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Original poster

Rules you had in your childhood that now seem bizarre?

999 replies

Tattted · 05/02/2022 17:20

As a child/teen living with my parents we were actively discouraged from showering/bathing everyday. It was really frowned upon and seen as unnecessary and probably a bit extravagant. I know probably as a young child I didn’t need to but as I got older and even after I turned 18 and was still living at home they would have been a bit annoyed about it if I wanted to shower everyday . I should say where we live has no water charges so it wasn’t about that. Now as an adult and a mother myself it seems so strange. I realise it’s probably because my parents both came from large families that had very little money and, back then, no hot running water. Even know my parents bath weekly but sink wash every day.

OP posts:
WalkingOnTheCracks · 06/02/2022 21:17

Not exactly a rule, but 'if you're too ill to go to school, you're too ill to watch the telly'.

"Mum, that's obviously bollocks."

She usually relented.

On the other hand, she had a kind of benign rule that you were allowed one day - strictly one day - off school each term for no reason other than you just didn't feel like going.

Mushypeasandchipstogo · 06/02/2022 21:18

Following on from my previous comments….
Although very old fashioned in some ways I was always given a large bottle of cider to go to friends’ houses with and my parents thought I was weird because I wasn’t smoking at 16. Confused

orangetriangle · 06/02/2022 21:19

yep we were allowed soda stream which was vile but no fizzy drinks
I think to be fair a lot of these rules are down to many people being quite hard up in the 70s
Never ever had pasta pizza and the like or fancy ice cream just didnt really exist then it was a tub of vanilla ice cream or strawberry if you were lucky

unsalted · 06/02/2022 21:21

My mum wouldn't buy coca cola as she believed it was awful.

It's not untrue, but she would buy lucozade and fizzy lemonade... ...just not coca-cola.

orangetriangle · 06/02/2022 21:22

mum would always say I needed a slip under a thin skirt As someone else said in that time of day it was always all about what will people think
Mum is now 80 with dementia and we still have that annoying phrase what will people think arghhh

StellaGibs · 06/02/2022 21:23

That my dad used to say every swear word under the sun in front of me including c*nt, but I got slaughtered for saying fart one time.

Inspectorslack · 06/02/2022 21:23

My granny used to get neopolitan ice cream for us. We thought we were living the life. 😂😂😂

StellaGibs · 06/02/2022 21:24

Ohhh and we were never ever allowed to go to McDonalds, Burger King etc, any fast food chain but my dad was 25st and ate constant rubbish...

labsarelife · 06/02/2022 21:24

No. No weird rules whatsoever. We were allowed to eat whatever we liked, when we liked. Go to bed practically when we wanted to. Use the landline for hours. Sleep in until we wanted to get up - on school days I used to get up at 8.30am and leave the house at 8.40am. We could open our Christmas presents at stupid o’clock. Eat our Easter eggs all in one go and have sweets every day of the year. I used to stay in the bath for hours and we could have as many baths and showers as we liked in any single day. We always had friends over. My brother and I both turned in to very responsible adults with successful careers and are now married with our own children. Do I parent the same way? No. Why not? Can’t stand the chaos. Was it the best childhood? Damn right it was 😂 Rules - what rules?!? Only my friends’ parents had rules and that’s why everyone came over to our house!!

Sundayvibes · 06/02/2022 21:24

@CMOTDibbler

Not allowed to watch TV past 9. My mum would get up, turn everything off at the switch and that was it. Even as a visiting adult she was twitchy if I wanted to stay up like I couldn't be trusted to turn it off when I went to bed. I also never had a doorkey, ever. We only had a bath on a Sunday evening, but that was as there wasn't enough hot water normally and the immersion had to be ceremonially put on
I remember watching Jason manford live. He talked about parents switching everything off at the switch (plug socket). Except they didn’t switch the fridge/freezer off at the socket. Almost like everything else electrical might catch fire if plugged in but not the fridge freezer….🤣🤣
Weepah · 06/02/2022 21:27

During lightning storms we were not supposed to take baths or showers, watch tv or use any appliances as my grandmother who lived with us thought this would "bring the lightning into the house"

Serrina · 06/02/2022 21:29

@Payitforward55

Oh goodness. I think I am regressing. I don't boil the kettle until the end and only eat half a cream egg at a time 🤣🤣🤣 But growing up the kettle was always boiled and Def cream eggs were eaten entirely in one sitting. My father did control the TV any sniff of a potential kiss or swear word and the channel was changed or the whole thing switched off. I do find myself fast forwarding unsavoury bit of films now 😂😂
My parents did the same with the TV lol. Also I remember whenever the AIDS information advert with the tombstone came on the TV was swiftly turned off.
WinterGold · 06/02/2022 21:29

I must just drop this one in. It’s nothing to do with rules, but the posts about interesting generational attitudes to sex reminded me of this incident.

My MIL - she must have been in her mid 60s at the time - asked me one day, “what is this oral sex that I keep reading about?”

I just didn’t feel it was my role to enlighten her after all her years on the planet, so I replied with the first thing that came into my head.

“I think it’s when people prefer to talk about it, than do it”

Luckily, she seemed fairly satisfied with my reply. When I told DH, he nearly wet himself laughing! Grin

VodselForDinner · 06/02/2022 21:31

I’d never heard of the whole “never wash your hair while you have your period” thing so googled it to see where it came from.

One of the first results was a two-year old article from a website called Daily Hunt which reads-

Menstruation, or period, is a common procedure for women every month, in which dirty body blood is released. This is the reason that women are asked to take good care of themselves during this time. At the same time, it is advisable not to wash hair during periods, but nowadays women consider it wrong and wash their hair, which is wrong. Today we will tell you whether to wash hair in periods or not ...

In such a situation, if you wash your hair during your periods, it will cool the body temperature. However, during periods, the body needs to be kept warm, so that the dirt of the stomach gets cleaned thoroughly. In such a situation, the body temperature decreases by bathing or washing hair during this time, due to which the dirt of the body is not able to get out well.

Not only this, slowly this filth becomes lumps, which can cause cancer in addition to diseases related to the uterus. Bathing or washing hair in periods does not completely release the toxins, causing infection. Chances of problems like intense pain increase. So do not wash hair for at least 3 days. You wash your hair during the last days of the period. If you cannot avoid bathing and washing your head during this period, then use light lukewarm water for this.

Hmm
Sundayvibes · 06/02/2022 21:37

Don’t put your feet in front of the fire
‘ you’ll get chilblains ‘

ShallWeTalkAboutBruno · 06/02/2022 21:38

@VodselForDinner

I’d never heard of the whole “never wash your hair while you have your period” thing so googled it to see where it came from.

One of the first results was a two-year old article from a website called Daily Hunt which reads-

Menstruation, or period, is a common procedure for women every month, in which dirty body blood is released. This is the reason that women are asked to take good care of themselves during this time. At the same time, it is advisable not to wash hair during periods, but nowadays women consider it wrong and wash their hair, which is wrong. Today we will tell you whether to wash hair in periods or not ...

In such a situation, if you wash your hair during your periods, it will cool the body temperature. However, during periods, the body needs to be kept warm, so that the dirt of the stomach gets cleaned thoroughly. In such a situation, the body temperature decreases by bathing or washing hair during this time, due to which the dirt of the body is not able to get out well.

Not only this, slowly this filth becomes lumps, which can cause cancer in addition to diseases related to the uterus. Bathing or washing hair in periods does not completely release the toxins, causing infection. Chances of problems like intense pain increase. So do not wash hair for at least 3 days. You wash your hair during the last days of the period. If you cannot avoid bathing and washing your head during this period, then use light lukewarm water for this.

Hmm

The grammar in that article offends me almost as much as the content.
absolutelynotfabulous · 06/02/2022 21:39

I was one of the luckier ones and able to bath twice a week.

No random hair washing though - twice a week only. I also had the talcum treatment like a PP (sucks up the grease).Wink.

My friend wasn't allowed to wash her hair on Sundays.

We kids weren't allowed out to play on Sundays either, thinking about it. No idea why.

I lived in a "no ITV household too. Had to go to my auntie's to watch On the Buses..
Not allowed out after a bath. No idea why.

On rare visits to the beach, we were only allowed in the sea once. Then we had to dress and drink tea out of a flask. We always had hard boiled eggs with some salt to dip in.

Loads more "rules", usually involving propriety, "common-Ness" or respectability.

Serrina · 06/02/2022 21:41

I constantly had tonsillitis as a child but wasn't allowed my tonsils out because my mum didn't like the fact that you were only allowed to eat ice cream after the operation. So at least twice a year I had to suffer excruciating pain and not being able to eat at all for about a week Hmm

Sundayvibes · 06/02/2022 21:42

@Weepah

During lightning storms we were not supposed to take baths or showers, watch tv or use any appliances as my grandmother who lived with us thought this would "bring the lightning into the house"
I bet they didn’t switch the fridge freezer off though 🤣
Curlygirl06 · 06/02/2022 21:43

@Scianel

Omg! You're the only other person I've ever come across who had a pillowcase for Santa presents!

I had one as well, on the foot of my bed.

And me!
Serrina · 06/02/2022 21:44

I think its been translated from another language

Queenbee77 · 06/02/2022 21:45

I nevwr bathed my children more than once a week until they were 5 and then one bath and one shower a week. We do catlicks in morning and night time. Its to do with the bodies natural oils. You just wash them away if you bath and shower every day. But this is great reading......its just normal stuff mostly.

Justmuddlingalong · 06/02/2022 21:49

Sunday night baths here too. About 4 inches of lukewarm water allowed, a squirt of washing up liquid instead of bubble bath and used for shampoo too. Was cleaner than when I went in it, but left with a slightly greasy film on both skin and hair. I remember getting a bottle of bubble bath as a gift, probably from someone taking pity on me. I treasured it, used it sparingly and hid it between uses.

CatsnCoffee · 06/02/2022 21:51

@MissMarplesGoddaughter
Yes, my Mum was the same about eating cereal and drinking juice for breakfast. Apparently, the milk from the cereal would curdle with the juice. However, tinned or steamed fruit with tinned condensed/evaporated milk was OK?

TolkiensFallow · 06/02/2022 21:52

I was not allowed to watch Grange Hill, Byker Grove or Eastenders because they were “common”