Things your parents did that you wouldnt dream of?

[Frasersmum123]

Is there anything that your parents did when you were younger that you wouldnt do?

Our used to leave us in the car while they went shopping, for what seemed like hours, but in reality was probably about half an hour.

There was 4 of us and we all used to squeeze into the back of my dads car, which had three seats.

[scrooged]

My dad used to smoke like a chimney, we ate chips every day, loads of things really

[MissisBoot]

I can remember being left in the back of an austin maxi on a really hot day and burning our bottoms on the plastic seats!

[Lawks]

Mine used to put a couple of duvets in the back of a 4x4 and go boozing at their club until the small hours while we slept in the carpark.

I have a feeling I'll be back to this thread...

[MissisBoot]

driving us to the beach with two of us in the boot (estate not a hatchback!)

[liath]

They left all of us (me age 9 and sisters age 7 and 5) in a hotel room in Italy and went out for the night. They checked it was OK with the hotel owner. My mum is fairly gobsmacked in retrospect that they did it.

[angelene]

Smacking (very rarely, last resort etc)
Putting my sister in her carry cot on the back seat of the old style VW Beetle with me and my other sister sitting on either end.
Driving all the way through France in a Morris Marina Estate, with the luggage on the back seat and the three of us in the boot!

Never did me any harm... [wibbles]

[nickytwotimes]

Putting baby rice in a bottle at 4 weeks.
Leaving a very young baby to cry it out.

Trust me, I am no attatchment parenting afficionado, but jeez, they did things differently then, didn't they?

Oh, and getting a pushchair by collecting cigarette coupons. I kid you not!

[Frasersmum123]

Just wanted to add that I love my parents!

[sweetkitty]

Smoking around us all the time
Weaning a premmie baby who was technically term
Making the holes in bottles bigger with nails to get rusk through
Smacking
Crap food we maybe had a banana once a week

[claireybeemine]

Piling loads of children into the back of the car

Leaving a bottle of milk between the bars of the cot for when we woke in the night.

Putting us in the pram (or playpen when older) at the end of the garden so my mum could get her housework done in peace.

Letting us cry it out from a couple of weeks old.

Putting raw egg in my bottle (on Dr's advice ), apparently I didn't drink much so it meant I got more nutrients

Weaning at 6 weeks

God there are loads

[MaureenMLove]

Oh it was so much more fun and more comfortable in the back of a car going on holiday in the old days! Me and my DB used to set up all the cushions and sleeping bags and snuggle down. The best fun was when we'd play a game that involved squatting on the back seats and seeing who could stay upright the longest, as we went round corners!

(Obviously, this is something that my parents did, that I would never do now!)

[mrsmaidamess]

When my Dad's friend came over ,(Colin) my Mum (who never smoked) used to sit and have a cigarette with him at the kitchen table! With me watching her, in shock.

Oh and we were NEVER strapped in the car, in fact we used to stand up on the back seat of my dad's open topped 2CV with our heads out the roof.. God I loved doing that.

We used to be put to bed in the back of the car with the seats down when we had a long holiday drive. I loved that too.

[mrsmaidamess]

Cutting the toe ends off our leather school shoes when we outgrew them, to make 'paddling shoes' for the beach.

Actually, that just makes good sense.

[nickytwotimes]

Me too, Frasersmum!
As I say, they did things differently then, didn't they?

Smoking whilst cuddling me, there's another one.

[MitchyInge]

cars just didn't have back seatbelts when I was young, it was great, we used to scramble all over one another (there were 7 of us children)

all average 70s/80s parenting I suppose - lots of physical freedom but not encouraged to have own opinion/say about anything much

so many things were forbidden that I just don't think twice about, like commercial television for example

[Saltire]

Well my mum left me outside a shop and got all the way home and dad said "wheres the baby". her reply was "What baby". She often left us outside shops, but in their defence it was a very small town where everyone knew everyone else

[2shoes]

used to leave me and db in the car on the street in London(at nighT) whilst they visite dmy auntie in hospital.

[brimfull]

My mum used to put 4 of us in the back of a mini,and we had friends back for tea

[brimfull]

I remember my mum giving my little brother 2 mugs of sweet tea when he woke up,whilst he stood up in his cot!

[2shoes]

Saltire lol I did that with the family dog

[squeaver]

All the usual rolling about/being packed into/being left alone in the backs of cars.

Being left in hotel rooms while they went out to dinner (in the hotel, to be fair) every night. I'd say that was from the age of the youngest being around 5/6, maybe younger.

Here's a good one - my Mum used to give us all half a valium on Christmas Eve to calm us down and make us sleep.

[squeaver]

Oh and I walked to school - from one side of the village to the other - from the age of 5.

[Lawks]

I used to ask my dad to blow cigarette smoke into a butter tin for me to play with.

[Pinkglow]

Controlled crying at 6 weeks (they say this was in their version of the Dr Spock book)

Rusk in bottle at a month old (as advised by HV)

smoking around us

oh and sticking me in front of the TV for hours on end (my mum says I should get a huge widescreen for this reason)

I love them though really they did many other things which I will be doing

[Frasersmum123]

My dad let me and my sister try a cigar when I was about 11. It put me off smoking for life! - not my sister though, she smokes like a trooper