If you grew up poor and in bad areas, did you feel like you were missing out by not being middle class?

[cocolamer]

I grew up pretty poor and come from a housing scheme once considered one of the worst slums in Europe. My parents did manage to move to another scheme when I was 8 but it was still a poor area and my parents really struggled to make ends meet.

I was clever at school but it was rough and if you were clever you got bullied. I did escape into reading and I think it was though books, films and TV that discovered a different world of middle class people where people had things like holidays abroad, music lessons, ballet lessons, trips to the theatre or the museum, different kinds of food and experiences in life. I would have been about 7 when I realised I'd been born into the "wrong" life! I longed for all the trappings of a middle class lifestyle and loved to read books and watch films that depicted the kind of arty, intellectual middle class family life I wish I had myself.

It was something I really felt right though school and I did seek out by myself schemes that would allow me to get free music and art lessons (never did get to do ballet though sadly) I did go to university and have a home and life more like the one I wanted as a child although I have made peace with my working class background now and appreciate the good bits of it.

Did anyone else who did grow up poor notice and feel like they were missing out on all the benefits of a middle class upbringing like music lessons, the piano, the art gallery trips, the educated parents with lots of books? I certainly met middle class people at university who seemed to wish they had been brought up poor like the boy I dated from south London who had me convinced he was from the "ghetto" but was in fact from a lovely town house in leafy Greenwich and his parents were both academics at good London universities!

Have you seen the 7up documentary series? A moment that really stayed with me was when the working class, east end girls in the show turned 21 and were shown documentary footage of the rich girl who'd also been in the show since she was 7. The working class girls were asked if they envied the rich girl.

They indignantly replied 'of course not! What has she got that we haven't?'

I'd have answered pretty much everything: a top independent education, ballet lessons, paid-for experiences abroad, riding lessons, great clothes, access to homes in Scotland and London, family holidays abroad, money to travel when education didn't work out for her etc. The working class girls were bright, motivated and doing reasonably well at this point but they just didn't realise how limited they were by circumstance - especially the grammar school girl who was working as a mobile librarian.

It made me realise the extent to which less wealthy people are unaware of how much others have (though clearly you were very aware). Or maybe they block it out because it's so staggeringly unjust. The whole show changed my opinions of grammar schools actually. They're clearly a path to upwards social mobility for many.

We did go to plenty of museums and libraries because these were all free things to do so I don't think my childhood was culturally devoid but I was acutely aware that we were poor. I asked for music lessons but we couldn't afford them. I often felt ashamed and embarrassed about my unbranded trainers. I was extremely jealous of children going to Disneyland etc. This was not helped by going to secondary school in quite a middle class area where many of my peers lived in detached houses, had long haul holidays and gifted driving lessons and cars. I was very aware of what I didn't have. My childhood was quite chaotic in parts. I was most jealous of those with a mum and a dad and a warm home - not just cosy but a sort of lightness and happiness that often meant I felt sad to come home. This made me quite driven to have a better life and I did make it university and get a well paid job. My baby will have a radically different childhood from me but I'm mostly grateful that he will likely never experience being so cold in his bedroom that he can see his breath, or have his shoes go mouldy.

If I've read the thread properly it's not that you grew up flat broke wishing you had food and a home like other kids, but that you grew up normally but wished you had more bougie stuff like skiing holidays and ballet and museum days out etc
Apologies if I've got the wrong end of the stick it took me a while to read the thread and I've sort of forgotten what was on the early pages lol
I think most kids dream of being millionaires and stuff even rich kids wish they were richer. We should be grateful we had normal childhoods and not shit ones (again I apologise if your childhood actually was shit and I missed you saying that)

95% of kids don't get skiing holidays. That shits expensive

They were far away. We did not live in a city. One thing that I noticed as I neared adulthood was how "posh" families thought nothing of driving to far-off places for an outing. We weren't poor compared to some, but the idea of driving 20+ miles to the nearest city, let alone 100+ miles to London, was not really on our radar. And you'd better believe a packed lunch would be involved! A standard outing for us was to drive to nearby hills or woods and run around there. Then go home and read!

I have to say, I now have museums within easy reach, and I'm not overly bothered about going or taking DC. It always feels like a lot of overhyped traipsing about to me. Running around and reading still work for me 🤷

Me too. We moved (the whole are was being demolished as they were classed as slums) when I was 11, to a council estate. I had my own bedroom! And a bathroom, garden and a park nearby. It was very posh to us

I'm sorry you had those responsibilities and lack of care when you were a child.

@TryingToMakeSenseOfIt thank you that's kind. It's done, dusted and I have a great life 😁

Well I never dreamed of skiing holidays but perhaps a camping trip in France which seems to be the typical middle class 80's family holiday.

I think you have missed things I grew up in extreme poverty in an housing scheme considered the worst in Europe in what was essentially slum housing which affected our all our health, my older brothers eczema was so bad due to the mould and damp in our flat that he would lie awake all night scratching and then fall asleep in class, it massively affected his education, I had very bad asthma due to the poor conditions of our home. There was food but it was crap, cheap food, you couldn't even get a fresh tomato on the scheme. My parents loved us but they worked so much to try and get us out of that shit hole that they weren't really around to take us to museum visits which may have been free but would still have been an expensive journey with multiple buses each way.

I don't think museum days and ballet are so expensive they are out of reach to most people who fit in the hat middle class bracket. I was a sensitive, intelligent and artistic child who longed to express myself and to learn. For many middle class kids back then things like dance lessons, music lessons, access to culture was just the norm and expected. I might as well have wished to be a millionaire because that is how far out of reach a piano or ballet lesson was for me.

My whole point of the post was that even at a very young age I was keenly aware of what I was missing out on and that for people who already had a nice warm home, good health, a decent school, healthy food also had access to all these other riches that I knew I would love and be good at and would benefit from but I had zero chance at getting to even try. Still nice of you to reduce all that to me being an entitled little shit wanting bougie stuff.

This^^

I grew up very poor. Our house was heated by a single coal fire and we couldn’t afford coal half of the time. There was ice on the inside of the windows. We didn’t have enough food and skipped meals. I never got treats and barely got a Xmas or birthday present. I certainly never had a holiday. And we were surrounded by people who didn’t work and who committed crimes and dealt drugs for money.

Despite the odds I was a very intellectual child. I taught myself to play chess with a library book and a board I made from paper. I learned a bit of music from a book and a toy keyboard that someone gave me. I watched tv documentaries and read a lot, and drew and wrote poetry. I was desperate for piano lessons, dance lessons, horse riding, travel, trips to museums and theatres, all the stuff I wanted to do but couldn’t. I dreamed about being able to go to boarding school. So to answer your original question, yes I felt like I missed out.

My own kids are middle class. In fact I stay in an unhappy marriage because my DH’s income allows them to be middle class. Because I can’t possibly leave and drop them into the sort of shitty poor life I had. My kids have everything I ever wanted. And now I finally realise the main things I lost: time and opportunity. You can take music and dance lessons as an adult but you don’t have the hours upon hours for practice that kids have. You can’t ever master it in the way you would if you learned as a child. That ship has sailed and you always feel like you’re trying to play catch up.

Ah yes I remember you mentioning the slum housing now, I apologise for the misunderstanding after reading about six pages of thead it kinda merges into one if you know what I mean and hard to remember who said what. But there are a few posters who unironically sound like They just wanted bougie stuff

This thread is all a bit four Yorkshiremen.

I didn’t know that these things existed so made no difference to me. Except music I wanted to learn an instrument and Im too frightened now.

Excuse us for having been poor.

I'm working class and don't recognise some of the depictions of it here. I realise that people all have different experiences and am sorry for the awful ones.
Both my parents went to grammar school and owned their home.
Both sets of grandparents also owned their home.
I had private piano lessons and violin at school. We had an upright piano as did quite a few others.
Our house was full of books and we visited the library weekly.
I went on a school trip to Germany in 1980 but family holidays were in the UK. Caravans or small hotels.
My mother would take us to museums and galleries in our nearest city but as a pp said not everyone has easy access.
Politics and current affairs were always discussed.
This was, and still is, a very working class area.
My childhood was not idyllic as my parents were very strict and controlling.
I wasn't jealous of anyone for their wealth.

I grew up very poor even for the working class neighborhood we were in.
We did have a lot of free academic and cultural opportunities.
But yes I would have liked enough money for new clothes and to always have enough food etc.

I really dreamed of having a lifestyle as shown on Inspector Morse, big scrubbed pine tables, everyone with glasses of wine, conservatories and the like. I'm thoroughly happy to have a middle class lifestyle and for my kids to have just assumed that they could go on ski trip if they wanted to.

I didn't grow up poor as such and my needs were met in terms of food, clothing and toys but I never really knew the class difference until going to uni and noticing subtle signs of difference between middle/upper middle class and those who were working class like myself. The main difference I would say was confidence and being able to handle a well structured argument during lectures which continued into professional work life where I was always a few steps behind in this area. Despite having a good career later on and getting married to a very middle class man, I think I'm now starting to see what I have missed out in my childhood.

Everything I have achieved from reading at primary school to winning school awards and competitions and going to uni were on my own merits and I had no help from anyone.
I have never attended any extra curricular activities and never had any connections through my parents.

I think since going to Uni and working in professional jobs and also marrying a very middle class man who has very wealthy family members kind of opened my eyes in terms of how connections and nepotism works and how at least one parent takes on a project of training a child from a young age to create the next big thing. They actively work to create a portfolio for this child. Everything is orchestrated by the parent and marketed in such a way that you would think the child is the next world's most influential person. Ok, I wouldn't have loved this extent of meddling but at least a bit more interest in me and my interests and perhaps guidance would have helped but overall I am happy how I have ended up although I still have confidence issues and at times still have imposter syndrome overshadowing me which I can't get rid of as it's coded in me.

how connections and nepotism works and how at least one parent takes on a project of training a child from a young age to create the next big thing
I totally relate to this. The most obvious thing was that at 21 my CV was just academic qualifications and nothing else, because as a child I never had the opportunity to do anything other than read books and play in the street, and my “hobby” at uni was working in a pub to pay the rent.

Meanwhile the other job applicants I was competing against had done internships (arranged by a parent), they had captained sports teams and won trophies, performed in stage shows, earned extra curricular qualifications like music grades, and they had interesting expensive hobbies. Then I wondered why I wasn’t getting picked from the list of candidates.

I wasn't jealous of anyone for their wealth either but I knew I was missing out on the things I knew I would be good at and would make my life worth loving and I was right.

Private music lessons and UK holidays in caravans and small hotels was completely out of reach for us, it sounds like you were very lucky in many ways, your family were well off compared to many working class families.

No, but I can offer a different perspective. I grew up in Windsor in the 80’s with what some might call a middle class upbringing. Both my parents worked, dad had his own engineering business. They owned their house, 3 bed semi with extension and later converted to a 4 bedroom. They also owned my grandmas house, a 3 bed semi also. Both parents had a car, we had many holidays abroad, visited countless museums and stately homes etc. I attended numerous sports clubs and had piano lessons. We were brought up to use impeccable manners and made to write letters of thanks at Christmas for any gifts we received. From the outside we looked like the perfect family.

Behind closed doors it was a different story, M was very abusive which I endured every day from morning till night. It was a very unhappy childhood. All of my friends lived on the ‘rough’ council estate a few blocks over. Most of their parents didn’t work, didn’t drive and were not able to afford day trips let alone holidays. However, they were loving homes even though they struggled to feed and clothe their children.

I feel like I missed out on my childhood and would much rather have lived in the ‘poor’ area and gone without than lived a more privileged life in the circumstances I did.

I now live in a HA property in a village that is predominately middle class, I feel I don’t fit into either class but I am much happier in general now.

I could have written this. Though I would add that I also went to a state school that had a fairly decent contingent of solidly-MC kids, and that was difficult for me at times. I felt very much like the poor one. Even knowing that academically I was wiping the floor with them didn't really reduce that feeling of "less than".

I am now within the top 5-10% of earners in the country and have ensured that my kids have every opportunity that I didn't. Not materially, necessarily, in terms of "stuff" but with enrichment opportunities and the expectation of further education, etc.

You weren't working class.

You were raised by parents were home-owning grammar school kids who put their kids in private piano and violin lessons - and who themselves were raised by property owners.

Your lack of self-awareness is really something.

Following.

@wannabetraveler @cocolamer
We were definitely working class. Both of my grandfathers were miners, for goodness sake. My father was an electrical engineer and my mother worked very part-time until my sister was in high school.
Lots of our neighbours in the terraced street were in similar positions.
The piano lessons my sister and I had were either 25p or 50p from a retired teacher. School offered violin lessons for free with loan of instruments.
This was the 70's and early 80's. Many working class families were home owners in my area of Wales.
My point was, it's less about money than it is about having parents who try to see outside their bubble.
The only thing I do agree with is coming from my background, I had no chance of nepotism.
You don't need to be middle class to do lots of the things mentioned on this thread.
Being in poverty is very different from being working class.

My point was, it's less about money than it is about having parents who try to see outside their bubble.
You don't need to be middle class to do lots of the things mentioned on this thread.
Being in poverty is very different from being working class.

Actually that's a very good point, @Bumface56 . It's the poverty of expectation which is as restrictive as anything else.