The Inevitable Happened this week with my 9 yo son! SPOILER ALERT!

[MarianJack]

Last Friday on the way home from school, my son told me that he "knew". When he said this, I immediately knew what he was talking about but I still asked.

He told me that he knew about the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus. He said that he knew that they were Myths. I knew that this was inevitable and even necessary. After all, we live in a society where a young child who believes is very cute, BUT, after a certain age (that my son is rapidly approaching), a kid who believes may be considered a little weird.

Still, it puts my wife and I into a bit of the quandary that every parent faces frequently with varying degrees of intensity. The quandary is the feeling of pride seeing your child reach another developmental milestone and the mourning over what is being left behind. The first time we noticed this was when he was about 18 months old. At that time he'd been saying "too-too" for thank you. After about a month of this we were riding in the car one day and I handed him a cookie. He said "tank you". My wife and I looked at each other with frowns as I mouthed "I'm going to miss "too-too".

We're not sure how long we're going to keep insisting that Easter Bunny ans Santa ARE real. This morning he still enjoyed his Easter Egg hunt like any kid would. Still, we knew that this day was coming just as every parent does. I've had my explanation that we are ALL Santa and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy ready for some time now. He has such a sense of fun that we have every confidence that he won't spoil the illusion for his little cousins.

Still...

We're proud to see him growing up, but we're sorry for what has passed.

What has you're experience been when this has happened with your kids?

PEACE!