Small ways in which your parents fucked you up

[SaladBap]

Over the last few days, I've come to the uncomfortable realisation that what I thought was clever, edgy humour is actually unpleasant, mean and arrogant.

I was raised to think that our family was a bit of a cut above other people in terms of humour/intelligence - edgy jokes that cut very close to the bone, self deprecating humour, but also snobbery regarding other people's hobbies and interests (anything pop culture)

Other people were humourless, dull and couldn't take a joke

I've realised that this isn't a sign of how quirky and funny I am, nor of my moral superiority, but actually makes me seem an arrogant snob. It's also caused a kneejerk habit of thinking negatively about people

It explains why I've struggled to make friends, I think, and why my self esteem is quite low at times - I apply that really sarcastic voice to everyone including myself

I'm looking at my parents through totally new eyes. Things like their sneering at "catalogue families" who brought rounders sets to the beach or park - we could easily have done so too, my parents didn't want to, but us children would probably have quite liked it instead of being forced to just sit there while they read the newspaper!

It's a small thing, but I actually feel quite cross about it.

Can anyone relate?

My dm was totally obsessed with appearances and how things looked to outsiders. One of my siblings self-harmed and had really scary episodes of, I don't know, mania or something when I was a young teen. It was NEVER spoken about, either within the family or outside. I was terrified for most of my teens (and twenties) that my sibling would kill them selves. There was also no space for me to go through teen angst or anything myself. I was pretty well-behaved anyway but as soon as I could go away for uni, I got far away and never returned so I was away from being ignored. I'm only just coming to realise now, approaching 50, how I have a lot of anxious habits that I guess are from internalising this fear.
My parents also never celebrated anything, my dm is never happier than when she has something to complain about. We were never praised for achieving anything. I got a prize at school which I was really proud of, and when my nephew got a prize, my DM was all over Facebook saying how proud she was about the first one in the family getting a school prize.

My parents were deeply miserable as long as I could remember. My dad had manic depression. He had an explosive temper. My mum just switched off or argued but there was always an atmosphere.
It affected all of us kids in different ways. For me I became a people pleaser/smoother overer of all things. It's not served me well at all.
I hate it on here when people describe their arguments and fights with their partners and say " the children don't know how unhappy we are" Oh Yes they bloody well do.

Yes to what you said OP. I was also raised with this constant low level theme that we were somehow a bit above everyone else. Which meant we didn't do what ordinary people did or enjoyed what ordinary people enjoyed. Wonderful way to grow up. Not.

To cut a long story short i began to wake up once i had my own kids in my early 20s and ever since have been having little revelations about how my mother in particular put a weird slant on everything. I've gone out of my way to make sure all 4 of my kids were raised in line with what ever other kids were doing. Mc Donalds, bowling, noisy toys, lots of play dates, sleep overs, long hair with fancy hair bands .... just ... normal stuff instead of being sensible and cats arse faced about anything remotely fun!

It goes so deep. So detailed. And it's all wrapped up in her personality not wanting me to do anything which she couldn't or was too afraid to do as well. Narc? I don't know. Controlling and snobbish? Definitely. AND the weird thing about this is that she is the one who 'married up', if you like. She came from nothing more than a good basic common 1940s London family (never owned their own property or had a car) and it was my dad's family who had a bit of £££.

I was also given so much freedom to roam from a very young age (70s only child) that it's a wonder i'm still here at all!

It can be a bit scary when you start to see things clearly because it can feel as if all your childhood memories were false and a bit 'who am i?'. Compared to the horrific upbringings some children have though mine was a paradise and i do count myself lucky.

to posters here who suffered physical and mental abuse at the hands of their family.

@SaladBap are you related to me?! This describes my mother and her family perfectly. I grew up thinking it was normal to sneer at people for liking anything that wasn’t intellectual enough. It has taken years for me to feel comfortable liking things that don’t meet their approval, but I still struggle with judging people.

Being told that I hadn't gotten into a particular school because I "wasn't clever enough" even though my younger sister had passed her entrance exams. After getting my A level results, being told I could have tried harder and to get on the phone and beg the university to take me. Getting hung up on by my mother after telling her that my first job out of university was as a cleaner.

My dad used to hit me, threw me down the stairs and hit over the head, teeth down with a handsaw, i needed stitches, i was 5.
She left him after that and i never saw him again. but my mum would still hit me when i wouldn't do as i was told.

There was a time when i blamed my mum (and my dad) for everything that ever went wrong in my life but then i came to realise she was under enormous stress too, escaping violent abuse, no money, shame of a failed marriage, kids and no help.

It was then i stopped blaming her and looked at my own actions and decisions, it took a while, certainly into my 30s.

She became my rock in life and my greatest friend.

We all have free will, sure parents have an impact but take control of your own life, blame is hugely negative and gets you nowhere.

• being told every day Mum was going to kill herself. (I now live with anxiety and panic)
• being told I wasn't clever enough for Uni and that I shouldn't apply.( I did and got my degree but made zero friends as I felt I wasn't worthy and they were all better than me)

I have loads, unfortunately lol. I haven't read through all the posts, but I think my parents taught me a lot of wrong ideas about people etc.
One of them was when people makes jokes about you that it is "the british sense of humour " (parents are non british) and I should laugh it off, now that is true to an extend but I did have friends, especially one In particular who constantly made jokes of putting me down and laughing at me and she even said to me once " I can say anything mean to you and you just laugh " but looking back I just gave her the green light to put me down and take the mick out of me which she loved to do.

Another one was assuming the best of people, my mother always jumped to positive conclusions of people and made excuses for them etc and I did the same, now I try not to be so naive.

I think my parents taught me to be a bit of a lapdog to people both friends and boyfriends. I had to teach myself to have a bit of self worth against other people

ah @outwest i love that!! i was brought up by alcoholics and left home at 15 ..but have kind of used the negativity and darkness to steer me in the opposite direction with parenting so can identify with both poems.

No displays of affection towards each other. No holding hands, no pecks on cheek, no touching or cuddles or hugs. I wasn't cuddled, hugged or kissed by my parents either. I'm a cold fish who finds emotion and being physical with ones I love extremely difficult. In fact if my relationship breaks up I'm going to stay on my own, with my cat who I've got no problem with hugging, kissing and cuddling

Mine didn't teach me much agency besides keep doing what you're doing, which meant I struggled with being passive well into my thirties.

I was a chubby kid and my mum used to buy me clothes that were a bit too small in my teens and tell me I'd shrink into them

I wasn't chubby and my mum would buy me smaller clothes and tell me to breathe in I have had body image issues my entire life and i have never been overweight but always feel like I am

My mum slagged us all off to each other and our families off to us. She didn't want us to have anything to do with our families ( 3 different dads, 4 kids )

She told us all horrible stories about our relatives and we ended up not liking them because she twisted it that way

As an adult, to realise she had been telling lies my entire life was shocking.

Any time i spend time with my friends I feel uncomfortable once I have left, worried they will slag me off and talk about me ( they dont, we are all nice to and about each other ) and I know that stems from my mum Slagging us all off to each other

She also labelled us all to each other and made everyone not tell each other..... for example she was adamant my sister had autism, despite her having several appointments with specialist, all who said she was fine!! My mum just kept pushing it! She would tell us all things about sis and say "but don't tell her she would be upset"

My older sister was the "abusive one" she had a fiery temper as a teenager ( probably from watching our mum smash the house up in a rage )

I was "the crazy one" ( still wonder if i am?) And my other sister was a "victim"

The amount of things that woman has said and done, I honestly dont think people would believe half of it

I am constantly paranoid because of how ibwas raised. I don't feel comfortable around people and I feel paranoid with my friends that they say bad things about me and are nice to my face. I really struggle somtimes to keep those thoughts away

I am 5'2 and weigh 8st 10lb. I'm not fat and I'm not thin. But I cannot enjoy the way I look. I always hear "You fat little bitch" when i catch myself in the mirror

I have 2 small children and i am frightened to death of turning into my mum with them

My parents were the same OP, people who went on package holidays were common, people who went to theme parks were common, people who listened to pop music were common, people who had conservatories were common, people who liked to wear nice clothes were common, people who lived in new build houses were common and so on it went, it was a revelation when I left home and realised that my mum basically used Hyacinth Bucket as a role model, that actually we weren’t superior to anyone and all those ‘common’ things are actually enjoyable things. All I can do is not pass it on to my kids.

Two things my parents did

Always emphasising how clever I was and how pretty/ beautiful my sister was, obviously bad for both of us, I struggle with being the 'ugly' one now and she struggles with a lack of ambition/ feeling like she can't do anything career/ education wise

And secondly my mum always thought the worst of me and made it clear to me and her friends, thiught I was the worst behaved kid and teenager (I remember her saying you'll get a reputation as the town bike when I started going out at the weekend around 14/ 15... I'd never even kissed a boy ). So I now struggle with always feeling like I'm not good enough for my parents, not a proper adult and that the slightest mistake/ fuck up will set me back in their eyes.

But overall I know they did a good job, I was very lucky and I love them very much. It could have been much worse.

OP, your post really resonated with me. My parents were also very sneery. Not quite in the same way I don't think, but definitely saw themselves as different (better) than the people around them.

Due to my dad's shit financial decisions we grew up on an estate where, to be fair, a lot of people did have very different outlooks on life than my parents. But rather than keep this quietly to themselves, as adults, they made regular jokes and references about the 'caravan holiday' families who went to Harvester (or whatever they were then) for their lunch every Sunday. My dad was actually had a very strong sense of social justice underneath all this, and was very funny, but looking back it was totally inappropriate for young children who didn't have the critical reasoning to see their comments for what they were (mocking of stereotypes) and instead took it quite literally.

I think it had a hugely negative impact on me growing up and made me not a very nice person as a child. I am very, very careful not to repeat the same behaviour with my children and never allude to the idea of there being 'better' or 'worse' ways of living, as long as people are considerate to others, etc etc.

My dad used to make up unkind names and songs about me and point out my physical flaws. He would do this until I eventually ended up crying and then he'd say he was only being funny and that's just what dads are like.
He also used to tell me and my siblings that he knew everything we did and could always see what we got up to.
We also never got any treats and there were never any snacks in the house. For example we couldn't have biscuits because "we would just eat them all". Even now I take pleasure in buying myself a chocolate bar just because I can.

Oh, and in the spirit of the thread there was also a lot of inverse snobbery especially around education. Students were the lowest of the low growing up, even though they really placed a lot of importance on school.

Deep ingrained negativity about life.

And an expectation of failure. I talked to a counsellor about this last year and it has literally changed my life. They have this utter conviction that I will fuck up. And passed it on to me as a self belief. And that they won't help me if (when) I do. Complete disbelief if something goes right.

I was regularly told that if my mum or sister were going through a difficult time then I had to put them first. It meant not upsetting them, and I had no idea what might or could upset them other than anything they didn't like. It made me not only always think other people were more important than me but that I couldn't trust what I said or did because if one of my friends or my husband are upset I've been conditioned to assume I made them upset or angry and it's my fault.

Nothing nice is said about Other People, we judge them because we know they are judging us.

Also both my parents and now my sister take to their beds when unwell. So if they have a bog standard cold, they will go to bed for two or three days and indulge themselves fully in being sick. It's to garner sympathy. I hated it when I was younger - it was another means for my mum in particular to be centre of attention. I've now gone the other way to the point that when I had possibly Covid, I ignored it and tried to carry on as normal. I don't want my children to be scared of getting a cold or to think they need to act like Victorian ladies and swoon into a bed as soon as they sneeze. This time, I ended up having to get into bed and stay there for a day. This has backfired a bit as DH doesn't seem to understand when I actually am ill that I will need looking after because normally I push through.

I was quite unwell with tonsillitis a few years ago and got antibiotics for it. GP told me to go to bed and stay there. I couldn't as I didn't think I could ask for any local friends to help with the school run, and my parents told me they had to help my sister with something She should have been able to do on her own and really didn't need both of them to do. My mum cried and guilt tripped me for asking for help when she wasn t able to help me. Go figure. Anyway, the meds kicked in 48 hours later so I was fine.

So I don't ask anyone for help. And have been conditioned to assume I must help others or am to blame for them need ing the help and am A bad person.

That was cathartic.

I haven't even begun to think about more recent things either.

They were wonderful but never taught me a thing about finance. I left school, sorted out my own uni, entrance, accommodation and grants...and did it all with no help whatsoever.

Nothing. No encouragement or advice. I had no idea how loans worked or anything

Anything financial wasn't discussed in front of us, I did 'commerce' and the 'economics' at school yet it still meant nothing to me in a practical way for adulthood.

Another was self confidence/assertiveness. It was a constant 'you might drop that' 'you might fall' 'that's too dangerous'. It stopped me doing anything independent as a young adult, I then met DH and had kids. Although I encouraged mine to be adventurous and independent I still haven't achieved stuff I wanted to do. too skint for some and lack confidence still.

Although in some ways we still had more freedom than todays kids, I did go out to play and bike without worry (1970s)

So much of this resonates with me.

Yes to the posters saying that it often goes in hand with fun times, generosity, and other examples of good parenting

I feel that on a day to day basis, if you break it down, my childhood was absolutely fine, but it was almost as though my parents framed everything/saw life through a lens of intellectual snobbery and negativity which influenced me to an extent I didn't realise,and in turn this has influenced my own children

They were always very disparaging about us doing typically childlike things - they'd moan if we wanted to go to the park, say "thank god that's over" after a birthday party- we had some lovely parties and days out but it felt begrudged,as though they resented having to accommodate our childishness.

They were fab when we were teenagers, but again it was largely based on discussing books, ideas, bonding over fairly harsh jokes. It was great in its own way, but as a PP said, if we expressed a desire to do something a bit "pop culture" like bowling or going to McDonald's we were mocked relentlessly and made to analyse our desires to do something so intellectually uninspiring.

We were actually banned from McDonald's for ages due to health and ethical reasons. McDonald's parties were v popular in our school at this point, we were given leaflets with info about why McDonald's was bad, and we were made to hand them out in class!

The thing is, my dad LOVED football, and when I challenged him over this (as he was doing to me at the time re the music I liked) he got really cross, and started this whole line of historical argument to justify his love of football!

Both of them sneered and mocked at any interests of ours that didn't tally with theirs, though they mostly supported us doing them and bought us what we needed, though often we stopped doing the thing as it wasn't worth it for the mocking.

There are big ways that I won't mention, but little ways...

Whenever I cooked dinner (which I started doing quite young for various reasons) my mother would be so critical of the food that it was like Gordon Ramsay and Simon Cowell mixed into one. Her own cooking was bloody dreadful, by the way, and she freely admitted this. So the criticism was odd.

To this day I get very nervous when people other than my DH and kids dig into any food I have made, because there is a little girl inside me waiting for them to all sneer and criticise.

Always said I looked nice and fine. Even when I clearly didn't, and looked a mess or innaproppriate. I can't tell if it was because they didn't have a clue what looked ok or they didn't think they should get me to change anything. So I was sent out like a lamb to the slaughter. Took years for me to attempt to turn it around.

Very similar parents to you OP. And similar self esteem issues. I assumed everyone slated everyone else so constant worries that people were talking about me.

This reminds me of something my mother did. I remember when I was about 9/10 years old I went to a friends house for the first time. I think the mum was a dinner lady and the dad had a trade. Just an average normal family.

Anyway, they had a lovely house. Leather sofas, a nice painting of a flower on the wall and an enormous fish pond with trellasing around it. I came home and said to my mother how nice I thought their decor was and she went into this tirade about how stupid they were as people. She actually marched me over to our bookcase and was like "look at all these books, I'll bet they dont have a single book in their house". Completely and utterly fucking unhinged, bitchy and unnecessary.

I have my own child now and if she ever came home and said her friends house was nice I would say "sounds lovely".

My mother told me she wished she'd never had kids, and if she could go back in time and do it over she wouldn't have us. This wasn't in anger or anything, just a matter of fact conversation on several separate occasions.

I genuinely didn't realise how awful this was until I had kids myself and realised I could never in a million years hurt them like that Even if it was true, I'd just never say it!