Did you drink tea regularly as a child?

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I was born in the late seventies , growing up I always drank milky tea at breakfast and dinner and during the day when I wasn't at school.

Giving a baby milky tea from a bottle was also common practice. I have been thinking about this and was curious to know if this was a class / cultural thing or just "what people did in those days."

I grew up in a white working class "done good" family.

I had tea from about the age of 6/7 in the early 90s. It was milky with half a sugar. I was drinking milky coffee from the age of 4 or 5 though, which I find astounding. I'm from an upper working class background.

Yes, born 1969, white anglo/irish 'aspirational' working class family, I drank very milky sugary tea from one of those lidded cups for toddlers from whenever I was old enough to do so.

Moved on to drinking it from a proper mug but went off it from the age of about 7.

I actually hate 'tea' tea now, though I don't mind fruit/herb type teas and love coffee.

I drank both tea and coffee as a child , but not until about age 7.

I added sugar and a good deal of milk. I gave up sugar when I was a teen and only add a little milk to tea now (I don't drink coffee much any more but add more milk to coffee than to tea).

Fizzy drinks were strictly rationed in my family. We had Cidona at Easter and Christmas, basically. I don't remember Coke or Pepsi until I was a teen.

Background: Irish, UMC.

The idea of anyone under 18 drinking coffee was completely astonishing to my American exILs. ExH probably drank beer a long time before a sip of coffee passed his lips. But of course Coke and Pepsi were completely acceptable. UMC background there.

Americans I know now in a MC-UMC area would have similar issues around kids having caffeinated tea or coffee, and are very conscious of the dangers of sugar. However there are many elsewhere who would happily serve fizzy drinks to kids, both caffeinated and otherwise. But no tea or coffee.

I was born in the early 80s. My Mum told me she took me to a cafe when I was about a year old and I was interested in her cup of tea, so she put some in a saucer for me to try. I loved it. I then had tea in my baby bottle, and can remember going up to bed at about age 3 with tea in a sippy cup. I turned out fine, though lots of people seem horrified when I tell them this!

Solidly Northern working class. Given sugary milky tea in a sipper cup!
it took until my late 40’s to wean off the sugar!
I still adore tea -Yorkshire Tea loose leaf made in pot.

my Irish nana gave me cups of tea as a child in the 90s

My mother was giving my nephew tea in a bottle as recently as 2018. It's still a thing. They have stopped with the sugar on cereal to be fair though ...

I was born in 1996 and yes had tea.

My DD was born in 2016 and has had tea for years. No sugar.

I wasn’t first offered tea until I was at a friend’s house at about 14 but my mum doesn’t like it herself and still finds it strange when I like things she doesn’t. MC southerner born in the 90s.

70s WC family and I have always drunk tea. I remember my granny pouring some in a saucer for me. I was given a flask of tea for primary school trips.

Tea is my favourite drink.😍

I drank tea from infancy, my DD's did too (thanks to my mother)

From around 8. But I wasn't allowed sugar.

I don't think the issue of caffeine, tannins reducing iron uptake etc were known about in the same way.

Yes, cups of "char" they were called.3 sugars, half milk. Then weaned onto 'proper tea' approx 9/10

@Cameleongirl i do mine a bacon sandwich as a treat and they love it, the eldest is all “ooooh goo’won mum” in his best Chas N Dave.

Yes since I was 6 or 7. Tea with sugar but not milk. And a good book before bed. 😀

Yes tiny proportion of tea which gradually increased as we aged. There was always tea on the go in our house (70s). It did mean we drank loads of milk though. I think I’d definitely give milk with a dash of tea over a fizzy drink to a kid? Disclaimer: no kids. Further disclaimer: I now can’t stand tea, especially with milk, and only have coffee or herbal tea

Mid 60s born, UC and drank tea from very young. First cup of Earl Grey aged just 4 at a wedding. It blew my mind and I have been drinking vast quantities of it ever since. DCs also tea fiends, specially youngest. None of us apart from DH drink coffee at all. One of my fondest memories is formal tea at my grandparents' house; bread, butter and jam, at least 2 types of cake and both Indian and China tea for adults, children and dogs!
I have probably just outed myself to any of my cousins who might be on here!

Born in the late 60s, middle class I guess. I can't remember a time when I didn't drink tea. A cup at breakfast and one with my mum when I got home from school, and generally whenever the family was having one. I was always disappointed when school friends' mums offered me orange squash!

I also would have been introduced to tea quite young. I don't think my mother went so far as to put it in my bottle (which I have seen) but as soon as I could hold a cup, I was drinking tea. Maybe not five cups a day! but I definitely had milky tea at least once a day. I'm Irish and there wouldn't have been anything down market about a child having tea. It just would have been a nutritious drink (no sugar obviously) but less milk than a glass of milk, so you'd still have an appetite for food. I refuse to believe it's bad for you! Never did me any harm,

Yes, since I was very young; not very milky, just a usual amount, and one sugar, until I was in early teens when I stopped taking sugar. Also drank coffee from young, it was completely normal for children then - I was born in the 50s. We weren't hyped up on caffeine, we slept at night - honestly I think all the kids now who don't taste tea or coffee till they're almost adults are sadly deprived! So now we have the horrors of the caramel hazelnut frappuccino with whipped cream, half a ton of sugar and hundreds of calories, masquerading as coffee!

My own mother has been giving my baby tea on a spoon since she was about 8months old and now she gives her (at 15 months) the odd very milky decaf tea in a cup

Milky tea on Sundays here.

And yes, I remember my grandma giving some to the dog, in her saucer

I don't really remember having tea but I must have as I remember going off milk and switching to drinking it black when I was about 9. I do remember drinking coffee though, in fact I used to take a flask of it to primary school for morning break because I didn't like school milk!

I preferred coffee.

OK, it was only Mellow Birds when I was 3-4 (switched to my brother's Nescafe when I couldn't get proper coffee from a moka by about 6 years old), but it apparently didn't seem to have any negative effect upon me - I'd never really slept anyhow and if anything, I was more likely to sleep if I had a coffee before bed.

I was born in 1990, I cant remember ever having tea as a kid.