Should You Tell Your Kid You Were Canned?

So you figured that it would happen at one point in your life and it finally did.  You’ve been fired.  Pink-slipped.  Handed your walking papers.  Now what on earth do you tell the kids?

My initial gut would have been to sugarcoat it…spin a fairy tale worthy of Walt Disney himself.  But then I read a piece in the Huffington Post by Mika Brzezinski’s, co-anchor of MSNBC’s Morning Joe.   A few years before landing the cable gig,  Brzezinski was a hot shot at CBS News:  anchor of the weekend newscast and correspondent for 60 Minutes Wednesday.  A network shakeup sent her to the unemployment line, clutching a severance package and a bruised ego.

When the time came to break it to her two daughters, she “fed them a speech” on how good it was going to be, how mommy would be around more and isn’t that just wonderful?

Brzezinski felt satisfied that she had adequately protected her children from life’s harsher realities…but the next day, a teacher called.  Her eight-year-old was beside herself and the teacher needed Mom to come to school as soon as possible.  Here’s what happened:

“I found Carlie outside of her classroom in the fetal position; her teacher crouched over with her hand on Carlie’s shoulder. My child was clearly upset; the teacher looked uncomfortable and said in a low voice, ‘Carlie tells me you’re leaving your job, and she’s very upset.’ I turned to Carlie and said, ‘That’s a good thing, right? It’s a good thing because we’ll get time together. No more rushing. No more missing your events. No more job!’ She pulled her head up, and, with two big blue eyes pooling with tears, said, ‘But Mommy, you love it so much! I don’t want you to have to leave your job.’”

Brzezinski realized right then that you can’t hide all the nasty bits of life from your kids.  It’s okay to show them that you can be discouraged, sad…even angry at times.  Above all,  the important thing was to be honest with your kid.  The truth is always the way.

Because, guess what?  They know it anyway!  It’s a lesson that we seem to have to learn time and time again:  Kids aren’t stupid.

Do you agree?  How much do you share with your kids? How much is too much?

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Tags: children, family, kids, parent, parenting, parents, talking to children