Madeleine McCann: Her Parents Use Psychologist To Help Tell Twins About Madeleine

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Mail Online Sunday November 8th.

"The parents of Madeleine McCann have revealed how a child psychologist is helping them to tell their two other children about her disappearance.

Kate and Gerry McCann said they would be ‘frank and open’ with their four-year-old twinsSean and Amelie when they ask why their sister is still missing.

Mrs McCann, 41, said experts have said the youngsters will ask about Madeleine’s disappearance when they are ready.

‘We’ll be led by them,’ she said. ‘We’ve had advice from a child psychologist and they’ve said Sean and Amelie will lead the way.

‘If they ask a question, we’ll answer them honestly. I’m not going to rush them, but if they ask something then I’ll answer them.’

I'm slightly confused by the use of the conditional, "if," here. If they ask a question? Does that mean that they have not yet asked a question? And, "Sean and Amelie will lead the way." Does that mean they haven't yet done so?

The reason I pose these questions is that in January 2008, several news media, including The Metro, reported that the twins played a game called, "Find the monster that took Maddie." Now where did they get that from? Why did they believe that Maddie had been taken by a monster? Do you think they came up with that all by themselves?

Although there is a disclaimer at the foot of The Metro story, which adds that a source close to the McCanns said they denied the story, the game was reported by Ray Wire, said to be a "top criminologist," after meeting Kate and Gerry McCann, it was also repeated in The People, on January 20th 2008.

"By Daniel Jones

Maddie's little brother and sister are learning to cope with their devastating loss by playing a game called Find The Monster Who Snatched Her."

"Wyre went on: "Kate and Gerry told me they were sitting together the other day when the twins rushed into the room screaming and shouting.

"They asked what they were up to and the twins told them they were going to go and find the monster that took Maddie.

"Then they dashed off to play the game."

This article in the Scottish Daily Record Scottish Daily Record appeared later in April 2008, but it seems to demonstrate that members of the family were not exactly guarded about what they said around the twins. Eileen McCann, the twins' Scottish grandmother was interviewed, while Amelie was sitting on her lap. It doesn't say where the interview took place.

"LITTLE Amelie McCann clambered on to her grandmother's knee, gently touched the chain around her neck and whispered: "That's Madeleine. She's lost."

Later in the interview Eileen McCann says: "It's unimaginable. Whoever did this is a monster."

She also describes at length what she was told had happened that night, how Kate and Gerry left the children asleep, checked half-hourly, and how Kate found that Madeleine was gone. And all this with Amelie clambering onto her lap, but now Kate and Gerry say they will wait until the twins ask questions?

Another thing I picked up from that Daily Record article was that Eileen McCann, stressed each time she referred to Madeleine's being taken from her bed, that she had been taken, "in her pyjamas." I wonder why she kept stressing that? I think most people would assume that if a child had been left in bed asleep and they were taken from that bed, that they'd have been in pyjamas. No need to keep reinforcing that, surely?

In today's Mail Online article, Kate McCann is quoted as saying, "If they ask a question, we’ll answer them honestly. I’m not going to rush them, but if they ask something then I’ll answer them." Well, Kate, do you think your children don't actually listen to conversations going on around them?

Going back, once again, to that Scottish Daily Record article, I noticed that Eileen McCann talked about Madeleine's having spent Christmas at her house when she was two. (That would be Christmas 2005, when the twins were 10 months old.) She doesn't say that Madeleine was there with her parents and twin siblings. She just says, "When she was two, Madeleine spent Christmas at my house and it was lovely."

"The next year, the family came up for New Year but on Christmas Day Madeleine called and said she'd got a kitchen from Santa. She was very excited and said 'I'm going to make some tea'."

And differentiates the next year by saying that the family came up. I wonder why Madeleine was not part of the family Christmas that year, but instead spent it with her grandmother in Scotland? If Christmas with three children, all under three years old was difficult, surely Eileen, or some other member of the family could have stayed in Rothley to help out? In that way, Madeleine would have been part of the family celebration, especially as it was the twins' first Christmas.

I seem to have discovered a few extra puzzles there as I was looking for items about the twins and their search for Madeleine. The other reference to "monster," that occurs to me is that I recall Kate, I think, being quoted as saying that, "the only monster out there is the one who took Madeleine," but at the moment, I haven't found any link to that quote.