Was this normal in the 90's

[sparklybin]

I'm trying to sort in my head some of the things my parents did when me and siblings were growing up to see what was normal and was was not.

When my parents used to go into town ie the high street, if they had their shopping to do or something like a bank appointment they would drop us at the toy store and leave us there playing with the toys until they'd finished and then they'd come back. Probably used to leave us for about an hour but I'm not sure if it was longer. We were about 4/5 when they started doing this
I can't imagine doing this. It was early 90's though so I don't know if it was normal or not.

I worked in Early Learning Centre from 2003-2007 and phoned the police at least once a month for kids who had been abandoned in the store while their parents went shopping.

@MrsLargeEmbodied

in the uk babies would sleep in the garden in the 1960s

And @MrsLargeEmbodied?

Why is that so awful?

Mine both slept in prams in the enclosed and safe garden in the 1980s. Obviously I could hear and see them from the house.

Fresh air is good for babies.

Not normal for 90's, no. The prams outside the shop thing was more like 60's /70's - I remember it being discussed when I was a kid in the 80's that my mum used to leave my older siblings outside the shops in her quiet town in midlands ten years before but wouldn't have dreamt of doing it with me when I was that age in london. Sometimes these things go on for longer in quiet rural towns, I'm sure, and I can kind of see the library thing being okay for older children but not toy departments / sweet aisles. That would have been considered pretty neglectful by the 90's. It's true that different sections of society have different rules though so maybe some people might still be doing that but Social Services would have considered that inappropriate.

In the 1970s my mum used the library and the newsagents as childminders while she shopped for about an hour. I'd have been between seven and 10 and sat quietly looking at books. We always borrowed some or she bought me a paperback from the shop to say thanks. I'm sure the shopkeeper stocked books according to the ones I or similar children liked so it was win-win for everyone.

It helped that it was a small community where everyone knew each other. She worked in the bakers in the High Street and would do similar favours like putting extra filling in a sandwich or saving something that she knew someone would like. She and her friends would always do childminding for each other. I whinged when I had to go round to the boy round the corner or have him round to my house. There was nothing dodgy about him or his mum I just didn't like him. I was undoubtedly being a brat and my mum nodded but didn't give in.

But she was nobody's fool and would never have left me with people she couldn't trust. It was usually in a public environment and I was told to stay put whatever someone said. The library was very safe because you had to walk out by the librarian's counter. They'd have never let me go off with someone and neither would the newsagent - not that I ever did or met anyone creepy. Perhaps I did but but there was always someone there keeping an eye out.

I don't know how she or other women could have made it work otherwise. It makes me smile and though I don't have children I'm glad I live in a place where neighbours help each other despite wariness. I'm sure lots of people still do.

Mine used to do same with drop me at toy shop or library but they went to pub not bank

@MaybeAMoaner

I never had this happen to me but I can imagine it being very normal in the 90s

My mum told me how in the 80s you were not allowed to take prams in shops so you had to leave your baby in the pram outside the shop and this was totally normal.
Imagine doing that now!!

This was the same in the '70's. My sister was left in the pram outside the supermarket regularly. Once, when we'd walked home we realised she was still there! In her defence my mother was heavily pregnant with my youngest sister.

did i saw it was awful @ChocolateGingers
no i didnt
i said times have changed

@MrsLargeEmbodied

in the uk babies would sleep in the garden in the 1960s

Mine have all slept in the pram in the garden on lovely days, and this is right into the 2000s. Perfectly safe in an enclosed space with no external access, tall fences and only accessible through the house.

@MrsLargeEmbodied

in the 1970s we were left in the car while adults were in the pub

Yes, left with steaming windows a packet of crisps and a lemonade. Children were strictly not allowed into pubs and when it rained it was miserable.

People weren't child centred then. It was seen and not heard and never answer back.

I was labelled a trouble maker in1980 for wanting a demin jacket! Apparently only trouble makers wore denim, including jeans (sigh).

@ParmigianoReggiano

My brother and I used to walk to school alone when I was 4 and he was 5 - it was very close, but did involve crossing two roads! This was London in the late 70s.

I had to walk to the school bus at 6. Crossing a main road without a crossing. It was normal where I lived. In the 1970's there were not so many cars though.

It was normal for me but not at such a young age. Maybe at around 7-8 years old?

I remember being left in the magazine section of the supermarket to sit and read the magazines while my mum did the food shop! She was regularly gone for 30-40 minutes and nobody batted an eye. She had to walk past the magazines to get back to the car so she'd pick me up on the way out.

@XiCi yes a bit of this does apply to me. That it's only now I'm realising things weren't entirely normal.

The number one prize goes to me being forgotten at the end of a week long school residential trip and the teachers ended up running around trying to find where my parents were because they'd failed to turn up when we got back to school and we waited an hour.
It did get embarrassing as I got older. But the toy store thing was more a general thing they did.

I knew the school thing was odd because everyone else's parents turned up except mine. Back then though they just let me go home with it friends parents who were kind enough to wait for me (been there an hour waiting and my friends mum had to drive me to the pay phone to ring my home!) so my parents always got away with it.

@MrsLargeEmbodied

did i saw it was awful *@ChocolateGingers* no i didnt i said times have changed

They haven't

My younger neighbour's babies slept in the garden in a pram as recently as 3 years ago.

DH remembers waking up in the car. Parents had parked up at motorway services and popped inside for a meal leaving two young kids asleep in the car

They were scared so made their way through the dark car park into the services to find their parents

Always being left locked in the car whilst parents went in shops. It was so boring. Was worse when they accidentally set the alarm so every time you moved the alarm would go off.

I remember being left outside the pub with a packet of crisps and a bottle of lemonade while my dad would be inside (because he was told to keep us out of mums way while she made sunday dinner). Would be a line of kids sitting against the wall outside. 1970's

Babies sleeping in big prams in the garden is great. My grandchildren did it here. (They have grown up now)

Tragic events like Jamie Bulger and MM certainly changed perspectives

No that was not normal in the 80s/90s.

My mum left us in a supermarket creche to do the shopping. That was far more normal.

Not left in shops, but definitely in library or in car for long periods of time

OP my parents would also forget me or just be very late to pick me up. Often waiting outside school on my own just waiting.
But both parents worked, whereas in the 80s it was more normal to have a SATM. Plus schools didn't have after school clubs. So I think my parents thought they had a right to be crap...

Yes this was a thing for sure. Out shopping with DD I turned my back for a few seconds ,she was gone! In a terrible panic I went looking everywhere in the Shopping Centre ,and found her playing in the ELC(Early learning centre).The Staff told me that parents often left DC in there to play! I was so relieved to find her TBH .I cannot imagine anyone doing that then or now!

how is your relationship now op?

I don’t think it was normal, I certainly didn’t and wouldn’t have done it but I think the Jamie Bulger case made me more wary about leaving her.

@ChocolateGingers

No it's not normal.

My kids were born in the late 1980s and there is no way I'd have left them alone in a toy shop.

Also, the nonsense about leaving prams outside shops.

You've got your timeline way out.

It was normal in the 1950s and 60s when I was born, but by the 80s and 90s, we had buggies not large prams.

I never ever saw prams outside shops in the 1980s or 90s.

Well that's your normal. My normal about prams being left outside shops was that it was very much a thing in the 80's and 90's.

Where I live people were still using large silver cross type prams as well as buggies much later than that. They were also still leaving babies in prams outside shops. It was still very much the norm on our high street well into the 2000's and even now I still see the odd one or two every week.
I still also see a couple of large silver cross coach built prams on the high street weekly (they still make them so people must still buy them) so it really does depend on where you live. I really don't think it is fair to say that other people's experiences are nonsense just because they don't match your own.