Bed time stories

‘Remember Corona virus?’.....

Suggested bedtime story topic from my 3 year old. It’s been a little over three months since this monster attacked my city and I thought I had done a decent job of shielding the younger one like wonder woman. But somehow it had crept into our favourite time of the day. Like a termite infestation. Eating away to satisfy a voracious craving, multiplying itself and leaving a pile of dust as a reminder... ‘I was here’.

I tried to change the topic to more self esteem building stories, positive reinforcements and tales of two boys changing the world. ‘Tell me the story of Corona virus and when it came to our planet’. He insists, refusing neither to be distracted nor dozing off. How do I introduce this bad guy without the fear and panic? This is my monster....everyday...lurking under my bed, waiting for me to slip an arm or leg. Every day that we are spared by him is a dodged bullet. Do I even want this to be part of the scrapbook of his memories from this year? It’s definitely not going to be included in mine, it will forever sit outside, along with 2016.

I couldn’t think of any interesting way to tell the story of this virus...What could I say? the world defeated it by washing their hands? Seriously!? Or that we all got vaccinated and went back to normal? There isn’t a happily ever after when this is all over. So I let him make up all of it...what it looked like, how it attacked, how he defeated it, saved the world and went to Harvard (that’s a MUST!). As he snored away, dreaming of chocolate fountains, dinosaurs and a world where anything is possible....I was overcome by grief and disappointment. 

This was not part of the plan and he was not supposed to know! How do I undo this? Can I make it go away?