To ask what the weirdest thing you experienced or saw at someone else's house when you were a child?

The house had the mother wearing a see through lingerie while coming to talk to us. When I gasped and looked away because I didn’t want to see her topless she asked me whether the issue is that me and my mum have small boobs and she had bigger ones. Switching on the TV at 7 am to the loudest setting when we were sleeping in the living room because that was the only place to sleep.

And then she decided to come and engage in a conversation about her intimate life when we were just teens.

Unfortunately though that was my step mum and that was on the first occasion when we were able to visit dad and apparently that was her being welcoming.

A primary school friend, went round once and used the loo but they couldn't afford toilet paper and instead used the freebie weekly newspaper... 😢

When I was a kid back in the 60s my friends mum used to stand in front of the fire, lift her skirt and warm her bare bum.

When I was a kid I used to go to my best friends house alot and we would sometimes play in his parents bedroom when they were out. His parents had a big photo of themselves completely naked, hanging on the wall

We were a weird family. We had no carpets, no central heating and all second hand furniture. We had one gas fire in the living room which was the only source of heat in the house. My parents never spent any money on the house at all and I was always very ashamed when friends came round. Everyone was made welcome though. Strangely, my siblings and I always had good clothes and shoes and food was plentiful. When my dad died, years ago, we discovered that he had in excess of £100,000 in his bank account. I believe I had a great childhood in spite of our terrible living conditions and loved my parents dearly. They are both gone now and I miss them every day. On another note, there was a family that lived in our road (nice, middle class area) and their daughter came to school on several occasions with a shaved head. She had nits and her mum's solution was to cut all her hair off. This was in the early 70's.

I was friends with a boy whose mum was a drug addict. Whenever we went to his place his mum was sprawled on the sofa in a right state, she could never talk properly - always slurred. It was horrible, hardly ever food in the house. I remember him pinching some money off cupboard shelf once and she shouted at him to put it back - he said he wouldn't because it was her drug money and he was hungry. She said she'd made him dinner but it was a pan of brown slop that contained god only knows what. He's grown into a wonderful man and is now very happy with a partner and a little girl, his mum passed away a few years back.

My friend had a ‘playhouse’ - it was her great granny’s house before she died ... it had four or five bedrooms, kitchen, bathrooms, a massive double garage and every single room was full of toys, dolls, toy cookers, dress up clothes etc . Had a working phone line and satellite TV . Parents never used it, only her and her sibling and cousins . It was so so cold as no one heated it, and it was damp and eerie as it was silent .

DM suspected her parents/aunts etc were millionaires - they were all doctors, business owners, lawyers - but never have found out .

At the other end of the scale - other neighbours dropped their kids off once and disappeared ...

Daughter had burns from nappy rash, mum had the health visitor round m, screamed constantly, no food or milk provided . Other daughter had a terrible speech difficulty and wet herself numerous times . Parents turned up at midnight bladdered and hardly able to walk . I think of those wee girls every so often and pray they were removed from the family.

Sorry I am pretty we didn't drink thankfully lol I meant lots of drinking going on.

I have to join in. When I was 9/10 so this is around 1986/87 my friend invited me to a sleepover. Her mum and her mums boyfriend who I found weird were there but went off to a pub and left us with a babysitter or someone. My friend had a brother he was around 8who tried to snog me but that's another story. Anyway my sleepover turned into a rave. The next thing I knew all these punks turned up, lots of smoke I remember heaving my way through and drinking. Couples all over the house slobbering over each other. And asking us if we are enjoying ourselves? Shocking but looking back my friend and her brother were neglected, other signs.

Another friend down the road cigarette butts all over floor everywhere. . And she had a bucket in her room to pee. I found that disgusting as at 11 I wouldn't never have peed in my room. The smell too.

Two sets of neighbours running off with each other’s partners and one lot stayed swapped!

I went to a friends house and her mum asked if we wanted a cake, we obviously got excited and said yes please. She gave us all a slice of white bread thinly spread with margarine and folded in half. The disappointment was crushing.

When I was a youngish teenager, my friend's mum was going away for a visit to her home country for a few weeks during the summer holidays. The daughter didn't want to go. She (the mum) said, rather casually "Oh, you'll help out, won't you, Cru" (not question).

I hadn't thought much about it until a few weeks before the trip when my friend said that her mum was expecting me to sleep at her house for the trip. "Oh, don't worry! You'll still be allowed to go home to visit sometimes!" I was quite shocked (I have always hated sleeping at someone else's house) and said that there was no way I'd be allowed. I think my mum rang hers and said she had to get an adult to look after her daughter as I wasn't going to supervise her.

I was a school year older but only older by a few months.

This is the best thread ever! I remember being 10 years old and having dinner at a friends house. My friend lived with her nan, dad and little siblings (5 & 7). The nan served up mountains of fried chips and sausages to all of us on the sofas, as they didn't have a dining table! It was literally falling off the plates. I was so shocked at not eating at the table, and at the size of our dinners, i struggled to eat a quarter. I watched the little siblings clear their plates and ask for bread and butter! I asked where their mum was, she said in a matter of fact way mum ran away and left us all when we were little, because she didn't want us. We live with nan and dad now. That broke my heart. I remember going home afterwards and asking my mum, why would any mother abandon their children. I couldn't believe it really happened. Seven years later I bumped into said friend and siblings and they were all very obese. I was not surprised.

The lady who lived beside us as kids in the late 80's early 90s' would go through our bin and take whatever she wanted. My dad was sadly unemployed for a while after being made redundant when I was 6 months old so it really was rubbish that she was taking as my parents both used to alter things for as long as they could to keep fitting us etc.

My mum got really annoyed and started making sure that what she did put in the bin was proper rubbish. (this lady was in her 70/80's then and was properly eccentric - I think it'd be dementia now) and started cutting up everything that she put into the bin - this lady then removed the net curtains from our bin that had been cut to literal shreds and put them up at her windows.

Sadly when I was around 7/8ish and we (my brother and I) had been put to bed I kept going down to my parents to tell them I could smell smoke and it turned out that next door (the old lady) was on fire after she'd fallen asleep whilst smoking and the neighbours the other side had gone in to rescue her. She didn't make it - poor love. I often think of her and her daughter/grandson.

Had friend as a teenager whose family were (and are) lovely, used to let me stay with them as long as I liked during school holidays. Rather posh with a large detached house, separate cutlery for first and main courses, etc. Friend and sister made to have lovely manners.

So I was surprised when we had a Sunday roast, people finished eating, and friend, sis and mum all picked up their plates and licked up all the (delicious, home-made) gravy! Mum was embarrassed and asked me not to tell anyone!

My mum wouldn't let me watch Why Don't You... because the kids spoke with regional accents. I never even asked about Grange Hill!

I made a new friend when I went to secondary school and her parents started asking me to stay over on Saturday nights (this was in the 70s, no such word as sleepover).

This was unusual for the time. No one I knew did it. But my parents were ok about it. But not ok at all when they realized the invitations were purely so my friend and I could be used as babysitters for her very disabled younger brother.

I'd forgotten about that until this thread jogged my memory. I remember being so relieved when my mother said she didn't want me to go again. The poor boy was quite scary.

The same friend dried her first sanitary towel and kept in the airing cupboard as a souvenir.

Then there was a boy near us who lived in a huge house and went to Eton. His dad had a Rolls. The poor lad had his own flat inside the house and lived there all alone. They had staff who looked after his meals, laundry etc but no one seemed to care about him. He was an only child and I wondered why they'd had a child at all. Even at 12 I wasn't fool enough to envy his money and luxury.

One weird thing I remember was that my friend had parents who lived in different houses. I had never come across that before. I must have been early primary school.

I remember someone once saying they found my house strange because my dad just sat in the chair all night. I thought that was just a dad thing.

@minou123

I know someone who grew up LIVING IN BEAMISH!!

@bintang
They are! It was so long ago I’ve forgotten why I said you should get them!

Going to a friends house to see their cat on the kitchen unit licking the food in the saucepans that they were about to serve up!

Not being allowed in a friends house at all. We had to play in the garden, and if I wanted the loo I had to run home. It wasn’t just me, none of her friends were allowed in the house.

@aroundtheworldyet I thought GHDs we're straighteners? I don't want to straighten my hair, just dry it... also my DS has hair almost to his waist, so his needs drying too, not straightening (though it's like a poker already)

HRTFT as too long. Our neighbours all wore their coats/jackets indoors all the time - even in summer. I’d go in and they’d be scrunched up on the couch all in their coats with arms folded as if we lived in Siberia. I’d be in shorts and t shirt

I sometimes walked home with this kid from school in the 1970s. We were about 9 or 10. We would get to his house and I would continue home. One day he said wanted to show me a toy that he had and we were both walking up his garden path when the front door flung open and this woman came running towards us holding something. She had such a grim and determined expression on her face. I started to run and she threw a full bucket of water over him. He just stood there drenched, his arms by his side, not reacting.

As a kid I was stunned, not really understanding what I was seeing. She grabbed him by the collar and marched him inside shouting at me to go home. This all happened in seconds. I went home completely confused and never mentioned it to my parents and the kid avoided me after that. I once asked him if that was his mum and he said yes but didn’t say anymore and I sensed not to ask.

I remember going to my primary school friends house early one sunday evening as mum announced it was nearly bath time and not to miss their turn. I then found out all 5 kids in the family shared the barely 3 foot or so of bath water, oldest child had the privilege of using it first. As this was just a weekly event ( still 'normal' in many households today ) the youngest child must have come out of the filthy water dirtier than they went in. Stank too.

I also remember going to my friends grans house and she regularly gave us raw sausage to eat and the red rind off edam cheese to chomp on. The mind boggles.

I used to go to my friend's house quite alot especially between the ages of 6 and 8. We lived a few doors down from each other. Anyway her house was soooo messy and dirty. No where to comfortably sit, the kitchen was a warzone and the garden was totally overgrown. I quite liked visiting as we used to play dress up using the theatre costumes her mum had made and her older sister was really fun. However, the weird thing my friend did regularly was ....piss in her wardrobe. I remember being quite shocked by this. She even said I could follow suit if I liked - I naturally refused. Her sister would shout downstairs to her mum - N has weed in the wardrobe again!! This whole family were extremely intelligent, social and well liked, but lived like feral cats. I have no idea why she would do that.