MoN, that is precisely it:

How difficult is it to tell your child that even if your teacher assures you that the food is verified safe, it still might not be safe. Even if the teacher feels like she went through a lot of work for YOU and you feel like you should eat it, you go ahead and hurt the teacher's feelings and decline.

You learn that you must do this not only with teachers, coaches, Santa Claus, etc. etc. etc.

but more than occasionally, even with VERY close family friends-- and family.

You can imagine that HG children are pretty good at connecting the dots there.

The problem is that to a 4yo, it's a pretty horrifying set of bare-faced facts to actually process, what this actually MEANS.

frown

Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.