I always remember my Mam shaking her head at me and my sister.
‘You’d get me hung, you would!’ she’d say, laughing, as we’d let slip yet another secret that she’d asked us to keep.
It would be something silly or small, usually if she’d bought us a new pair of shoes or yet another new outfit that she’d told us not to tell Dad about.
Then, of course, as soon as he’d come in from work, that would be the first thing we’d burst out with. He’d look at Mam and roll his eyes, while she tried to shush us before he saw the price tag.
That memory sprung to mind when I saw a Mumsnet thread this week, from a parent who had told her six-year-old daughter to pretend to be sick on a Thursday afternoon, when she was really going away for a long weekend on the Friday and would be sneaking her out of school for the day.
Of course, the little girl had immediately told her teacher that she was going to be sick the next day. When her teacher had questioned her, she happily announced, ‘We’re going on holiday, and Mummy doesn’t want me to tell you, so she said to tell you I would be sick tomorrow.’
I can’t stop cringing for her – especially as the teacher asked to have a word with the mum in question at the end of the day and told her she knew! Can you imagine the horror?
I mean, obviously this woman should never have told her daughter to lie about being ill in the first place – she admits it herself in the thread. But we’ve all done silly things that we regret two minutes later.
It’s too late for her – but please, other parents, particularly parents with young children, learn from her mistake. Your little ones are not to be trusted! Not with anything!
Me and my husband Tom have learnt the hard way. Don’t tell them a thing!
Not that, you know, we’re trusting them with state secrets or anything. Just daft little things that we’d prefer them to keep to themselves.
‘I told you not to tell Mammy,’ my husband will say in exasperation
Like, when my second child, Immy, was about to turn two, and I thought it would be a sweet idea to take our eldest, Theo, then four, shopping to let him choose a birthday present for her.
I left it until just two days before her big day – safe enough, I thought. He picked a mini Care Bear, green, because apparently that was her favourite colour. He also picked himself a matching purple one, but I digress.
‘Remember though, it’s a surprise,’ I told him, crouching down to look him straight in the eye at the checkout. ‘We’re not going to tell her about it and then we can wrap it up and give it to Immy on her birthday.’
Wide-eyed and innocent, he had looked back at me and nodded seriously. I really thought it had sunk in. Until the minute we walked in through the front door and he’d shouted, ‘Immy, I bought you a soft toy at the shop!’ ‘Oooh, can I see it?’ she asked, her eyes bright with excitement.
Before I could stop them, the two of them had delved into the shopping bag, emerged with the Care Bears and had ran into the living room to start playing with them.
And that was far from the only time. It happens regularly, even now that they are five and three – usually Immy is the culprit. ‘Guess what?’ she’ll say when I come in from the gym. ‘Daddy gave me a chocolate biscuit.’
Tom, stood behind her, will groan. ‘I told you not to tell Mammy,’ he’ll say in exasperation, ushering her into her bedroom. ‘It was the only way I could get her to eat her dinner.’
Or when she’ll come back from her grandparents’ house, the first thing she’ll tell us is that she was allowed to skip her fruit and just have cheese and crackers for lunch.
Now a bit older and in reception class, Theo is slightly better – although he does still love to tell you if he has a secret, and he isn’t exactly the toughest nut to crack. A couple of questions and you can have it out of him in no time.
Like the time he came home, grinning, and told me he had something in his bag. ‘A surprise!’ he beamed. ‘Oh, I said distractedly, trying to juggle his water bottle, rain coat and umbrella. ‘What surprise?’ ‘A Mother’s Day card!’ he blurted. ‘For you!’
If, therefore, we ever decide to sneak him out of school for a mid-term holiday, we definitely won’t be telling him until the morning that it’s happening. In fact, he’d still be likely to spill the beans when we got back, so it will probably be safest for us to stick to the rules and not break them out of school when we shouldn’t.
Either that, or at least tell the teachers what we’re planning to do ourselves and risk their wrath, before Theo does.
Because, when it comes to kids, as we – and the poor woman who posted in Mumsnet – have learnt, honesty really is the best policy.
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