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Frayda Sheldon told Home Truths about her son, Kenneth’s, imaginary friend called Bobbin and how he helped Kenneth, as a child, to understand the concept of death…

The first Frayda knew about her son’s imaginary friend was when Kenneth announced that his friend was coming to stay for a while. Kenneth was about two and a half at the time and Bobbin, his illusory pal, was, he told his mother, 6 years old. Frayda thinks that the appearance of the friend coincided with Kenneth trying to understand the meaning of death. "I was in the kitchen and Kenneth came into me and said ‘Come out in the garden, there’s something wrong with a bird’. I went out and this bird was dead - a cat had obviously got it. Kenneth said, ‘Make it fly’. I said ‘I have many talents, but I cannot make this bird fly. He said, ‘Why not?’, I said ‘Because it’s dead’. He said ‘What does dead mean?’

Frayda felt that the only thing she could do was tell her son what happens physically when you die - the heart stops pumping blood round the body and brain. When Frayda suggested burying the bird, Kenneth protested. He insisted that it was put on top of the compost heap. The next morning, Frayda found Kenneth and Bobbin in the garden, down by the compost heap, discussing the way the bird was rotting. They loved watching the decompsoing body.

For the next year, Kenneth developed the habit of asking any and everyone what would happen to them when they died. Bobbin was around all this time, he even started nursery school with Kenneth. One day he came home and Fradya realised, "He’d obviously been told the story of Jesus. He said ‘Is it true, that if you’re good you go to heaven, which is a nice place and if you’re bad you go to hell which is a horrible place - do you think that’s true?" I said ‘No.’ Kenneth then asked, ‘What do you think is true?" I said there’s lots of theories, but the one I like is that we’ve all got a special part inside us which is nothing to do with our body. Some people call it a soul and some people call it an inner spirit. I think when our bodies rot like the birds did, then this special part may go on to another place and all its friends and families and the people it loves, their souls and inner spirits join them." Frayda felt that at the age of 4, it was too harsh to say to her son, "When you die, that’s it!"

Kenneth thought about what his mother had said, "literally you could see him thinking.." Then he replied, "That’s all right because I know my inner spirit". Frayda asked him how he knew, and Kenneth replied "It’s Bobbin." Frayda felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up, "I just knew he was right". The next morning Kenneth announced that Bobbin had gone to live with another family.

Frayda’s feeling is that when a child creates an imaginary friend, they do it for a purpose, such as confidence. For Kenneth, Bobbin's role was important,"I think the concept of death could not have been overcome if it hadn’t of been for Bobbin. He was there to help Kenneth through the concept of death."

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