To ask how those of us who were smacked

There’s a huge difference between the 2 scenarios. We know children’s brains go through critical development in the first 5 years of life. That’s when they learn about the world, how people interact, they form core views of themselves and what to expect from other people. A child growing up where they feel safe, nurtured & able to control their emotions (through good role modelling) is going to have very different foundations from someone who grew up with parents who made them feel scared and hurt them.

"giggling at the dinner table."
Gosh so glad we have moved on from children should be seen and not heard, I can't imagine an expression of joy being punished nowadays!

i was smacked infrequently but reading your OP instantly brought back the feelings of humiliation. I was so mortified and scared and embarrassed by it all. Dreadful for a little person to go through alone. I remember each and every occasion (the emotional fallout not any “lesson learned”).

I don’t care that we were smacked as children. I think my parents did the best they knew how.

It's something I would never do to ds. My dad smacked us as a form of discipline when we misbehaved etc and it was always one moderately hard smack job done then reconcile. It was very much a case of him parenting the way he had been parented and what he thought was 'right'. I don't think it ever taught us anything because we still did the same behaviours and then just tried to be better at hiding things or avoiding him - it definitely didn't actually help us to stop and think about what we were doing and why it wasn't a good idea. My mum often smacked because she felt overwhelmed, couldn't cope and I guess didn't have the emotional resource or parenting strategies to manage us better and she moved over into physical abuse with it, smacking repeatedly until she was out of breath. It taught me nothing apart from that she couldn't cope with me and that she really must not like/love me very much.

I think smacking is a dangerous road to go down because we all get days where we are overwhelmed and kids are being challenging and I think when we move to smacking in those moments rather than actually grounding ourselves and using other skills it's more likely to get out of hand because you've already crossed that boundary for yourself. I also think you cannot teach children not to hit or be violent when you're then modelling hitting and violent behaviour, you're undermining yourself. I would never expect ds to tolerate or think it's ok for anyone to hit him, so why would I want to teach him that it's ok for him to be physically hurt by me. Again it undermines what I try to teach him even at an early age about respect for our bodies/ consent/ safe hands.

I remember reading a thing a while ago about how for many children their parents are actually the first bullies they encounter without even realising it and that really stuck with me. For me smacking falls into that category.

". I don't know why she didn't love me"

Because she didn't love herself. Your child is a defenceless mirror of yourself , so if you don't think much of yourself then it acts out on your child. It was nothing you did, and I hope you can heal

Born in 1975. Have a younger brother who was deemed to have 'special needs'. I got the blame for everything he did. He definitely was a trouble maker. I mostly got smacked or beaten by dad. He died when I was 20. Frankly his death was a blessing. I shed no tears whatsoever. I was beaten with hand, slipper, belt, bath brush.

On a different note, my DH's nephew (DH's older sisters son) was smacked around the head by his father. Developed epilepsy. Is now dead.

I was, particularly by my Dad, who found my personality difficult. To me it's wrong - it's violence against children - taking our your frustration on a child is not ok

I was smacked as a child, not what anyone would call abuse and probably would still be defended by my mum.
I distinctly remember the most horrible desolate, lonely feeling. I remember crying and begging saying ‘mummy, mummy, mummy’ I was desperate for comfort and she was ignoring me. Then something twigged in my little brain and I thought ‘why do I want her when she hit me?’. I remember the thoughts and feelings so very clearly. Funnily enough I remember neither the pain of the smack nor the thing I did wrong (I don’t think I understood what I’d done at the time either). I do think it was harmful to me, that gut punching loneliness is never far from me, I’m very sensitive to perceived rejection, it definitely harmed my bond with my mum. I also struggled with lashing out and aggressive behaviour when something felt ‘justified’ somehow.

My Mum smacked me. She put me over her knee and hit my backside with a wooden hairbrush.

My thoughts...

It hurt but not dreadfully (some of my friends got the belt from their Dad's!)

I had been properly naughty....it was never done in anger for no good reason.

It didn't really work. I was just a spirited adventurous child. So while the threat of the punishment sort of put the brakes on me a bit, it didn't stop me much.

The most effective punishment she gave me was when I stole some daffodils. She was a keen gardener and they were some special type so she knew exactly where they had come from. She made me go to the house, own up and apologise. That was extremely effective. Probably when she hit me it was times when that sort of option wasn't available.

Being a parent myself I vowed never to.smack my two for that reason - smacking didn't really work. I would be better chatting to them as to why and explain then why not and that is what I did and it was successful.

Interestingly, my Mum who helped care for my two in the holidays never dreamt of hitting them. She said that was partly because she now didn't think.it was right but also that they were lovely kids and I was a nightmare!

My Mum claimed not to believe in smacking but did smack me, more than once at a time, on several occasions, usually for nothing. The hypocrisy made it worse. Once, when I was 6, she said that I'd played a note wrong on the piano, and I said I hadn't, and she said I wasn't allowed to contradict her when she said I'd played a note wrong. A few minutes later, she said I'd played a note wrong when I knew I hadn't, and I instinctively said I hadn't, and she chased me up the stairs, threw me on my bed and smacked me several times. She'd engineered the whole situation to assert dominance.

Once, when I was about 14, my brother and my Dad were away, she hit me because I'd used up a roll of toilet paper too fast (?!), so I hit her back and we ended up having a full physical fight, which she won. Of course she did, she was a very physically fit adult and I was a weedy 14 yo the size of a 10 yo who hated all sports. She will never back down from an argument, even if she knows she is wrong.

It was usually when my Dad wasn't around, although he did give me the odd smack- in fairness it was always when I was being a terror and behaviour most kids would have got smacked for in the 90s. At least he owned it and didn't give sermons on why smacking was wrong.

I remember going through most of my childhood being scared of her and for a good portion of it I hated her. It wasn't just smacking, she was highly controlling and came up with cruel and unusual punishments for all sorts of things which weren't even bad behaviour imo.

We were low contact through most of my early adulthood.

We have a fairly good relationship now. She denies any of those events ever happened and claims she was a warm, lovely, gentle mother and I have a wild imagination to remember her as overbearing, cruel and angry.

She still makes underhanded spiteful comments from time to time and I pretend I don't hear them. She no longer affects me with her behaviour, but I still bear the impact of how she was in my childhood.

I would never, ever lay a finger on my DD and will never engage in the authoritarian controlling tactics I endured either. There is never any need for it; good parenting is about prevention and setting your children up for success, not punishing them for failure.

1970s.

My DM smacked me very infrequently, and the one time I clearly remember it, I 100% was being a wilful little pain in the arse who had ignored several warnings.

I would always run away crying, and within 5-10 minutes she would come and find me, we'd make up, and it was over.

When she smacked me it was always clearly linked to something I had done, and always for something fairly major. She and I had an excellent relationship up until the time she died. I still really miss her and have no hard feelings towards at her at all. She was an excellent parent, very loving, encouraging and genuine, and I don't feel that she was abusive in the slightest: my school still had the cane and the slipper, rarely used to but known to be in the headmaster's study.

My father on the other hand was vindictive and very heavy handed. He regularly threatened me with being hit over quite petty things, and seemed to enjoy scaring me. Was he abusive? I would say yes, but physical punishment from him wasn't straightforward punishment for misbehaviour, it was part of a wider pattern of bullying and control.

Smacked often and hard, always in anger, often out of the blue (if we saw it coming, we’d run). This was the 70s. You used to often hear adults threatening to pull their kids pants down and smack their bottoms. It was all about control and humiliation, outrage that children had wills of their own, annoyance at normal childlike behaviour (noise, squabbling, dysregulation). It taught me to fear my dad (he got harder and was a lot quicker to anger/more difficult to predict) and to disrespect my mum (she couldn’t move fast enough to reach us as we ran, and it would be my dad who followed through later - the classic ‘wait ‘til your father gets home’). I loved my parents, but I’m sorry, their parenting was crap and I will never understand how a grown man can grab a child by the back of their collar and whack them because they don’t like how they’re behaving/the tone of their voice/the look on their face. It may not have ‘done me any harm’, but it definitely marred my childhood, if not my love for them, and it wasn’t until well into adulthood that I was able to let go of my anger towards my parents. What amazes me, is that we were out playing for so much of the time, out from under their feet, demanding so much less of them (in terms of time) than kids today expect. Parenting was so much less intense back then, yet parents seemed to have such short fuses, such an inability to control their anger and irritation. It baffles me.

Smacked? I was leathered

Not abusive as such, but I think it was ignorant and/or lazy. The quick (and completely ineffective) solution to bad behaviour instead of taking a minute to think about why it’s happening and how else to handle it. My Mum made a lot of questionable parenting decisions including smacking and I we don’t have a close relationship as adults.

I was smacked by my Mum never my Dad. It was on the legs or backside and punishment for doing something wrong obviously. It was acceptable at the time, it was rare for me and I don't think about it now but I can see looking back how others could have abused this and I'm glad smacking is no longer acceptable.

I was smacked by a teacher repeatedly as I struggled with my times tables - she smacked and shook me by my shoulders repeatedly for failure to grasp them - I am so angry and upset now as an adult that she did this to me - this was in the 70’s -

I was smacked by both parents, also by a teacher in primary school. I dwell more on the neglect and emotional abuse I suffered by my mother. She scapegoated me as a child which affected all my future relationships. Thankfully therapy has sorted that out but I still can't understand why she hated me so much. It was insidious.

I was smacked as a child and I think I tainted the relationship I now have with my parents. My dad mostly, he is a very angry man, still is, but my Mum said some really nasty passive aggressive things to me as a teen.

I hit my son once and deeply regret it, I was deep in the newborn fog when DS2 was only maybe 2 months old and struggling with life, DS1 was being alert challenging and I lost my temper. I apoligised to him and I've not done it again since. I am working on my shouting, I don't want to rule with fear as my own Dad did, and I certainly don't want them to feel about me the way I do about my Dad now.

I was smacked constantly as a child. Whether I misbehaved or otherwise by my mum. Yes that was abusive. Whereas my dad smacked me once in my life, for running in the road when a car was coming. I learnt from that mistake and never did it again and I don’t blame him for that.

My dad was the smacker.
I remember one time me and older brother had a disagreement on who was washing the dishes or drying.
Dad got his belt out and we both had thick bruises up our legs.
Brother was able to cover his but I wore a skirt.
Went to a catholic school and all the teachers (nuns) said we must have deserved it.
Mum just stood and watched.

Small-minded? For sharing their OWN experience and feelings? I think you're the one that is small-minded as you are unable to see that other people will have a different perspective. How very bizarre.

I was smacked as a kid, it was the norm along with smoking indoors and misogynistic Saturday evening TV shows and all the other hallmarks of the time.

It doesn't bother me now, I don't think about it.

I don't think people see it as being effective now which is why they don't do it.

It's the same strategy as the UK police use - diffuse the situation rather than escalate it. If you hit someone they will scream/cry harder, which isn't a logical strategy when you want someone to calm down and listen to you.

If you can't imagine the mental (and physical?!) impact of being physically attacked by someone who is bigger, stronger, and 100% in charge of your life, that you depend upon .... then there's some pretty deep damage there. Which is pretty sad. I've had to do a lot of work on myself, not all because of my parents. But there was definitely a lot of 'I'm OK, it hasn't affected me', people pleasing, BS I had to get past in order to actually grow.