How did being smacked as a child affect your life?

[Roxietrees]

Just interested in whether those who were smacked as children suffered any lasting damage/trauma from it? I was a very young child in the early 90s and clearly remember being 4 and extremely shy (undiagnosed selective mutism with hindsight) and being pretty violently smacked by my mum for not speaking to her friends/teachers when I was asked a question. Although I was also smacked when I was older for “being naughty” it’s the vicious smacking for being unable to speak when I was so young that has stayed with me and has honestly caused some lasting trauma. It wasn’t just the pain & viciousness of it, it was the humiliation (pants down, bare bum, over the knee style) and it never being explained to me why I was being punished so harshly for something I couldn’t control or apologised to. It obviously didn’t work - I wasn’t even scared into speaking, I physically couldn’t. It just made me more scared and anxious than I already was. Now having a 4 yo DC myself, who, I admit I’ve totally lost my shit at at times and have even screamed at, I’ve always apologised to her, and no matter how angry I get I could never physically hit her. She’s so small and helpless. I can’t get my head round how my mum (a good mum overall and pretty reasonable person) could have ever done that when I was that tiny. I don’t buy these boomer excuses of “we didn’t know any better” or “it was what was done to us as children” - well it was done to me and I know better.

I wasn't just smacked, I was beaten too so the affects on me are probably greater than just a slap but I struggle a lot due to the physical abuse I suffered.

I genuinely remember feeling like my parent was out of control and therefore I could do more of what I wanted 😂 obviously not so consciously at that age, but looking back. My personality means it just fired me up to piss my mother off even more, and to this day we butt heads a lot.

And obviously if you’re being smacked it’s a clear sign you’re not loved. I remember as a small child telling my mum it’s obvious she doesn’t like or love me (she’s never said she loves me). She buys people things instead of telling/showing love.

Please try not to feel guilty for it. You were doing it to stop them getting seriously injured which would have been much worse for them.

I couldn't have articulated this at the time but it made me feel much less secure, as I knew my mum had lost control and wasn't in charge as she should have been. It wasn't the only thing that contributed to my lack of security so I can't isolate the effects of the hitting in particular, but the whole picture has made me extremely untrusting of others.

I disagree that it’s a sign you aren’t loved. I know my parents love me very much, even though my mum gave me the odd slap on the leg after many warnings.

Hasn't affected me at all. Just how it was in the 1980s.

It’s made me avoid conflict and I struggle with my own parenting. It’s exhausting having to explain the rights and wrongs, establishing clear boundaries and fair consequences. It must have been easier for my mum not bothering with all that and just giving me a few smacks (which sounds less painful that it was, I still remember the stinging pain now). I don’t remember having anything explained, we just had to behave ourselves. I think the smacking, and the general background of being threatened with smacks, has contributed to my imposter syndrome and I suffer huge guilt about things that aren’t anything to do with me. I wasn’t smacked as an adolescent and I remember that time much more fondly, which suggests to me that smacking was a poor strategy for my upbringing.

I was slapped across the face by both my mother and father when I was a child and as a teenager and hit across my bare bum by my father when I was really small.

It culminated in my father attacking me when I was about 13 while I was simply sitting down reading a book because he thought I was 'looking down at him because he did not have a job' and knocking me off my chair. My mother just stood there and did nothing.

All of the above also came with frequent rants about everything that was wrong with me and a constant need to be controlling. In reality I was an almost mute, timid, quiet child who did well at school and never caused any trouble.

As a result I had very low or no contact with them as an adult.

Sometimes I look at little girls with their parents and I wonder why on earth two adults thought it was appropriate to behave in the way my parents did with me and hit a defenceless child.

I was smacked regularly as a child. I think my mum would be patient up to a point, then she'd lose it and we would be hit. However, I was born in the 1970s so this was pretty common.

I don't think it's affected me. Although I don't think smacking is great parenting and it's not something I do to my own DC, I don't hold it against my mum. She'd been hit regularly as a child (her parents believed "spare the rod and spoil the child") and I think it was still considered normal when I was little. I have a good relationship with her and I don't have any issues with self-esteem etc.

In addition, I'm sure there's plenty of things that I do with my DC (such as allowing them to have smartphones) that are normal at the moment but will be considered abusive in ten to twenty years time, so I hope that by modelling forgiveness to my parents now, it will encourage my own DC to be more understanding of my shortcomings in the future!

None whatsoever
but I would never describe it as vicious
i pissed someone off - sometimes they were reasonable to be pissed and sometimes they overreacted and that’s life - move on

I grew up in Asia where smacking was commonplace so it hasn’t affected me in any way - all my friends had the same. I don’t know how it would normally impact a child but I don’t have anxiety or fear generally or if I do something wrong - and always had a good relationship with my parents. Was also pretty rebellious as a teen/adult so doesn’t seem to have killed my spirit! I wouldn’t do it myself as it’s illegal here but personally don’t see anything wrong in a smack (not a beating) if a child is really not responding to words and pleas.

Posters don't seem to be differentiating between a smack on the legs and out and out abuse. There IS a difference. I had a few smacks on the legs and bum (grew up in the 70s) but it was a last resort. I've turned into a well rounded, respectful and well mannered adult.

I'm sorry but that's just not true. My mum smacked my brother's and I often but I know she loved us. I had five boys and used smacking initially because it was all I knew but my fifth was on the autistic spectrum and as a result I had a child psychologist to teach me how to parent without smacking and I never looked back. That was in 1994. Sorry edited to add that I love all my boys to bits.

I'm the same, but then I wonder if other factors for me are that I was only smacked maybe 10 times total (possibly less) and I wasn't afraid of my parents. I can imagine if smacking was a common occurrence and accompanied by shouting at me I'd feel differently.

70s child here too. I remember feeling the humiliation of getting a smacking - usually it was for something I'd done that I couldn't understand. In retrospect it was about my parents being in a particular mood.

TBVH the effect it had on me was to think less of my parents when it came to having my own kids. Both of them spoke to me very seriously about the benefits of smacking my toddlers (ffs) and once, my mum behaved appallingly to one of my kids in a way that I recognised would have ended up with me getting a smacking, back then. The viciousness of it has been one factor in my deteriorating relationship with her.

I was smacked occasionally in the 1960s. Can't say it affected me.

I don't support smacking, but I think it's about the way it's deployed. An abusive parent using smacking to humiliate, physically harm, or unduly intimidate a child will cause long lasting trauma

It didn't at all. I was smacked when naughty in the 90s but it wasn't done to humiliate me nor was it overtly violent.

However I don't see how screaming at a 4yo who you recognise is "so small and helpless" is any better.

I was smacked regularly as a child and my mother was often overwhelmed. I remember but it doesn't bother me. I smacked my children in the 80s too. Not proud of it but being SAHM can be very difficult. I had my kids every day for every waking minute until they were 3.5 when you might get them in playschool for 2.5 hours a few times a week. If you could afford it as you had to pay. Of course, if I had my time again, I would never smack but I would work, probably full-time so I only had evenings and weekends with my children. Hopefully I would have more patience. I would NEVER smack or even shout at my grandchildren.

Be careful not to judge unless you have walked a mile in their shoes. Most fathers didn't help at all. Worked full time, commuted and kept up hobbies. Frankly. Being a mum was relentless and it was your job. I got virtually no help and my own mother was the same.

My own mother was desperately disappointed by her own working mum as she was a latchkey kid from a very young age. It ruined her relationship with her mother and the memory of her mother, literally until she took her last breath.

Being a working mum is difficult but does mean you get respite from motherhood.

I remember being scared of my dad- running upstairs and locking myself in the bathroom to avoid his smacks. He once smashed a mirror that was attached to the back of my bedroom door- I was leaning against it at the time- in his force to get to me to wallop me. My relationship with him is polite but not much more. I live some distance away from my parents now and see them rarely. I have never and would never hit my own children who are both utterly lovely. My relationship with them is much better than I ever had with my parents and they are most certainly not scared of me or my husband. Interestingly, my sister who had the same upbringing as me, did hit her kids when they were little. Her personality has always been hugely different to mine- much more hot headed and aggressive in her manner. I hated the way she treated her kids and on occasion got between them and her to stop her hitting them.

How anyone could ever justify hurting their own children, who they are supposed to love, protect and nurture, is beyond me.

I don't actually remember it though I'm sure it happened. I only remember one occasion when my mum shouted at my brother for leaping about in the car and being dangerous and then smacked him when we got in the house. I thought he deserved it.
My DS has in the past been very aggressive including things like trying to push us down the stairs and we've had to restrain him/push him off us. I'm pretty sure he will see that as us hurting him but we've come through that now and I was very proud of him yesterday for not retaliating when a boy accidentally hit him with a ball at sports. We are slowly getting through to him about how sometimes people accidentally hurt you and it's not their fault.

I think it has impacted me to the extent that I was very very clear that my children would never ever be hit by us as parents.

My parents only hit us when they were overwhelmed and lost control, and I was able to see and know that, so it almost made me pity them. I absolutely knew I was loved and cared for as it was never part of a planned punishment or done in a controlled way, thank goodness.

Both my parents experienced physical punishments for their whole childhoods, my dad was routinely caned at school and beaten at home and my mum's parents were very strict and unforgiving. For them to not completely break the cycle is not surprising. But they have brought up all their children to be parents who do not lash out to their own kids and I know they are both pleased and relieved that it's stopped with our generation in our family.

I made a point from my children being very small of saying, " we have kind hands, we don't hurt" and apologising when I accidentally hurt them ie bumping a head in a car door and expressing clearly that, "I would never ever mean to/deliberately hurt you." I really wanted them to know that people who love you never ever hurt you - I hope that helps them have that boundary as they go into their own relationships.

I was smacked the normal amount as a child in the 70's - very rarely, and usually all my mum had to do was threaten a smack (on the hand with a wooden spoon) and I'd behave. My mum is very loving and we're very close.

I had no qualms about smacking my own child, only ever a small whack on the bum when they are really acting up. And never even needed to do it after about the age of 6 or so as you can reason with them by then.

I have no problem with smacking and I see the most appallingly behaved children and their parents who have no control whatsoever and think 'one quick smack and this would be sorted'. It makes me sad for them as the children desperately need boundaries and a sense that grown ups are in control.

OBVIOUSLY some of the behaviours above - hitting around the head, pulling pants down and putting a child over your knee etc is abuse. This is not smacking as it is commonly understood.

Not greatly to be honest. It didn't happen often, nor was it especially hard and it just gave me a sharp reminder I was out of line. But I don't feel like I carry any trauma or issues from it (and no I don't smack my kid)

I think some of the posters here were abused rather than smacked. I was smacked twice. Both times were for lying when I’d been really naughty and there was no lasting mark.

I smacked the back of dd2’s hand once very calmly as I knew I never wanted to do it in anger and it was a last resort after trying everything else. She kept taking her arms out of her 5 point harness car seat and it was dangerous. I was pulling over each time but it was making me late to pick up dd1. I calmly said “if you don’t put your arm back in the seat belt safely I will smack your hand” she didn’t so I pulled over, smacked her hand and put the seatbelt back on her. We drove to do school run with no further issues and never had an issue again. I had hoped the other discipline methods would work but they just didn’t. She’s got no recollection and I think it upset me far more.