<p>okay… I don’t know if these are lies – but they are a little dishonest…</p>
<p>Many moons ago, we were out of the kids, favorite cereals, so I made some oatmeal and served it to them. They asked what it was and I told them that it was “special”. For years, they called oatmeal, “Special”.</p>
<p>My older son hates cheese – all cheese. So once when I made him a bagel, I put strawberry cream cheese on it and told him it was “pink butter.” So… in our house, strawberry cream cheese is called “pink butter” (ok, that one does qualify as a “lie”.)</p>
<p>When my kids were little and strongly believed in Santa Claus, I wanted my kids to change a few “bad habits”. So… around Thanksgiving, I put an envelope with each kid’s name on it on the fireplace. In the morning, the kids found the envelopes (they could recognize their names) and I read the “notes” that were inside. The notes were from SANTA!!! And Santa was telling them what they needed to do in order to get presents on Christmas!!! Boy, were these kids cooperative!!!</p>
<p>Hey, I bet spiders do hide in the canopies of canopy beds!!!</p>
<p>Her kids kept giving her long lists at Christmas time. When she said that she can’t afford all those things, the kids said, “Why do you care, the gifts come from Santa,” So she told them that after Christmas, parents have to send Santa money to pay for all the gifts. (I think that really does happen and Santa’s name is VISA.)</p>
<p>I totally agree!!! How can you expect your kids not to do something if they hear that you used to do it??? Kids have a way of thinking, “Well, mom (or dad) used to do XXXXX, and she/he turned out okay.” </p>
<p>We had a youth minister at our church who used to tell teens, “When I was younger I lived a very sinful life. I slept with a lot of girls. I had a lot of “one night stands”.” I told him that it was okay to tell adults that story but he shouldn’t tell teens. Afterall, he is a successful man today and kids will think that they can be promiscuous when they are young and still be okay as adults. Plus, I reminded him that he has no idea if any of those “one night stands” led to any abortions by the girl (this is a Catholic youth minister). Once I said that, he understood the error of his words.</p>
<p>I do think that kids can benefit from some information (especially if the action had a bad result - such as a DUI or a failed class or something along those lines) but sometimes its better to change the name to some one that your child doesn’t know and emphasize the “bad result”. Otherwise, again, the kids will think that everything “eventually” turned out okay.</p>
<p>I once gave my elementary aged D steamed milk from Starbucks and told her it was a “plain white latte.” She bought it for a while, but then figured out what it really was.</p>
<p>Spiders in canopies of canopy beds…yes. We got rid of the canopy.</p>
<p>When my youngest was little (3 maybe), she didn’t like to eat potatoes, even french fries. I think it was all in her head–she just had it in her brain that she didn’t like potatoes and that was that. One day while at the Sizzler (when they used to have the “kid’s bar”), I put some hash browns on her plate for her to eat (they were pressed into McNugget form). She said that she didn’t eat potatoes–I told her the hash browns were chicken. She ate them…</p>
<p>she just had it in her brain that she didn’t like potatoes and that was that. …I told her the hash browns were chicken. She ate them…</p>
<p>We have had to resort to similar “tricks” numerous times. Kids will just “get it into their heads” that they don’t like a basic food item that we, as parents, know isn’t “unlikable” (like potatoes, rice, noodles, etc). </p>
<p>My older son insists that he doesn’t like mayonaisse, yet he loves ranch dressing (which is mayo with seasonings & buttermilk). So…whenever I use mayo in some recipe, he thinks I’ve used ranch dressing. Oh well…</p>
<p>Off subject a bit. When my best friend was married to her first husband, he said that he hated onions and insisted that she never use onions in her cooking. Well, she couldn’t stand for that, so she used to buy tons of onion powder and powder away… If it was a food or sauce that could be put in a food processor, then she would use regular onions. Well, when he left her for another woman, she got a bit of a kick out of telling him that, “oh by the way, you have been eating onions for years…” He was a real horse’s patootie!</p>
<p>(And aren’t we all proud of ourselves when we can trick them into eating stuff that they insist that they “hate” !!! I just love it!!! )</p>
<p>If I smothered it in ketchup the youngest would eat almost anything. We went through a lot of ketchup when he was young. But there are still foods he won’t eat because he doesn’t like the feel of it in his mouth. I have the same problem with coconut (love the taste but don’t like the feel), so I let those foods go.</p>
<p>When mine were learning to read they still wanted me to read to them every night and I wanted them to practice reading. So . . . I bought some new books and called them “sharing books,” which meant I would read one page then they had to read the next. I told them these books couldn’t be read by just one person. By the time they got to chapter books they’d figured it out, but still enjoyed the “shared” reading.</p>
<p>When my children had headaches or tummy aches or any of those things, we gave them a Tums and told them “don’t worry, the placebo will take care of it.” (I hated lying to my children.) This lasted until I got a call from the school: “your daughter says she has a headache and would like a placebo. Apparently, I have the wrong kind of placebo. What kind of placebo would you like me to give?”</p>
<p>However, our tooth fairy was also extremely slow.</p>
<p>well I wouldn’t call it a lie. but we had monster-be-gone spray, that I would spray around the room at night- it was lavender scented for a refreshing monster free rest :)</p>
<p>When S was way too old for his bottle (about 2 or 2 1/2), we were staying in a hotel. I told him that the maid cleaned the room and threw his bottle away; worked like a charm.</p>
<p>Arrgh, who invented this whole toothfairy thing, anyway? Not that I could complain; I unnecessarily complicated the whole thing by adding fairy dust (silver sprinkles) to the money. Anyway, my TF lie was, “well, of course there’s nothing there–you got up too early. The tooth fairy didn’t get here yet, check again after you come out of the bathroom!”</p>
<p>RE special oatmeal–when my S was very young, he needed to take medicine every night for three months, which came as a pill. Since he was too young to swallow it, we crushed it up and mixed it with grape jelly. so, every evening, we made a big deal about him getting “special jelly”!</p>
<p>In moving stuff out of our basement this weekend in anticipation of having it finished, a big ole box of pictures surfaced that my son delighted in going through. Many were from the college years. I eventually gave up lying, as there were just too many incriminating photos. One in particular makes me want to seriously re-consider sending him to college. I’m worried that I’ll have no parental authority (let alone dignity) to call on not matter how idiotic he behaves.</p>
<p>DMD- My oldest used to complain a lot about stomachaches and things like carrots made her throat itch. For years we just thought it was her personality. She was pretty prickly. We would give her Tums anytime she had an ailment. Her pediatrician also humored her and said have your Mom give you a tums when your tummy hurts.
Boy did both of us feel really bad when at age 13 my D was diagnosed with asthma. The allergy specialist also discovered that my D was alllergic to a wide array of foods. Including carrots.
My worst lie was telling my spouse that the lamb kabob he was eating was beef.
My kids when they were little didn’t think they wanted to eat cow. So we called all beef brown chicken.</p>
<p>I can’t eat carrots that aren’t organic- root vegetables absorb more chemicals than vegetables that are just sprayed- your D might try that unless she has a very serious allergy, to see if organic makes a difference</p>
<ul>
<li>I put boca burgers in spghetti and let my husband think it is hamburger :)</li>
</ul>
<p>Mom60, scary story! My kids, thankfully, are allergy free. And they complained only rarely about things like tummyaches and headaches. To this day my favorite headache remedy is still “drink a large glass of water and wait 10 minutes.” It astonishes me how often it works. I must say, before I got to “asthma”, I thought “she’s going to say celiac disease.” A friend’s child was recently diagnosed after years of stomach aches.</p>