How did you find out about Santa?

Thalia · Nov 27, 2002

Did you believe in Santa, how did you find out? What do you or will you tell your kids about Santa? 
My ex's sister (who's Jewish) believed in Santa just from her exposure to kids who celebrated Christmas, and just figured Santa didn't come to her house. Weird, huh?

GhostUser · Nov 27, 2002

This is sort of embarrassing, but I believed in Santa until I was in the 5th grade. <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="/images/smilies/blush.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="

"> 
My teacher was reading that children's book Superfudge, and Peter (the main character) made a comment about Fudge (his little brother) still believing in Santa, even though Santa's not real. 
It broke my fifth grade heart! I went home and told my mother and she made me promise I wouldn't tell my little sisters. <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="/images/smilies/smiley.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="

"> 
I often wonder that if I eventually have kids, will I go through the whole Santa facade or can I actually frame it so that they understand the whole lore behind Santa without them believing that he is who puts treats under the tree...

RedStarJedi · Nov 27, 2002

I don't remember when I found out, but I remember it was through other older kids at school. I might have been in 5th grade though. That sounds about right.

Poesa · Nov 27, 2002

Funkified, I did all that too for the longest time! My mother would actually say to me, "Please honey, just leave one carrot and one cookie this year. I can't eat all that." She was the one who wrote the note, too. I love her for doing that for so many years. I hope I can do the same for my children. I think it's so important to have MAGIC in your childhood. So many kids don't even get a childhood these days. 
As for my story of how I found out, I think I was in 3rd or 4th grade. I was a Santa-defender in school. I would get so angry at any of my classmates who told me he didn't exist. And my Jewish classmates would be like, "Santa? Oh come on, give me a break." So I would go home and report all of this and my mother would tell me that the Jewish kids celebrated a different holiday that didn't involve Santa but that doesn't mean Santa doesn't exist (I know she tried hard not to burst my bubble and simultaneously not make the Jewish kids sound like they were lying!) and she told me that anyone else who said he didn't exist was just being cynical (or something like that). At any rate, she told me that what mattered was that I believed in him. 
I guess as I got older I started to question it and got a few hints that it was really my mom being Santa (my father was usually asleep in his easy chair so I don't think he counts as being Santa) and one night I woke up because I heard the jingle bell on my stocking and I peeked out into the living room and my mom was filling our stockings. I wasn't completely shocked because I had had a gut feeling that Santa wasn't real. I didn't tell my mom for a long time that I found out the truth. But the magic always stayed. My brother is 5 years younger so I got to believe through him. But even after he got older, I still believed. It's that whole Miracle on 34th Street thing.

LadyFaile · Nov 27, 2002

i figured it out pretty young. one year i got this rockin' stuffed animal, that was on the foot of my bed when i woke up christmas morning. i was told santa left it, my parents even tried to convince me they heard him walking around the house. i pretty much bought it. then a year or two later my mom was on the phone and for whatever reason was talking about the stuffed animal, where they bought it, how much i liked it, etc. 
she pretty much blew it, cause i sat there thinking 'wait wait wait, if she bought it, then.... *gasp*' 
but i still liked the idea of santa and still loved that my mom would label gifts from santa. she still does it. we still stuff stockings too, but now we each buy little things to put in them, including into my mom's

soilman · Nov 29, 2002

My parents made sure, before i even asked, that I knew that Santa was a myth that stupid people believed in, but that it was important not to show stupid children that you knew how stupid they were, because they might get upset or angry, therefore I was told that if a contemporary insisted that Santa existed, the best thing to do was to just not discuss the issue. I was given a list of pat replies I could use, if stupid children insisted on asserting that Santa existed, such as "oh yea?"; "you think so?" "no kidding?" -- that neither assented to, nor dissented with, their stupid assertion. Non-jewish children just aren't as smart as Jewish children, my parents told me, and it was best to be kind to the congentially stupid.

soilman · Nov 29, 2002

My parents were charming, weren't they?

soilman · Nov 29, 2002

The idea of giving a gift and insisting that it didn't come from you, and making up a fictitious giver, is charming, as LF pointed out. However going into precise detail about the fictitious giver is not necessary. Fiction is only fun if children can figure out it is fiction. If you seriously try to convince them it is truth, it ruins all the fun. I think LF's mother has the right attitude -- she still labels gifts to LF as being from Santa, knowing that LF has doesn't actually believe in Santa, but has merely "suspended her disbelief."

RichBeBe · Nov 29, 2002

My life was changed for ever on November 24tht about 5:12 pm, at 34 years old my life was ruined when I found out that Santa wasn't real. It happened on here and it was all Brake4Squirrels fault: 
But what is that faith based on? If nobody knows for sure, why do we pretend that we do? Why believe something is there for which we can't back up. We have just as much proof for God existing as we do Santa Claus, but we would all call each other silly if an adult actually believed in Santa Claus (as we think of him now anyway.) 
RichBeBe: 
Woah...Woah...Woah... 
Wait a second what does this mean: 
'but we would all call each other silly if an adult actually believed in Santa Claus (as we think of him now anyway.)" 
Are you trying to tell me their is no Santa????? 
I went out and did some research and found out he doesnt exist <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="/images/smilies/sad.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="

">

Avalon · Nov 29, 2002

BUt Rich! That is where you are WRONG! Santa DOES exist! If not, how do all those presents get into my mum's stocking and under her tree each year, even when I'M not staying over that night? And by the same token, how did all those chocolate egg poops get all over my BF's bedroom this year at Easter, huh?? 
I still 'believe'. I sit up on X-mas night each year and listen to the Santa reports on the radio- I dunno if you guys get this in the US, but up here the Canadian Military broadcasts Santa Sightings, and "UFO's that look as though they are being pulled by eight tiny UFO's!!" It rocks my socks off. 
Sitting here discussing it, my mum says: "I liked your Dad's version best." Apparently on the Christmas nights he had to work and be away from home (Flying commercial jets for AirCanada) he would do Santa reports all night over the intercom for the kids on board. He'd talk about blips on the radar, and lights in the sky, and sometimes, every once in a while he'd make the airplane bump up and down a bit and announce: "Sorry about that, Ladies and Gents, we're experiencing a bit of turbulence here because I think we just passed through Santa's contrail..." 
At home he also pulled all sorts of stunts. He put reindeer tracks in the snow once, and left Santa's hat in the bathroom by the can. 
When my half sister was little he stomped boot marks all over the livingroom carpet from the fireplace and back just to see her reaction when she saw Santa was really there! 
She was a tricky little bugger though. One year she rigged the livingroom with booby traps to see if she could trip Santa, get him tangled up and cause the struggle to pull a bell that would wake her up so she could SEE him... 
My fav story has to do with my best friend's little sister. The first year I found out about Santa she came up to me with this calculating look on her face and said, while looking me up and down: "Avalon, some of the other kids at school say Santa isn't real..." 
I hadn't dealt with "continuing the myth" yet at that point, so I wasn't quite sure what to say. After a long pause I finally said: "I've heard that too, but if he isn't- how do all those presents get under the tree every year?? He MUST be real!" 
She thought about this for a long while, still looking very suspicious and perplexed, then suddenly broke into a big grin. 
"Yeah! Those other kids are pretty dumb, huh?!!" She said, and happily walked away.

Thalia · Nov 29, 2002

<div class="quote-container">Quote:
<div class="quote-block">Originally posted by soilman My parents made sure, before i even asked, that I knew that Santa was a myth that stupid people believed in, but that it was important not to show stupid children that you knew how stupid they were, because they might get upset or angry, therefore I was told that if a contemporary insisted that Santa existed, the best thing to do was to just not discuss the issue. I was given a list of pat replies I could use, if stupid children insisted on asserting that Santa existed, such as "oh yea?"; "you think so?" "no kidding?" -- that neither assented to, nor dissented with, their stupid assertion. Non-jewish children just aren't as smart as Jewish children, my parents told me, and it was best to be kind to the congentially stupid.</div>
</div>
 
Soilman, although my parents convinced me that Santa was true, and made all kinds of convouluted lies to keep me believing, my parents, upon sending me to a Christian nursery school, told me similar things about how to deal with "Jesus in heaven" as your parents told you to deal with Santa. They weren't trying to insult the Christians, they just had to explain it to me when I came home asking what God and Jesus were in our daily "prayers". I don't think that they said, "stupid people" though.

Skylark · Nov 30, 2002

My parents never tried to convince me that Santa was real. I never contrived it in my brain, and always avoided the subject with the neighbors who were assured by their parents that their chimney was big enough. My parents main reason for not teaching me to believe in Santa was because once I figured out that Santa wasn't real, I might apply that same child-logic on the central figure in my parents' belief system- Jesus. I don't know if I would have or not, but what it amounts to now is I think a belief in Santa is unnecessary and belief in Jesus is highly necessary. 
Sometimes, though, a kid can get Santa stuck in her head despite her family's best efforts. Two years ago, my then four-year-old sister Hope heard from somewhere about Jolly Ole St Nick, and even though my family and I tried our best to persuade her otherwise, she still insisted that Santa was real and he was going to bring her presents. It was the nuttiest thing! After that Christmas, she hasn't mentioned Santa again. I don't know if she still thinks he is real, despite our best efforts.

SilverC · Nov 30, 2002

I found out in the fifth grade too, FemmeDemonica. 
I was a very naughty girl and looked in my parents' closet for my presents. I found a Nintendo system (woo Mario!). Anywho, come Christmas morning, the Nintendo was not there. Then my dad pulled out a large present and said "This is from Santa". It was, of course, the nintendo. So that's how I knew. I ruined Christmas for myself. Naughty, naughty me!

Michael · Nov 30, 2002

I don't remember how old I was but I was staying at my grandparent's when I found out for sure. I think I already had an idea. I was sleeping on the floor in a spare bedroom and I saw the light in the family room come on. I could see straight down the hall into the family room and I could see and hear everyone filling our stockings. 
I can't say that I'm damaged from the whole "Santa" thing but the thought of lying to your children for so long just doesn't really appeal to me. Of course I'll probably do it because everyone else does (isn't that reason enough?) but still, it just seems wrong.

GhostUser · Nov 30, 2002

I'm hurt. After all these years of sneaking down your freakin' chimneys at night- I'm not as young as I used to be, you know- and this is how you repay me?? 
I sure as heck KNOW I exist!!! 
ho ho ho... hhmph! 
Santa will always visit you, as long as you believe. <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="/images/smilies/wink3.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="

">

Skylark · Nov 30, 2002

If I end up marrying someone who wants to teach our children that Santa is real and he absolutely will not back down, then I'd probably concede and tell the children, "Dad is the Santa expert. If you want to know anything about Santa, you have to ask him." But that's only if it's the one superimportant issue that my hubby wants me to relent on. I can't imagine Santa being that important to any adult, except maybe Tim Allen.

Skylark · Nov 30, 2002

Thanks, SS, that clears it up for me.

GhostUser · Dec 2, 2002

i found out VERY young, dont remember how though

GhostUser · Nov 27, 2003

<div class="quote-container">Quote:
<div class="quote-block">Originally Posted by Avalon <a href="/forum/post/0"><img alt="View Post" class="inlineimg" src="/img/forum/go_quote.gif" style=""></a> 
I still 'believe'. I sit up on X-mas night each year and listen to the Santa reports on the radio- I dunno if you guys get this in the US, but up here the Canadian Military broadcasts Santa Sightings, and "UFO's that look as though they are being pulled by eight tiny UFO's!!" It rocks my socks off. </div>
</div>
 
This is an ancient thread, but I have to bump it for this reason alone --- 
I LOVE THE CANADIAN MILITARY SANTA SIGHTINGS ON CBC!!!! OMG!!!!!!!! That is SOOOOO cool!

Strix · Nov 27, 2003

I was in third grade, my mother told me and I bawled my eyes out. I yelled at my mom and cried over and over again how she lied to me and that I thought lying was wrong. I was relentless <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="/images/smilies/brood.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title=":brood:"> 
I called my dad on the phone, crying and he then talked to my mom, giving it to her good <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="/images/smilies/smiley.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="

"> I was pretty upset for a day or two, but, I guess it was the lying factor that hurt most. My dad had always made Christmas SO awesome that I think he was mad at my mother, too, for ending all his fun. I got over it quickly, but I really missed believing.

How did you find out about Santa?

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