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Living Next Door to Batman
Toddlers and Imaginary Friends By Wendy Kelly
nd children know exactly what they are doing.
And that is the experience I have had with my neighbor and my son. Even though my son addresses our neighbor as Batman or Spiderman and plays along with him, he is completely aware that he is playing with Ted. That is not to say that things can't get carried away. Even as adults, we know a scary movie is make believe, but we are afraid anyway. In the same way, imaginary companions can be dear friends -- or scary, intimidating bullies.
Taylor relates a story of a child with an imaginary companion named Shark. Sometimes Shark was friendly, but Shark could be nasty as well and scared the little boy who imagined him. The solution was for the mother to have a talk with Shark as if he were real.
When my son came running upstairs one night calling out in a frightened voice: "Monkeys and gorillas mommy! There are monkeys and gorillas downstairs!" I decided to simply play along, and I quickly adopted a rule that all friends, imaginary or not, had to abide by the same rules in our house. "Did you invite them?" I asked. "Yes," he replied. "Are they being polite?" I asked. "No," he answered, thoughtfully. "Well then, maybe it's time for them to go home," I said, and we marched downstairs where I proceeded to ask, forcefully, for these unwanted "friends" to go home. It worked, and now I can occasionally hear my son asking his "friends" to go home when they are not being friendly.
Another toddler Taylor encountered had an imaginary sick bunny. The sick bunny had to be looked after, and so the child would not accompany the family on outings. Taylor suggested creating a nurse bunny to look after sick bunny. The parents did this, and it worked! As long as the bunny was taken care of, the child could leave.
At our home, all is well. We occasionally have stampeding horses run from the dining room to the living room. The gorillas continue to sleep with my husband and me, taking the idea of a family bed to new heights. A goose lives outdoors in the dirt. And the monkeys are still welcome.
As long as they clean up after themselves.
And we are fairly normal.