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What do you see?
"It's NOT my imagination!" screeched Maisy, aged seven and a half. It had all started during a visit to my friend. Her young daughter had entered the room, and after I asked what she had been doing, Maisy explained that she had been playing with her friend who was "a little girl from the old days". Her mother intervened to describe how Maisy often said she played with a girl, whom the family could not see. The girl was apparently dressed in nineteenth century clothes and adopted customs and habits of that historical era. Maisy's mother rolled her eyes and laughed, commenting "my daughter has such a vivid imagination" - a comment which Maisy took objection to.
Children are, of course, very accustomed to being told that something is just their imagination. It is a common strategy used by adults when children are too frightened to sleep for fear of a monster hiding under the bed, or are scared of ghostly noises that emerge in the middle of the night. It is also used as a compliment, when children write or tell stories about travel to other planets or lands filled with fairies. The phrase is also a convenient one for adults who do not want to confront issues of the unexplained. Could there be such a thing as a ghost of a child from another era? Could there be such a thing as a haunted house? Perhaps it is easier not to explore such issues if a child raises them; after all, the imagination is an equally plausible explanation, if not more so in many people's opinion. As far as Maisy was concerned, however, this was NOT her imagination.
But what does it feel like to be told that something, which is very real to you, is simply a figment of your imagination? This will have happened to many of us in adulthood, after confiding an unusual experience in someone we trust, often causing hurt. After all, you would have chosen your confidante carefully, assuming you would receive a respectful response, even if your listener believed that your experience was the result of an over active imagination. When a response is phrased in such a way that it is dismissive of your experience, it is unlikely that you will choose that same person to confide in again.
It is no different for children but often we forget that. Children need people with whom they can share, explore and discuss puzzling encounters. They are trying to make sense of the world. Children often do not question experiences which adults term unusual, such as having an invisible playmate, at least until they hear adults questioning them. After all, why should they? If something appears ‘real' why should a child doubt its existence? If they are told it is just their imagination, with no further discussion, they might then begin to doubt why they told anyone at all, and choose not to share this type of information with those adults again. At the very least, we owe children a chance to talk about this type of experience rather than simply dismissing them out of hand.
Of course, whether or not Maisy's playmate was simply a form of play - an ‘imaginary friend' if you like - or was what we might call ‘real' is an entirely different subject altogether.
