When did you find out the truth about Santa?
When did your kids find out?
I’m trying to see how much longer I should keep the illusion up with my daughter (assuming she isn’t already in on it and milking it).
Overall, I don’t want to continue, since I don’t like telling lies to my kid, but my wife thinks that it is a wonderful illusion and we should let our daughter enjoy her childhood.
I cannot ever recall believing in Santa. My earliest Christmas memories include being aware that Santa was a hoax.
I have no children.
My kids were in second and first grade - for sure. My daughters first grade class had the “Santa Religious War” - she was in the know because her brother was that much older.
But they’d really figured it out for the most part the year before.
I think I must have been around 8. I found out when I was deemed old enough to go with the family to midnight mass on Christmas Eve and thus witnessed Mom, Dad, and my older sibs putting packages under the tree.
I think I told my son when he was about 10. The Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and Santa – all spiraling down in flames at the same time. He was upset for about five minutes. And now, at 13, he STILL likes putting cookies and milk out for “Santa.”
I cannot remember ever believing in Santa; I remember being about 4 and not really believing.
My daughters are totally different. I have never encouraged Santa belief, and they love love love Santa. I have no idea how to cope with it. The oldest has only half-believed for a long time; I think she was hanging on to it because it’s fun and magical. A while back, my husband took her aside and explained it, and now she’s ‘in on the secret,’ which she also likes. The younger one still completely believes, as far as I can tell. I don’t really like that, but I can’t quite bring myself to burst her happy little Santa bubble either. She knows all about the Tooth Fairy though.
I was 10.
My kids are 9 and 11 and have their genuine suspicions.
I didn’t want my kids to believe in Santa but my wife wanted them to, so they do. I took the opportunity when the Tooth Fairy came up to tell my daughter that the Tooth Fairy doesn’t exist - Mom and Dad take the tooth and leave a gift. It was my hope that she would then start to question Santa’s existence, but she hasn’t yet.
I think I was five or six when I realized that Santa, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy all had my mom’s handwriting.
My daughter, who is eleventy flavors of awesome, was six when while reading the paper she noticed references to Globe Santa, and that was it for her, because “If there really was a Santa, I don’t think he’d skip the poor kids.”
I was 6 or 7 when I found out about Santa.
My 6 year old has told me she doesn’t believe in Santa, and challenged me to tell her he really exists. I told her she’s right. That’s a problem, since the 8 year old does still believe in Santa. Her belief is rational - she knows that the guy in the mall isn’t really Santa, but she does think there’s some guy at the North Pole who delivers gifts. We’ve pretty much blackmailed the 6 year old into keeping her mouth shut by promising her no presents whatsoever if she tells the 8 year old.
The 4 year old still believes of course.
Well, we were Jewish, so I never believed in Santa, but when I started kindergarten my parents tried to sit me down and explain what other people believed, so I wouldn’t ruin it for the other kids with my 5 year old know-it-all mouth. (I went to a super hippy preschool where commercial holidays were, it may be said, not the done thing, so it hadn;t come up before then.)
Except it seemed like far too stupid a concept for me to really grasp that other kids really truly believed in a magic present man. So, despite my parents best efforts to make me respect the beliefs of others, I set my best (Christian) friend straight that her parents are the ones who bring presents. I don’t even remember the incident, but apparently it was a major crisis in their household. Luckily they forgave me! We all remain close to this day.
My 8 year old boy totally buys it - wakes up at night with technical questions about how SC is going to get into the fireplace in the new house and stuff.
My mildly machievellian 11 year old daughter has done nothing to make me think that she questions it, which is in itself suspicious. I suspect that she has already sorted it out years ago, but enjoys the masquerade, and doesn’t want to spoil things for Attacklad, so is biding her time. I see no reason to address the issue, other than to play along. They’ll figure it out when they figure it out, I figure.
My kids are 27 and 18. I think they are starting to suspect the truth about Santa but are reluctant to say anything for fear that the presents will end.
I don’t celebrate it either, so I never believed. I remember in second grade going to some girl’s house and her telling me about how she tried to stay awake for Santa, etc., and saying, “Oh yeah, I don’t really believe in that.” My mom later told me to be careful, etc., don’t upset other people’s beliefs, so it wasn’t like I traumatized a bunch of kindergartners.
I don’t remember for me.
For my daughter, she was a true believer in Santa when she was four. When she was five, she also was talking about Santa and what he’d bring to her.
Then, as I tucked her in that Christmas eve, she gave me a very worried look and said, “Is it OK to pretend to believe in Santa?”
I told her “yes.”
I was about 7 or 8, and there wasn’t any big epiphany for me. I just sort of gradually began to suspect that it was all fake. My mother kept up the facade until I was 13 or so (she even put out cookies and milk and had someone go down at night and eat them). 
Oh, and I don’t have kids.
The funny thing about my oldest girl (now 8) is that she never once believed in any of the dressed-up Santas. She noticed her first one when she was about 4, and promptly said “Look, a pretend Santa. Does he help the real Santa?” I figured she would soon figure out the whole thing, but no, she kept believing with great enthusiasm.
I have a friend who truly believed until she was about 12. Her parents had this whole elaborate thing going with a guy who would arrive at her house in costume, sound effects and everything, the same guy every year, and ask for her wish list. I find that very creepy on her parents’ part, but it doesn’t seem to have scarred her; she thinks it was nice.:dubious:
I was 6 when I put the clues together, especially having older siblings.
My daughter kind of made it to 9. She probably was all but sure at 6.
My son is 8 now and seems to still believe.
I’ve always known.
We’re Hindu but we moved to north america when my sister and I were babies. We used to attend parochial school-my parents wanted to put limits on the prosletyzing but still allow us to participate in Christian holidays for assimilation based purposes and this ended up in some hilarious attempts to re-negotiate Christmas and Easter. So we got a christmas tree but it was super charlie brown (they bought it on sale and we were only allowed to get on-sale decorations for it) topped with a Krishna figurine. And they’d give us “Christmas presents” but they used to call them something nuts and told us that they bought them for us. Also, they explicitly told us other children believed in a red suited man bringing them presents and please don’t ruin it for other children.
I remember having IRL discussions and discussions on other boards about this…like, at what point does it get creepy? I can’t help thinking, “Twelve…really?” Aren’t most kids questioning stuff like that before 12?
:eek: You sons of bitches!!!