Crazy stuff your parents did that would have social services out now

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Dipping the dummy in sugar, fizzy juice for toddlers…did your parents do anything that would be considered shocking now?

For me, I looked after my younger siblings when I was 11 (they were 8 and 5) overnight a few times a week due to clashes of my mum & dad’s nightshift work. No adults in the house, just the three of us. It didn’t cross my mind that it was crazy at the time but when I think back, it was insane.

I sometimes wonder what our children will look back at and say “I can’t believe they used to do that!”

maybe it’ll go the other way. “They never let us out”

more likely that social media should have been much more strictly regulated

The only thing I can think of is being allowed to sleep lying down in the back seat - with duvet and pillows and no proper seatbelt on.

Yes, I think one day there will be adults criticising patents in horror that they posted their childhood on the Internet, warts and all, for everyone to see. Including random people who their parents went to school/worked with 20 years ago.

Me and my brother riding around in the back of my mum's friend's 2CV, standing up with our heads sticking out of the top, singing at the top of our voices. My mum was considered quite overprotective for the time too!

I read this recently: "You can't raise your children, the way your parents raised you. It was a different world back then, "

That got me cos it's true. I dare say your children will think the same about certain things when they are grown with children.

Mine are grown adults with children of their own now. I cringe at some of the things that weren't frowned on back them, now. I have had to realise that was the normal and we thought stuff our parents did wasn't good.

In the 60s, a child psych doctor was known as a top expert said in baby magazines. Spareth the rod and spoileth the child.

My mom read these magazines, so I got the smack as most did.

At the end of Dr. Spock life, he spoke out and said he had learnt he was wrong about that and much more. Times and thinking changes.

I try not to beat myself up too much now. I can't be that bad as I look after my grandchildren on a weekly basis.

Mind you, I'm a Nanna who very much sticks by their parents' guidelines. I wish some of the advice and parenting ideas were around when mine were born in the 80s and 90s

I remember doing that in the '50s, we would take the baby for a walk round the block and the mothers were pleased we did!

I know this is a thread about parents but one comment made a memory come to me - I watched my teacher (headteacher too) force feed one of my peers soap after we swore. This was the 90s

He swore not we

Cramming 5 adults, 3 children, two dogs and all the luggage into a morris traveller and driving round the North Yorkshire moors/Whitby/Scarborough for a fortnight.

When i couldn't sleep my mum would give me a teaspoon of hot brandy sometimes two. I remember sitting on the kitchen side and her holding a teaspoon of brandy over the spout of the boiling kettle. I can still feel the warmth of the brandy going down my throat. I haven't touched brandy as an adult!!

This is so sad I’m sorry that you had to go through this abuse, I hope you’ve managed to heal ❤️

Allowing me to play with friends on the site of an old pit, unsupervised- there was still part of the heap, old machinery and buildings there.

One Sunday morning (still dark) I was about 4- I managed to open the back door and get out of the garden gate into the lane with my little tricycle thing and it got hit by a van (travelling very slowly) and I was pulled under. The driver was horrified. Ended up in hospital with scrapes. Parents asleep when it happened, my screams woke my dad up. No investigation at all afterwards.

Going on holiday to Spain when I was 6 and my sister was 2 with my mum, Nan and cousin who would have been around 18/19. I nearly died 3 times on that holiday.

First time I was allowed into the sea alone on a lilo and I was happily paddling out until I got caught by a current and couldn’t get back. I shouted for help and luckily a lovely lady swam out to me and pushed me in and delivered me to my mum who was napping on the beach having not noticed anything at all.

Second time in the hotel pool, I had begged my mum to let me in the big pool and I was allowed with in with an inflatable ring around me. I somehow managed to tip myself upside down and couldn’t flip myself upright because of the ring so I was trapped head under water desperately trying to save myself. My mum jumped in and pulled me out, I had swallowed a lot of water and was poorly for a good bit after that.

Thirdly and the most terrifying one really was in the evenings after dinner my mum used to put my sister and me to bed and my Nan would be with us while mum and cousin went out drinking. This night I had asked to stay in my mums room, Nan and sis were just next door so this was allowed. I woke in the night alone and scared and realised I was locked in the room so couldn’t get next door to my Nan. I then remembered the balcony so went out there to shout my Nan to come get me but she was snoring and didn’t wake. I then spied the chairs so decided to pull one to the corner of the balcony so I could climb across to the other balcony to my nans room. I don’t know how my floors up we were but I can tell you it was a very very long drop. This time I was saved by the neighbour next door who had heard me shouting for my Nan and then the chair scraping across the tiled floor, she came out to her balcony just as I was stood on the chair about to attempt my climb across and stopped me. She got into my room and then delivered me to my Nan next door. I got the biggest ever telling off for that one!

Aside from that holiday I remember many other things namely getting the slipper smacked across our legs or bottom when we were naughty. The Christmas my mum had stepped on a tack while putting up the lights was particularly painful and memorable as we had little red welts from where the tack had been wedged in the sole of her slipper.

Being allowed a larger shandy or two in the summer from around age 12/13.

Sent to local newsagents with a note to buy my mums cigs, he would only sell them to me if I brought my own bag. Aged 7 or 8 I couldn’t find a bag so tipped out my mums sanitary towels from under the sink and took the packaging to hide the cigs in. The shopkeeper was laughing when I handed him the bag and wouldn’t tell me why, when I explained the weirdness to my mum when I got home she insisted I show her the bag I took, she was mortified!! This prompted our first birds and the bees chat, i remember being told about the eggs in my body and as a kid would do I envisioned eggs like the ones you eat and I remember being very worried I would smash them if I jumped up and down too much 😳🙈

I read this recently: "You can't raise your children, the way your parents raised you. It was a different world back then, "

That got me cos it's true. I dare say your children will think the same about certain things when they are grown with children.

Completely. Our parents were raising us for a different world.

I had a lot of freedom as a child, far more than my children will have. I was allowed out on my own from age 6, not allowed on the road until age 8 but I was allowed to walk across fields and climb over ditches to get to my cousin's and friends houses from 6. I was also in charge of babysitting my younger sisters while I was still primary school age.

@Gagaandgag This happened in my school too, also in the 90's. Also saw teachers throw books at students for getting an answer wrong. Once saw a teacher grab a 10-11 year old boy by the ear and twist it until the back split and it bled.

My dad had another lock and bolts fitted to the back door top and bottom afterwards and the garden gate was padlocked. He was so worried after that and became over-cautious for several years.

I seem to recall something called Indian brandy that came from the Chemist, it was warmed in a metal spoon when you had stomch ache.

I have really happy memories of my late 60s upbringing and yes my parents definitely broke so many rules …fast forward my children’s 90s upbringing and they could definitely find fault.
Main results are that I have good memories as do my chil!

My mum just got fed up with actually getting me up for school when I was about 10 and stopped taking me. For about a year prior to that, I ate ice cream for breakfast every day in bed (apparently that’s how she got me up, I’d wake up to ice cream being shoved in my face!). When that stopped working (because obviously it’s a horrible idea), she just couldn’t be asked. So she stopped even waking me up before she went to work.

I’d wake up about 9-10am and she’d be gone. I didn’t go to school for an entire year. I’d just get myself up and dressed and make my own food and walk the dog and entertain myself til she came home about 6pm.

I went to a private school so I think she must have obviously found a way to explain my absence and no one checked up on me. Frankly, SS probably should have been called! At the time, I just got on with it and it seemed normal. But my dd is now 10 and I could not imagine doing the same. (My mum and I are NC now for other reasons).

They couldn't be breaking rules that didn't exist, they may have been found wanting by today's rules but things like seat belts didn't exist and smoking was far more common. Leaving children alone was always frowned on, I recall in the '50s my mother being appalled by the behaviour of neighbouring families who went out drinking every night.

Omg where do I start…

Being left alone from young ages, I remember from ages 2/3, my older sibling would have been 5/6. Once I remember making toast for my younger brother, I was about 7, he was 3 and setting the grill on fire, instead of running outside we ran upstairs for our 8/9yo brother, because well he was looking after us… lots of being left alone, being sent to the shops for fags. Lots of disappearing in the woods, down the train tracks, swimming in the river. One time I remember visiting my DGPs in their high rise flat and waking up to lots of screaming, my aunt had come home from her friends to me & my brother sleeping, NO ONE ELSE HOME, I was younger than 5 as my younger brother was born when I was 4.5 and he wasn’t born or I don’t remember him being there. Anyway, I’d apparently woken up half asleep and tried to just jump off the 12th floor of their high rise flat. I use to sleep walk a lot as a child so as a parent I’ve never been able to reconcile this.

smoking indoors, I remember my DF painting all year round in magnolia to cover the nicotine stains. Grandparents, well there is a reason lung cancer is rife in my family 🚬🫁⚰️

drinking alcohol. Lots of it’s only a bottle of snowball or babycham from age 6+

Dad sending us up to the attic to insulate it by us kids stomping corn flake boxs on the weak parts of the roof.

constantly being slapped

being sent up to the bar during a free bar function to get a round of drinks in at 9yo, while getting yourself one each time. 40 years late and I’m still a sucker for a free drink.

next door neighbours kids clearly being abused but everyone’s attitude was “ it’s not our business” even my social services, house parent mother refused to “interfere”

Ask my parents and they would say none of this ever happened.

Good Lord, I'm 70. MOST of what my parents did would have me taken away today. At 7 years old, put out of the house right after breakfast (summers) to "go play." We came in at lunch, then right back out. Drank water from garden hoses. Ran the neighborhood in a small pack. Walked almost half a mile to and from school in first grade, and LOVED it! The ONE universal rule for all of us was, "Be in the front yard when the streetlights come on." If we misbehaved, ANY of our friends' parents felt free to swat us on the butt. It really was, way back then, a case of "taking a village to raise a child."

Cramming as many people as possible into cars for nights out (pre-seltbelt laws)
Usually a big lad in passenger seat with girl on lap - or in footwell!! 3 or 4 lads on back seats all with girls on their laps. My brother even managed to get a slim lad across his parcel shelf on a wet and cold night, coming back from a dance.
Dear God…😱
when I look back…😱

As soon as I was 7 I would cycle to and from school alone everyday in built up town (3.5 miles).
Broke my arm at 3/4 years old at nursery and noone believed me that my arm was sore for 3:weeks. Went to hospital and had to have a x-ray, cast etc - my mum felt terrible about it.
Same thing with car journeys etc. Being allowed to steer the car wheel at speed.

That's a blast from the past.
My mum had dinkys for my younger siblings in the sixties / seventies. I remember them well as my youngest sibling was still sucking away on it when he was due to start school and my mum having to 'wean ' him off it.
I'm so glad that someone else remembers them.

Yes, yes to being put out to play, drinking from hoses, the odd slap or telling off from friends parents and the streetlights coming on being your cue to go home. Great times 😁