can you say your name and how old you are?
SPEAKER_04 (34:34):
Um, what's the name?
Um, my actual name or mynickname.
SPEAKER_05 (34:40):
Whichever one you want.
SPEAKER_04 (34:42):
Okay.
Oliver and four year old.
SPEAKER_05 (34:47):
You're Oliver and you are four years old.
SPEAKER_04 (34:49):
Actually, I'm four and a half year old.
SPEAKER_05 (34:52):
Oliver, who's four and a half years old.
Can you tell me about SantaClaus?
Tell me what you know aboutSanta Claus.
SPEAKER_04 (34:58):
Him him give present to somebody.
SPEAKER_05 (35:01):
He gives presents to people?
Uh, when does he come?
SPEAKER_04 (35:06):
Um, at nighttime.
SPEAKER_05 (35:08):
He comes at nighttime?
What do you think about SantaClaus coming into our house
while we're all sleeping?
SPEAKER_04 (35:13):
Um, how can you get into the house him goes in the
chimney?
SPEAKER_05 (35:19):
Do you think that's okay that he comes in our house
while we're sleeping?
To leave us presents?
SPEAKER_04 (35:24):
What's Yeah?
SPEAKER_05 (35:25):
That doesn't make you nervous or anything.
SPEAKER_04 (35:28):
Well, not because husband goes upstairs.
SPEAKER_05 (35:31):
Oh, because he doesn't go upstairs where we
sleep, so it's okay.
SPEAKER_04 (35:35):
Well, because our tree's not upstairs, it's
downstairs.
SPEAKER_05 (35:40):
He just comes out and he goes to our tree.
SPEAKER_04 (35:43):
Well, and then he puts up presents under the tree.
SPEAKER_05 (35:47):
Nice.
So do you think that it's okaythat grown ups do Santa with
kids, or do you think do youwish that grown-ups didn't do
Santa?
SPEAKER_03 (35:54):
I wish that grown-ups didn't do Santa.
SPEAKER_05 (35:57):
Really?
Why?
SPEAKER_03 (35:59):
Because it's like if you're good you get presents.
If you're bad, you either getcold or nothing.
SPEAKER_05 (36:05):
What if that part of Santa was gone?
So what if we took away the goodand the bad part?
What do you think about Santathen?
SPEAKER_03 (36:14):
A little bit better, but still not the idea of
someone sneaking into yourhouse.
SPEAKER_05 (36:29):
Does he care if kids have been good or bad?
Um or do you think that he justgives presents to everyone?
He's a he just gives presents tothe good people.
SPEAKER_04 (36:45):
Well, I'm I'm a good piss since I say silly things
like the poopy stuff I say.
SPEAKER_05 (36:52):
Yeah, you are a good person.
If we decide to do Santa thisyear with Ollie, are you going
to help us do it, or are yougonna tell him that Santa's not
real?
What do you think?
SPEAKER_04 (37:04):
I'll help him.
SPEAKER_05 (37:05):
Do you think that Map believes in Santa Claus?
SPEAKER_03 (37:07):
What believes is Santa Claus?
I like playing along.
I play along with my friendsnext door all the time.
Like if they see like mom wouldpull in and it was like really
dark, they would think, oh no,there's a monster snake in your
house.
I'll just be like, oh no.
Even though I know it's my mom.
SPEAKER_05 (37:29):
Do you think that it's okay if other kids believe
in Santa, or do you think thatthat's anyone can believe what
anyone wants to believe.
Thank you for being on thepodcast, man.
SPEAKER_03 (37:40):
You're welcome.
SPEAKER_05 (37:46):
Thank you for your time listening to the whole
parent podcast today.
I hope you got something out ofit.
I have a couple quick favors toask of you as we end the
episode.
The first one is to jump over onwhatever podcast platform that
you are listening to right nowand rate this show five stars.
You'll notice there are a lot offive-star ratings on this show,
(38:06):
whether that's on Spotify orApple Music or Apple Podcasts.
We have a ton of five-starratings and it helps our podcast
get out to more people thanalmost any other parenting
podcast out there.
And so it's a really quick thingthat you can do if you have 15
or 20 seconds.
And if you have an additional 30seconds, I'd love to read a
review from you.
I read all the reviews that comethrough.
(38:28):
If some if you particularly likeone part of the podcast or you
like when I talk about somethingor whatever, imagine that you're
writing that review directly tome.
The second thing that you can dois go and send this episode to
somebody in your life who youthink could use it.
Think about all the parents inyour life.
Think about your friends, yourfamily members who could use a
(38:50):
little bit of help parenting.
It's vulnerable to share anepisode of a parenting podcast
with them.
I get it.
But imagine how much better yourlife is as a result of listening
to this podcast, of following meon social media, of getting the
emails that I send out.
You can share that with someoneelse too.
And so I encourage you, just goover, shoot them a quick text,
(39:10):
share this episode with them, orshare another episode that you
feel like is particularlyrelevant to them.
The last thing you can do is godown to the link show notes at
the bottom.
And like I said in the mid-roll,you can subscribe on Substack.
It's$5 a month or$50 a year.
Uh, I don't have that manypeople doing it, and yet the
people who are doing it havemade this possible.
(39:33):
And so if you like this episode,if you like all of the episodes,
if you want them to continue,the only way that I can keep
making them is through donorsupport, free will donations to
the podcast.
Please, please, please, please,as you're thinking about the end
of this year, as you're thinkingabout your charitable giving, I
know I'm not a 501c3.
You can't write it off on yourtaxes, but if you'd like to give
(39:56):
me a little gift to just saythank you for what you've done
this year, the best way to dothat is over on Substack.
Again,$5 a month,$50 a year.
It's not going to break thebank.
It's probably less than youspend on coffee every week.
Definitely less than you spendon coffee every week.
Maybe uh less than you spend onalmost anything, right?
Five bucks a month is very, verysmall, but it goes a long way
(40:19):
when it's multiplied by all ofthe different people who listen
to the podcast and sending thatover to me.
I get all of that money.
It's just my way of being ableto produce the podcast, spend
money on equipment, spend moneyon subscription fees, hosting
fees for the podcast, all ofthat stuff.
Email server fees, all that.
So if you're willing to do that,I would love it.
Thank you so much for listeningto this episode, and I'll see
(40:40):
you next time.
Do you know any songs aboutSanta Claus?
SPEAKER_04 (40:45):
Um, he comes Santa Claus, he comes Santa Claus.
SPEAKER_05 (40:56):
You don't know any more of that song, you just know
that part of the song.
Welcome to the Whole Parent Podcast.
This is John.
Before we get started today, Iwanted to give you a quick note.
This episode is a rerun.
We first aired it last yearduring the holidays, and it's
about Santa Claus and thesurprisingly complicated
questions that he brings withhim.
I decided to replay it becauseevery year around this time, the
(00:23):
same moment keeps happening inhomes everywhere.
It's a quiet room, a parentmid-thought, a child asking a
question that sounds simple, butit really isn't.
Is Santa real?
This episode really isn't aboutSanta.
It's about trust andimagination, about what kids are
really asking when they ask thebig questions and what it costs
(00:46):
us as parents to answer themhonestly and carefully at the
same time.
If you're listening with littleones around, just a heads up,
this episode talks openly aboutSanta.
And so you may want to save itto listen yourself later.
And another couple of things,first or second, or maybe third
(01:07):
at this point.
The episode is recorded before Ihad the equipment that I have
now.
So the audio is a little iffy.
I also back then tended to makethe music a little loud, so it
might help to listen onheadphones.
Again, it's about Santa, somaybe it's a good idea to listen
about on headphones anyway.
But yeah, I hope you enjoy it.
(01:29):
Here it is.
The Santa controversy from theWhole Parent podcast.
It's a crisp December evening,and you're sitting by the fire
with your kids.
The tree is twinkling, thestockings are hanging neatly.
We have six this year.
It's a lot.
Your kids are carefully settingout cookies for Santa because
it's Christmas Eve.
(01:50):
There's that magic feeling inthe air, the kind of magic that
all makes us feel like kidsagain.
And then, from across the room,you hear the words that you have
been dreading since your childwas born.
Is Santa real?
In that moment, time freezes.
You glance at your partner,you're caught in this silent
parental game of chicken.
(02:11):
Who's gonna take this one?
For generations, the story ofSanta has been this pillar of a
magical childhood.
The idea of this jolly old elfwho travels the whole world
every single Christmas, fueledby cookies and goodwill.
But the magic also comes withquestions.
What do we do when our kidsstart wondering if it's true?
(02:31):
What happens when theirwide-eyed wonder gives way to
skepticism?
How do we strike a balancebetween nurturing an imagination
and a childhood and staying trueto values?
Today on the Whole ParentPodcast, we're diving into the
great Santa controversy.
Is it okay to lie to your kidsabout Santa?
We'll explore the psychology ofwhy kids believe the moment they
(02:52):
start to doubt, and how younavigate those tricky questions
in a way that honors theirwonder without compromising
their trust.
Because at the end of the day,it's not really about Santa,
it's about how we show up forour kids.
When the questions are big, whenthe answers aren't easy, and the
stakes feel impossibly high.
I'm John.
Today we're talking about SantaClaus, why he matters, how we
(03:14):
can talk about him, and why hisstory, like parenting itself, is
more about a journey than anydestination.
So this year so far, we've beenwatching some Christmas movies,
maybe fewer than in years past.
I think we got kind of burnedout on them, but we did watch
(03:34):
The Santa Claus with my oldest.
It's a story about a guy namedScott Calvin.
He's this workaholic toyexecutive, he's played by Tim
Allen, and he is doing the bareminimum parenting for his son
Charlie.
He reluctantly takes him onChristmas Eve, and everything
just goes terribly.
He burns the turkey, they haveto go out to eat.
He doesn't know how to talk toCharlie when they're sitting
(03:56):
there, it's awkward.
There's this general vibe oflike when is this gonna be over?
And then something trulyunexpected happens.
Scott accidentally kills SantaClaus in front of his son.
I'm paraphrasing, but that'swhat happens, right?
He yells at Santa when he's onhis roof, Santa falls off his
roof and plunges to his doom.
(04:17):
Now you might think as a logicaladult that maybe Scott, this
very grown-up, very matureexecutive, is going to call 911,
maybe check to see if Santa'sokay, but no, not Scott Calvin.
He is going to put on the suitof the man that he has just
killed, because apparently whenyou kill Santa, that is what you
are expected to do.
(04:39):
What Scott doesn't realize isthat this small act is going to
have massive implications forhim.
You see, there is a clause, aSanta clause, get it
C-L-A-U-S-E, and it's written inmicroscopic legal language that
binds him to being Santa as hisjob for the rest of his life.
Because that's the real powerand magic of a well-written
(05:01):
contract.
Charlie and Scott spend the restof the night delivering
presents, doing Santa's job.
Eventually they wind up at theNorth Pole where they learn the
extent of this contract,including that Scott is now
officially Santa.
It's a fun movie.
I found myself enjoying it likeI did probably when I was a
little kid.
But I really found myself doingsomething that I'd never done
before, which is empathize withthe villain of the movie, the
(05:23):
antagonist.
His name is Neil.
He's Charlie's stepdad.
He's a psychiatrist who wearsthese horrible sweaters and
whose primary fault seems to bethe fact that he is deeply
troubled that Charlie's beliefsin Santa go way beyond what's
normal.
Charlie doesn't just believe inSanta, he said that his dad is
the real Santa.
And if we take this outside thecontext of the movie, you can
(05:45):
see how a psychiatrist wouldprobably be pretty unnerved by
this.
Neil is even more concerned thatScott, a man who Neil has been
nothing but nice to so far inthe movie, although a little
patronizing, if we'll admit, isfeeding into this delusion.
For context, the magic of thiscontract is transforming Scott
into Santa.
(06:05):
But what Neil sees is this adultthat's going to these extreme
lengths, putting on hundreds ofpounds, growing this massive
beard, changing his hair colorto manipulate this vulnerable
and confused child of divorce.
I have to admit, like I have areally hard time hating Neil.
And for that matter, you know,Charlie's mom.
I could keep going on aboutthis, but really what they seem
(06:28):
to be struggling with issomething that I very much so
empathize with, which is how dowe talk to our kids about these
sort of magical things?
What do we tell our kids aboutSanta?
Let's start by acknowledging theelephant in the room that Santa
is a really big deal.
For many families, Santa is thisfigure who represents joy and
magic and the spirit of giving.
(06:49):
And for others, the idea ofSanta feels just kind of
dishonest.
Just I can't lie to my kids thatway.
And I've walked that struggle,right?
Like it feels kind of at oddswith your values of trying to
instill honesty and transparencywith your kids, perpetuating
this myth.
And that kind of leads us to thereality, which is the reason
Santa is so controversial isthat it's really hard to take a
(07:12):
neutral approach to Santa.
Kids are going to ask you reallypointed questions, and at
different times it can be reallyhard to know what to say.
How does Santa get to everyhouse in one night?
Why does Santa have differenthandwriting or use different
wrapping paper at one friend'shouse or another?
Why did my friend get thislarger, bigger thing than my
other friend who has less money?
(07:32):
Doesn't Santa, you know, haveunlimited resources to be able
to give every kid what they areasking for?
And eventually it leads to thiskind of fundamental question,
that one that I talked about inthat setting of the scene on
Christmas Eve, and that's thebig one, you know, is Santa
real?
So how do we answer thesequestions without crushing the
magic or compromising our kids'childhood or anything like that,
(07:55):
or our integrity as parents?
First, I think it's reallyimportant that we answer the
question or at least ask thequestion why kids are so drawn
to Santa?
Why are parents so drawn toSanta?
Why do kids find it so easy tobelieve this?
And if you're going to askchildhood development
(08:16):
specialists, they're going tohighlight that before about the
age of seven, kids live in whatwe might think of as this kind
of magical way of seeing theworld.
Just take, for example, youknow, when we think about magic
and ask these fundamentalquestions, we are doing so from
a place where we understand howthings work.
(08:37):
And so when something like SantaClaus, which clearly doesn't
work, comes up, it competes withour views of other things that
do work.
Whereas for our kids, they livein a world that they don't
really fundamentally understandbefore the age of seven.
They don't know how an elevator,you know, doors open and how
it's hydraulically or whatever,pulley system to move it up and
(08:59):
down.
I don't even know really howelevators work.
I just know that they kind ofdo.
They don't really understand howcars work.
They just kind of, you know, youpress a pedal and then they
move.
They don't understand internalcombustion engines or electric
engines or whatever.
And so because of this, they arejust kind of wired to be open to
magic and wonder andimagination.
(09:20):
So they're not just believing inSanta because we tell them to.
They're believing because italigns with the way that they're
really processing everything inthe world.
Santa's story for them just kindof feels normal.
It feeds into their sense ofwonder that they're experiencing
all over the place, and it givesthem some frameworks for some
positive considerations.
Concepts like generosity andkindness and even delayed
(09:44):
gratification.
And that's that's the positiveside of Santa, if we're being
honest.
Waiting for Christmas morningteaches patience, it teaches
tolerance of emotions.
Writing letters to Santa is thisreflective process.
It allows us to even participatein some gratitude.
(10:06):
You're leaving out cookies,that's a lesson in hospitality
and generosity and doingsomething for others.
And so Santa's not all bad.
In fact, during this 2016interview that I was able to
find with the Wall StreetJournal, developmental
psychologist and best-sellingparenting author, also podcast
host of my favorite parentingpodcast, Raising Good Humans,
(10:26):
Aliza Pressman, who, by the way,herself is Jewish, so she has no
vested interest in this Santaquestion, said to the Wall
Street Journal that it's notonly acceptable for us to
perpetuate the myth of Santa inkids under the age of seven, it
actually can be beneficial tohelping them develop this rich
imaginary life.
She goes on to talk about howkids are learning all the time
(10:48):
through imagination.
This is how they're doingperspective taking and
developing moral reasoning.
It's something I talk aboutextensively in my book, that we
utilize and leverage theirimagination to teach them the
life skills.
And that traditions have beendoing this forever, not just the
Santa Claus tradition, buttraditions going back to
indigenous communities forthousands of years.
So participating in the Santamyth with your four-year-old is
(11:11):
probably not as harmful as someof the people who are on the
extreme, I will never lie to mykids' side, are maybe forwarding
that it is.
But it also can depend on thekid, and that's an important
consideration.
And really what this all bringsus to is the central question
that we have to ask ourselveswhen we're considering this
whole Santa thing, which isreally the central question that
(11:33):
we have to ask ourselveswhenever we're talking to our
kids.
And it's why are we doing whatwe're doing?
What are we getting out of it?
Is it for our kids?
Is it only for our kids?
Is it for both us and our kids?
Who is this Santa myth actuallyfor?
It's complicated.
(11:58):
I think one thing that kind ofgets to this is this interesting
phenomenon where kids pretend,and I don't know the statistics
on this, but I have heard thisin multiple different interviews
with parents.
I watched so many interviews,read so many interviews about
Santa from developmental childexperts.
And one of the things that oftenthey will point to, again, I
(12:20):
don't know the percentage ofkids who do this, is that at
some point kids will actuallylearn that Santa's not real from
school or from a friend, ormaybe they will just, you know,
kind of logic it out forthemselves and they'll stop
believing, or maybe they, youknow, saw it on a show or
something.
And they will actually lie andpretend to believe that Santa's
(12:43):
real for the benefit of theirparents.
And when they're asked aboutthis, you know, it's not just
like they're saying, oh yeah,well, I like the presents.
I'm gonna keep pretending sothat I can keep getting the
presents.
These kids will actually comeright out and say, no, you know,
my mom or my dad really lovesthis Santa thing.
They love that I believe in it.
And so like I just kind of do itfor them.
And so I think we often tellourselves that Santa is only for
(13:06):
our kids.
It's to keep their childhoodmagical.
I think the truth is often morecomplicated.
And I think our kids evensometimes will know that.
And then there's the other kindof issues with Santa that we
often don't really consider,that are really not for the
benefit of our kids.
I think about specificallySanta's omnipotence, and now he
(13:30):
has spies to assist in thatomnipotence.
Um, we call them the elves onthe shelf, right?
And they're the the these aretools of behavior modification
for parents and have been fordecades.
The holidays, the winter break,like these are dysregulating
times for kids.
We have holiday parties andfamily gatherings.
(13:50):
Parents can, you know, that canbring up some childhood stuff
for us.
We we don't often parent ourbest in front of our families.
Obviously, there's someuncomfortable clothing, itchy
sweaters, all of that, at leastfor my childhood, and just
generally way too much sugar.
We're missing bedtime, we're outafter dark.
And this just means that kidsare out of routine during this
time of year.
(14:10):
And so it's nice for manyparents to have a way of sort of
mitigating those tantrums andthose meltdowns.
And that's, I think, the kind ofuncomfortable part of Santa that
that we do need to touch onbefore we keep going with just
the do we believe, do we notbelieve?
And that's the part of the Santamyth where Santa becomes the
(14:32):
bribe or the threat that keepskids doing what we want them to
do rather than, you know, doingthe things we don't want them to
do, misbehaving, havingtantrums, meltdowns, whatever,
when they're in less than idealscenarios.
I have a story about this.
It actually just happened to meyesterday.
I'm recording this in Decemberof 2024.
(14:53):
And we went to the library, butnot our local library because
it's currently underconstruction.
We went to the one in the town,the next town over, and I go
there often with my middle kids.
So I have a four-year-old, Ihave an almost three-year-old,
and then I have aneight-year-old and a
two-month-old.
And the four-year-old and thethree-year-old are the ones who
(15:13):
are with me in the morning whiletheir brother is at forest
school.
And we go to this local libraryand we're playing in their play
area, and they both reach forthe same place piece at the same
time.
They're playing with the libraryLegos.
And they both reach for the samepiece, and then they both
proceeded to kind of let eachother know that they wanted it.
(15:33):
Now, nobody laid hands on eachother, but they both expressed
their displeasure, let's say, toone another.
And this is totally normal,right?
Sharing is difficult, especiallywith siblings.
And a librarian walked over andsaid to them, she intervened,
which was a little strangebecause I was sitting right
there.
Usually you don't see adults dothis, but she felt empowered to
(15:56):
come over and say, you know, weneed to share and we need to be
nice to each other at thelibrary, especially this time of
year.
And this, in my view, is justlike the highlight of, and I
don't mean to, you know, thislibrarian was had the best of
intentions, and she's justoperating from her worldview
too.
Like I'm not knocking her atall.
But this is the gross underbellyof the Santa myth, right?
(16:18):
The way that we use kids' senseof magic and wonder to gain
compliance and to try andincentivize good behavior.
You're being watched.
You know, he knows when you'resleeping, he knows when you're
awake.
You better be good.
And I would argue that if we aregoing to choose to participate
in this Santa myth with ourkids, at the very least, that
(16:38):
part of it, what I call thenaughty and nice list part of
it, we should deconstruct andget rid of.
Now, I don't think you have toget rid of the entire myth then.
I'm saying that the part of themyth that is used primarily as
behavior modification isproblematic no matter how old
your kids are and how you'reutilizing that.
(17:00):
And the reason I say this isbecause home really needs to be
a safe place for kids to expresstheir big feelings when they
have bad days.
And it cannot be a place wherethere are elves narking on them
because they got too hungry, orbecause they had trouble
sharing, or because they had abad day at school and they just
let off some steam.
And that kind of goes, and evenif you don't do the elves, you
know, the narking elves, youalso need to yourself be a safe
(17:25):
person.
The number of times I've been inthe grocery store or or we've
been walking by the toy aisle,and you've you hear a parent say
something like, Well, I'm gonnatell Santa that you are X, Y, Z
right now.
We need to be safe too.
And our kids need to know thatwe can be people who they can
bring their problems to.
The world is not a place whereour mess, our kids' mess, is
(17:46):
always going to be welcome.
And so that it needs to bewelcome in our home.
Like that's the basis of secureattachment.
As Eli Harwood, attachmentexpert, says, uh, you have to
give kids a safe home base.
Like when you're playing tag andthere's like a home base where a
kid can go and be safe frombeing tagged, like that has to
be home.
And you can't have that place bea place where they're constantly
(18:10):
being watched and assessed andmonitored.
And immediately, by the way,this was my son's, my oldest's
aversion to Santa and Elf on ashelf.
Like, immediately he was like,What do you mean this thing is
watching me?
I am not okay with that.
(20:34):
And even if it's not theremoval, by the way, of
presents, like, oh, if youaren't good, I'm gonna you're
gonna not gonna get anypresents.
Even if it's the reward side,the other side of this coin, we
still have the question (20:47):
should we be using rewards like
presents from Santa andChristmas to incentivize good
behavior?
I actually have a snippet herethat I'm gonna play from an
interview that I did for anupcoming episode of the podcast.
It'll be later on in thisseason, from Alfie Cohn, who
wrote a book called Punished byRewards.
But anyway, this is this is histake on rewards with kids.
SPEAKER_00 (21:11):
Studies have continued to show that children
who are frequently rewarded orpraised by their parents tend to
be less generous and caring thanother kids.
You might lose the behavior ofgetting them to do something.
(21:32):
But now the point is to see thatactivity as a means to an end.
SPEAKER_05 (21:41):
I want to stop here for a moment and ask you if
you're enjoying this episode ofthe Whole Parent Podcast, to
subscribe wherever you'relistening, to rate this episode
and review the podcast.
I read every single reviewmyself.
They are what keep me going.
And I I want you to go and doone extra thing for me here, and
that's to share it with at leastthree friends in your life.
(22:02):
Uh, you can share it on socialmedia, I think that that's
great, but I want you toactually send this episode to
three people in your life.
Who have kids between the agesof three and ten and say, hey,
check this out, especially yourfriends maybe who have already
talked about this.
Are we doing Santa?
Are you not doing Santa?
And send it to them.
You have no idea how much ithelps, not only me to grow the
(22:24):
podcast, to get more listeners,to keep us going, doing this
thing, but also how it how ithelps people.
You don't know what's helping.
And you can just point to thisepisode, this part in the
episode, after you share it withthem.
And if they say, you know, wait,do you think I'm a bad parent?
Why are you sharing this withme?
You just say, no, no, no.
He just told me I had to shareit, and so I'm just doing what
I'm supposed to do it, you know.
(22:44):
And if you don't do it, I wantyou to know Santa Claus is
watching you, and you're gonnaget coal in your stocking for
Christmas if you don't sharethis with three people.
Also, if you're looking to startthe new year off parenting
better, consider pre-ordering mybook, Punishment Free Parenting,
The Brain-based Way to RaiseKids Without Raising Your Voice.
It's available at the link inthe description, as well as
wherever books are sold.
And it's also available onaudiobook.
(23:06):
So if you like this episode,where I'm kind of doing episodes
a little differently, if youdidn't know that this season,
I'm doing them more similarly tothe way that I wrote the book
and the audiobook.
So chances are if you like thisepisode, you're gonna love the
book.
Okay, speaking of the episode,let's get back to it.
How do you handle thatinevitable moment when your kid
(23:27):
looks you in the eye and asksyou for real, you know, is Santa
real?
I'm gonna give you threeapproaches that I think you can
take depending on your child'sage and personality.
The first one is kind of theclassic way of talking to kids
about Santa, and that's to frameSanta as a symbol.
This works better for olderkids, you know, seven or older.
(23:48):
And this is where you saysomething to the extent of like,
Santa is real in the sense thathe represents the spirit of
Christmas or giving or kindness,and grown-ups get to take on
that role to keep that magicalive for kids.
Now you're old enough, you getto be part of that tradition
too.
You get to be Santa.
And this approach does somethingthat's really cool.
(24:09):
It empowers kids to graduateinto the role of Santa, which
we're going to talk about herein a moment, is a really helpful
balancing point for thatdisappointment that Santa is not
real.
And especially with oldersiblings, it can help them feel
more empowered, like they'recontributing to these acts of
kindness, helping the youngersiblings.
The second way to answer this isto answer the question with a
(24:31):
question this is what I woulduse with younger kids.
So if your child's asking youabout Santa, but you think you
know they really want you tojust validate that, you know,
Santa is real, you just respondby saying, Well, what do you
think?
And this gives them a windowinto their own thought processes
and allows you to kind of gaugehow much information they're
(24:51):
ready for.
This can often just lead them totell you everything that they
think about Santa Claus, whichmight be the reason that they
were asking you in the firstplace, is just to kind of bounce
it off of you.
And at the end, you can you canvalidate that.
You don't have to then say,like, you know, oh, well, that's
not true.
Like you can just kind of say,oh, that's that's really cool.
Thank you for telling me that.
(25:12):
Uh the last way is what I usefor more logical kids.
And this is just to give themit's uh what I call the it's
pretend answer.
And it goes something like this: you say, Santa is not a person (25:22):
undefined
who lives at the North Pole.
This is for the kids who areasking all of the technical
questions, you know, about timetravel.
If you're if you're getting intoquantum mechanics to explain
Santa Claus, like at this point,we're probably past the point
where we should have had theit's pretend conversation.
So you say, you know, Santa isnot a person who lives at the
(25:44):
North Pole, but the story ofSanta is something that
families, as grown-ups, like topretend.
And it's fun to pretendsometimes.
And so you can pretend alongwith us.
And this last approach, the it'spretend approach, is the one
that Fred Rogers used in hisvery infamous 1973 episode of
(26:06):
Mr.
Rogers Neighborhood called IsSanta Claus Real?
It's hard to imagine now thatthat that show was ever
considered controversial, butthere are actually a handful of
episodes of Mr.
Rogers Neighborhood that wereincredibly controversial.
Some of them so much so that youcan't even watch them.
I can't find them anywhere.
There's a whole week in the1980s where he talks about
(26:28):
nuclear weapons and disarmament.
I mean, like he Fred really uhwas pretty radical in many
respects.
But in this, you know, 1973 isSanta Claus Real episode, he
effectively tells kids at theend, no, Santa is is just
pretend.
And it's remembered for thatmoment when he admits that at
(26:49):
the end, and then he sings thissong about pretending.
But it also features what Ithink is one of the best
children's most poignant uhconversations about Santa in the
make-believe world.
So in make believe world, ifyou're familiar with the show,
this is where Daniel Tigerlives, this is where the puppets
live, and uh Daniel Tiger inthis case is is concerned.
SPEAKER_02 (27:11):
Santa Claus is coming to the neighborhood of
make-believe.
Santa Claus?
What's he gonna do to us?
Oh, well, I imagine it will besomething good.
Oh, I try to be good, but I'mnot always good.
I think I'm afraid of SantaClaus.
I wish he weren't coming here.
SPEAKER_05 (27:31):
Daniel basically says, like, he doesn't want
Santa to come because Santa iswatching him while he's
sleeping, and Daniel knows hehasn't always been good.
To which Santa, who is beingplayed by one of the kind of
regulars on the show, somethingthat Mr.
Rogers is going to point outlater when they talk about the
land of make-believe, that itwas just a person in a costume.
(27:53):
Santa says, you know, I I'm noteven always good.
SPEAKER_02 (27:57):
I am Daniel Striper Tiger, and I'm not always good.
SPEAKER_01 (28:01):
Well, I'm Santa Claus, and I'm not always good
either.
SPEAKER_05 (28:05):
And that he Santa has this line.
I I can just imagine Fredwriting it.
SPEAKER_01 (28:10):
You aren't?
Of course not.
Good people aren't always good.
They just try to be.
SPEAKER_05 (28:16):
By the end of the episode, I think it's kind of
inescapable that Fred is gonnahas kind of put on a masterclass
in how you can effectively andethically talk to kids about
Santa.
But I'm telling you, parents in1973, according to people who
have researched Fred in hislife, they were not, they were
not happy.
They did not feel this way.
(28:37):
They felt like the man that theyhad trusted to teach their kids
about emotions had just hurtthem.
So I think it's important topoint out that the reason they
felt that way, I think, isbecause one of the biggest
reasons that parents will keepup the Santa charade is because
we're afraid of how kids aregonna respond to the truth and
react.
So the next kind of point herethat I want to make is to ask
the question (28:59):
is that fear that our kids are going to be
absolutely devastated bylearning that Santa is not real
grounded in reality for us?
And according to Dr.
Eileen Kennedy Moore, who's thisPhD host of this Kids Ask Doctor
Friendastic podcast, which I hadnever heard of until researching
(29:19):
for this episode, she's shesays, you know, yes, there's
disappointment, but actuallyit's okay.
She's she's phenomenal in thissegment that I that I watched.
She says, Yeah, you know what,there is going to be
disappointment, but it'sactually okay.
Because if they're act at thisage where they're really looking
for answers, then they actuallyneed the honesty.
And that that if they're at theright age to learn this, which
(29:40):
by the way, the right age is notold enough.
It's not too old.
If they're young enough to learnthis, they'll recover quickly.
The disappointment is actuallyalso gonna be balanced out,
according to her, and this iskind of what we were talking
about in that first response, bythe sense of growth and pride of
being trusted with this adultconcept that Santa's not real.
(30:01):
But but what is very clear isthat that happens if you are
able to express that Santa isnot real young enough.
On the other hand, kids who aregonna, you know, by some
miracle, make it to middleschool and still believe in
Santa, they have a much harderroad coming ahead of them.
(30:21):
They face a much biggerbetrayal.
And there are socialimplications.
At some point, it stops beingnaive and imaginative to believe
in this immortal elf who useshis flying reindeer to break
into millions of houses aroundthe world to deliver gifts and
you know, satiate his seeminglybottomless appetite for cookies
and milk.
Uh, at some point it just getsweird.
(30:43):
Like if you have a 12 or13-year-old who believes this,
their friends are not going tosee that as like an endearing
quirk.
They are going to experiencesome social blowback as a result
of expressing that belief topeople in their life.
And finding out about Santa toolate doesn't you're not going to
(31:05):
get the benefit of that pride orthe sense of maturity.
It becomes a point of shame.
So that leads us to kind of thefinal point in this episode,
which is when is the right timeto spill the beans?
And in the view of some parents,some of my listeners, I'm sure,
murder your child's sense ofinnocence and Christmas magic.
I think every parent has toanswer this for themselves.
It can't be too late, as we'vejust highlighted.
(31:27):
But it doesn't, you don't haveto do it when they're four
either.
I think it depends on the kids.
For some kids, Santa is justnever going to work.
And I think parents who press itwhen it doesn't work actually
wind up going to more harm.
This is kind of what happened toDaniel Tiger.
The thought of a person cominginto your house in the middle of
the night, regardless of whatthey're bringing you, can be
(31:48):
unnerving, especially for highlysensitive kids.
For other kids, it's it's someit's that kind of underbelly of
the tradition, the, you know, heknows when you're sleeping, he
knows when you're awake, heknows if you've been bad or
good, so be good for goodnesssake.
That is going to bother a lot ofkids.
And if you are unable to divorcethat from the myth itself, you
may have to kind of end the mythearlier than you might like,
(32:09):
because that's a reallydifficult piece, and a lot of
kids have trouble with that.
That was the piece for my son.
Once he had heard that, he waslike, no way, no ho, no way,
Jose.
For some kids, the tradition isfun and whimsical, and later,
once their brain develops, thefacts catch up with Saint Nick,
and you know, it's a prettynatural, oh yeah, that was just
(32:33):
a for fun thing.
And yes, for for some, you'regonna have to have a hard
conversation that they may notwant to have, but for them, it
is the kinder option thanallowing them to kind of keep
perpetuating in this way.
And one last note on the winhere.
It's not always a clear line forour kids or for us.
(32:55):
Kids often reflect later thatthey knew but they chose to keep
up the charade, but that mightnot even have been a conscious
choice.
For them, the magic was justkind of worth perpetuating.
So, with that in mind, I want toend this episode a little bit
differently.
In our house, we have three boyswho have very different views on
Santa.
I interviewed two of them, andI'm gonna play that for you now.
(33:17):
Okay.
You can start by saying yourname, and yeah, just for people
who are listening, say your nameand say how old you are.
SPEAKER_03 (33:28):
My name is Matt, and I am eight.
SPEAKER_05 (33:31):
Okay, Matt, I have called you here with a really
important set of questions.
My first one, uh, I've alreadykind of told you what we're
gonna talk about, but my firstone is what do you think about
Santa Claus?
SPEAKER_03 (33:45):
Um, I think that I don't think he's real because I
don't like the idea of someonejust sneaking to our house every
year.
SPEAKER_05 (33:55):
What is what do the kids at your school think about
Santa?
SPEAKER_03 (33:58):
Most of him, yes.
About like two percent of themthink that Santa isn't real.
SPEAKER_05 (34:07):
So you're in the minority.
There's not very many people whothink what you think.
SPEAKER_03 (34:12):
Yes.
SPEAKER_05 (34:13):
Uh what do you think about your brothers?
Do you think that your brothersbelieve in Santa, or do you
think that they don't believe inSanta?
SPEAKER_03 (34:19):
I've never asked them.
SPEAKER_05 (34:21):
If you had to guess.
SPEAKER_03 (34:22):
Probably Liam believes in, and Ollie's like,
not so sure.
SPEAKER_05 (34:28):
Can you say your name and how old you are?
SPEAKER_04 (34:34):
Um, what's the name?
Um, my actual name or mynickname.
SPEAKER_05 (34:40):
Whichever one you want.
SPEAKER_04 (34:42):
Okay.
Oliver and four year old.
SPEAKER_05 (34:47):
You're Oliver and you are four years old.
SPEAKER_04 (34:49):
Actually, I'm four and a half year old.
SPEAKER_05 (34:52):
Oliver, who's four and a half years old.
Can you tell me about SantaClaus?
Tell me what you know aboutSanta Claus.
SPEAKER_04 (34:58):
Him him give present to somebody.
SPEAKER_05 (35:01):
He gives presents to people?
Uh, when does he come?
SPEAKER_04 (35:06):
Um, at nighttime.
SPEAKER_05 (35:08):
He comes at nighttime?
What do you think about SantaClaus coming into our house
while we're all sleeping?
SPEAKER_04 (35:13):
Um, how can you get into the house him goes in the
chimney?
SPEAKER_05 (35:19):
Do you think that's okay that he comes in our house
while we're sleeping?
To leave us presents?
SPEAKER_04 (35:24):
What's Yeah?
SPEAKER_05 (35:25):
That doesn't make you nervous or anything.
SPEAKER_04 (35:28):
Well, not because husband goes upstairs.
SPEAKER_05 (35:31):
Oh, because he doesn't go upstairs where we
sleep, so it's okay.
SPEAKER_04 (35:35):
Well, because our tree's not upstairs, it's
downstairs.
SPEAKER_05 (35:40):
He just comes out and he goes to our tree.
SPEAKER_04 (35:43):
Well, and then he puts up presents under the tree.
SPEAKER_05 (35:47):
Nice.
So do you think that it's okaythat grown ups do Santa with
kids, or do you think do youwish that grown-ups didn't do
Santa?
SPEAKER_03 (35:54):
I wish that grown-ups didn't do Santa.
SPEAKER_05 (35:57):
Really?
Why?
SPEAKER_03 (35:59):
Because it's like if you're good you get presents.
If you're bad, you either getcold or nothing.
SPEAKER_05 (36:05):
What if that part of Santa was gone?
So what if we took away the goodand the bad part?
What do you think about Santathen?
SPEAKER_03 (36:14):
A little bit better, but still not the idea of
someone sneaking into yourhouse.
SPEAKER_05 (36:29):
Does he care if kids have been good or bad?
Um or do you think that he justgives presents to everyone?
He's a he just gives presents tothe good people.
SPEAKER_04 (36:45):
Well, I'm I'm a good piss since I say silly things
like the poopy stuff I say.
SPEAKER_05 (36:52):
Yeah, you are a good person.
If we decide to do Santa thisyear with Ollie, are you going
to help us do it, or are yougonna tell him that Santa's not
real?
What do you think?
SPEAKER_04 (37:04):
I'll help him.
SPEAKER_05 (37:05):
Do you think that Map believes in Santa Claus?
SPEAKER_03 (37:07):
What believes is Santa Claus?
I like playing along.
I play along with my friendsnext door all the time.
Like if they see like mom wouldpull in and it was like really
dark, they would think, oh no,there's a monster snake in your
house.
I'll just be like, oh no.
Even though I know it's my mom.
SPEAKER_05 (37:29):
Do you think that it's okay if other kids believe
in Santa, or do you think thatthat's anyone can believe what
anyone wants to believe.
Thank you for being on thepodcast, man.
SPEAKER_03 (37:40):
You're welcome.
SPEAKER_05 (37:46):
Thank you for your time listening to the whole
parent podcast today.
I hope you got something out ofit.
I have a couple quick favors toask of you as we end the
episode.
The first one is to jump over onwhatever podcast platform that
you are listening to right nowand rate this show five stars.
You'll notice there are a lot offive-star ratings on this show,
(38:06):
whether that's on Spotify orApple Music or Apple Podcasts.
We have a ton of five-starratings and it helps our podcast
get out to more people thanalmost any other parenting
podcast out there.
And so it's a really quick thingthat you can do if you have 15
or 20 seconds.
And if you have an additional 30seconds, I'd love to read a
review from you.
I read all the reviews that comethrough.
(38:28):
If some if you particularly likeone part of the podcast or you
like when I talk about somethingor whatever, imagine that you're
writing that review directly tome.
The second thing that you can dois go and send this episode to
somebody in your life who youthink could use it.
Think about all the parents inyour life.
Think about your friends, yourfamily members who could use a
(38:50):
little bit of help parenting.
It's vulnerable to share anepisode of a parenting podcast
with them.
I get it.
But imagine how much better yourlife is as a result of listening
to this podcast, of following meon social media, of getting the
emails that I send out.
You can share that with someoneelse too.
And so I encourage you, just goover, shoot them a quick text,
(39:10):
share this episode with them, orshare another episode that you
feel like is particularlyrelevant to them.
The last thing you can do is godown to the link show notes at
the bottom.
And like I said in the mid-roll,you can subscribe on Substack.
It's$5 a month or$50 a year.
Uh, I don't have that manypeople doing it, and yet the
people who are doing it havemade this possible.
(39:33):
And so if you like this episode,if you like all of the episodes,
if you want them to continue,the only way that I can keep
making them is through donorsupport, free will donations to
the podcast.
Please, please, please, please,as you're thinking about the end
of this year, as you're thinkingabout your charitable giving, I
know I'm not a 501c3.
You can't write it off on yourtaxes, but if you'd like to give
(39:56):
me a little gift to just saythank you for what you've done
this year, the best way to dothat is over on Substack.
Again,$5 a month,$50 a year.
It's not going to break thebank.
It's probably less than youspend on coffee every week.
Definitely less than you spendon coffee every week.
Maybe uh less than you spend onalmost anything, right?
Five bucks a month is very, verysmall, but it goes a long way
(40:19):
when it's multiplied by all ofthe different people who listen
to the podcast and sending thatover to me.
I get all of that money.
It's just my way of being ableto produce the podcast, spend
money on equipment, spend moneyon subscription fees, hosting
fees for the podcast, all ofthat stuff.
Email server fees, all that.
So if you're willing to do that,I would love it.
Thank you so much for listeningto this episode, and I'll see
(40:40):
you next time.
Do you know any songs aboutSanta Claus?
SPEAKER_04 (40:45):
Um, he comes Santa Claus, he comes Santa Claus.
SPEAKER_05 (40:56):
You don't know any more of that song, you just know
that part of the song.
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