Before I had my child, I was determined to be the kind of parent who would be completely honest. Tell the truth, always, no matter how hard the question was. I suppose this was mainly because I was a little indignant about how many fibs I was told as a child – from the necessary to whatever my parents thought was funny.
I was a curious child who asked too many questions, it seemed, so perhaps little white lies were told to me so my parents could appease their boredom that ensued from having to reply to a hundred “Why’s” about everything in the world. Still, I didn’t appreciate misinformation like how the “L” plate on car licence plates (in those days, it stood for “learner’s licence”) stood for “Lion”. This meant that every time a car with a learner’s licence drove by, I would be terrified, thinking it contained a ferocious animal.
Not being totally naïve, I figured that there would be times when I would have to lie to my toddler to protect him from harsh truths that he was not old enough to handle yet, or to avoid hurting his feelings unnecessarily.
What I hadn’t expected was having to lie to him so soon – just to stop him from attempting dangerous feats, when no amount of reasoning would do (in my opinion, reasoning with toddlers is like reasoning with an inebriated man intent on grabbing the microphone at a karaoke bar), from eating things that are bad for his health, to do things that are good for him, to prevent him from running a water bill up to three digits and so on.
Here’s a list of shamefaced lies I’ve had to tell, although, I swear, some of them were absolutely vital:
- “This ice cream tastes horrible. Really. You wouldn’t want any.”
- “There’s no more water in the tap. There’s no use turning it on.”
- “We’ll be home in five minutes! Be patient, okay?” (to a wriggly car seat passenger, when home is half an hour away)
- “This medicine tastes exactly like chocolate ice cream. It’s just not on a cone. Really.”
- (to a food striker, referring to a bowl of pasta) “This is delicious! Yummy, it’s got ice cream in it!”
- “Mummy can’t open this, it’s too tight!” (referring to bottle of Vicks, diaper cream, moisturiser or any other item the toddler wishes to ingest)
- “You go play with Papa at the play gym, okay? Mummy will wait right here, outside.” (then run off to get a massage)
- “This Coke tastes horrible. Really. You wouldn’t want any.”
- “I don’t know how to call anybody on the phone. There’s no one to call.”
- “Mummy doesn’t know where her phone is.”
- “Stop messing up the clothes! That auntie is going to come and scold you!” (in a departmental store, not a salesperson in sight)
- “No, we’re not going swimming today. The pool is closed.” (Mummy feeling lazy)
- “We’re going to the playground today! Yay!” (then bring him to the doctor’s)
It might be easy to tell your toddler white lies to enjoy your Cornetto in peace (“Mummy’s in the shower!”) but what I’m not looking forward to is having to explain the concepts of sex, religion or death to him later (hopefully much later). I may feel strongly about being absolutely honest about those important issues, but it will be tempting to whitewash ugly truths to imagine a world that is not quite so bleak for our children.
In the meantime, I’ll be working on trying not to mislead my toddler into thinking every single food on the planet has ice cream in it.
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Janet Tay was a freelance writer and editor before becoming a stay-at-home mum. She has published short stories, book reviews and articles on books and the literary world in MPH Quill and The Star. She current juggles her time between writing and running after her toddler around the house.
