Quirks from a poorer childhood that have followed you through life.

[Motorwayview]

Inspired by the tight people thread.
No matter how much underwear I have I am always slightly panicked that I'll run out of clean underwear so have been known to handwash and leave overnight to dry. Ive got draws and draws of the stuff now - BUT growing up for a while I had just enough to get by on but only if DM washed them every night. ( 3 pairs knickers) Sometimes we didn't have the 50p for the meter to use the emersion heater or boil a kettle (this was the '70's).
The one that drives DH mad is that I have to use every last drop out of a bottle even if Ive got 3 more of the same in the cupboard ( shampoo ect) .
Anyone else ?

I hoard food. I have food hidden all over the house. It can be anything from a nice bread to snack bars. The ironic thing is that I rarely touch any of it.

Reading through the posts it shows col has always been an issue for sections of the British population.

Some pp are sad,I'm a 70s kid brought up council flat didn't have loads and neither did any of my friends.

The only kid that had a different life was a primary school friend 'Shona'her family home had a swimming pool ..big deal in 70s NE Scotland.

I like (and relate to) all of that except the dinners at others’ houses, unless she reciprocates? I think being parsimonious is ok in your own sphere, but sponging off others is not ok.

No, it’s not necessarily a hardship, but they did have holes in them. They looked very worn, and I didn’t have enough to always have them clean either 😬
We moved to a different country with no uniforms at school and I remember finding that a relief.
However, we were not starving poor, far from it.

I love this. It has actually made me quite emotional. Something so simple but filled with love. Can I ask what sort of things you pack? I have to do packed lunch for my daughter for the first time ever at camp next week, and I'd love some inspiration!

This thread is really poignant.
When my DC were in primary I used to give them packed lunch rather than school lunch because I wanted them to have good quality nutrition / protein/vegetables etc - within living memory of my dad relatives actually did die of malnutrition. Was so glad he lived to see his grandkids having healthy happy lives.
My DC when they were 10 and 8 I took them to Egypt and we were having pizza in Cairo at an outside table at a restaurant (with an armed guard!). They left part of theirs and some llittle kids came up and politely asked if they could have the leftovers.
This was a massive eye opener for them and since then (they are now in their 20s after being educated at top school, easy life etc) they do still refer to that as a turning point in their understanding and they both volunteer and give to charity - it made a huge impact on them.

She also does help us out with childcare too. She is a nice lady (for a mil). I don’t mind feeding her regularly. I do sometimes worry she doesn’t eat enough when she is on her own. She is lonely I think and likes the company too.

I just think it’s ironic she tells me how little she spends on food and that I should cut back (I do try but overbuy store cupboard things just in case) when she eats more here than at her own house.

I grew up in the 70s. My parents just didn’t have ‘stuff’. They had what they needed and no more.

My husband and I are perfectly comfortable - we have ‘nice things’ - but are very minimalist. I feel uncomfortable and suffocated by ‘stuff’ and I know it’s from my upbringing.

For me, it’s clothes (all mine were always hopelessly out of fashion and never suited me as they were either charity shop stuff or hand-me-downs), underwear (I only had about five pairs of knickers and my mum was weirdly resentful about washing so I used to rewear mine for a few days at a time so I didn’t make more washing for her), and toiletries (parents never bought me toiletries, ever, so I used to have to spend my lunch money on everything from conditioner to deodorant to pads and tampons).

I always make sure my kids have suitable toiletries and LOADS of nice clothes and plenty of underwear. School uniform, as well, but it’s easier nowadays with cheap supermarket stuff available. That wasn’t an option when I was a kid, although I still think my parents were insane thinking that a teenager can get by with one sweatshirt, tbh.

I’m also not sure it was poorness that was the issue with my parents as much as (possibly wilful) obliviousness, but the effect for me, as a kid, was the same.

Aww, this reminds me that I didn’t do French “A” level because then my parents would have had to have paid for trips to both France and Germany (I also did German) and I knew they couldn’t afford it.

Oh yes - the days out with the endless fish paste & flabby cress sandwiches, the apples, one packet of plain crisps between three and warm watered-down squash. The squash always got warm. As a youngster I absolutely yearned for us to buy lunch out rather than have yet another dreaded 'picnic'. It took me until I was in my 30's before I finally twigged that my parents had done it through necessity rather than choice.

You feel differently about it when it's from absolute necessity rather than choice.

DH & his family are walking-obsessed. They love going for walks, the longer the better, and like nothing more than to bother the countryside with their ramblings. Going to the pub for Sunday lunch? Sure - let's walk the 6 miles there, shall we, eat dinner and then walk the 6 miles back. Er - not ruddly likely. I'll drive and meet you there.

I hate walking with a passion. Why? Because my dad died when I was 12 and mum couldn't drive. She'd tried to learn but was utterly hopeless and just couldn't do it. We had to walk absolutely everywhere. Bloody miles and miles, to the shops, to & from school, day in, day out, in all weathers. Longer trips meant the bus when we could afford it, which wasn't often (and it was a 3/4 mile walk to even get to the sodding bus stop).

Why anyone would go for a walk just for the sake of it - and actually find it an enjoyable activity - is beyond me.

I chose never to have children (ADHD) but I was always shamed by the clothes I had to wear as a kid. Clothes from jumble sales, nothing new or fashionable. If I ever did have kids, I'd never embarrass them like I was humiliated by what I had to wear.

A bit off topic but I never had children. I always said I never met the right person.
I did meet one ‘right’ person and made sure I never got pregnant.
I am close to 60 now and realise it’s due to autism.
It has always been so embarrassing for me - I don’t cope well with bodily fluids and most foods. So I used to think well I must be nuts, and I also won’t be able to look after a baby.
There was nobody to talk to and I think that’s really sad.
I am so sorry you went through that.
In my primary school we didn’t even have a uniform so you can imagine what it was like - in the 70’s it was a bit grim. My mum put me in one anyway which drew attention. It was just a cheap uniform but I felt like one of those private school kids who were boaters!
She didn’t want me using the few nice clothes I had, or other bits which were worn but did for running about in.
I can remember kids in clothes with holes and shoes the same and they had a terrible time. It was really hard on them and kids can be so cruel.

I never went on a school trip, not once.

I went on zero holidays between the week Elvis died 1977, which was full of men moping round all sad and crying into their beer in Great Yarmouth, until a friend won a holiday villa for a week in 1994.

We had two towels when I was little. White ones with bands of colour along the edges - one was blue and the other green. These were so well worn that all the fluff had come off and they resembled net curtains for a number of years. So a 'scratchy' towel would have been luxury! These days I can't quite get over the novelty of simply being able to click on a towel on the supermarket website and it'll turn up with the rest of my groceries.

I'm still not sure why so many people of our parents' generations sought to save money on towels. They weren't horrendously expensive in the 1980s or 90s.

Another ritual I remember was to do with a mottled black and grey carpet which was losing its fluff and the underlying fabric was exposed. When the landlord was due to come round my mother would go over it with a felt pen (which was kept specifically for this purpose) dotting black spots over the worn areas. That's one thing I don't have to do now, thank goodness.

I’m so sorry. I hope life has brought you a few nice trips since then?

I remember my mate telling me when he was a shipyard apprentice on the Clyde, another apprentice was off one day in the middle of the week. Turns out his brother was at court that day, and they only had one pair of decent shoes between them, so the apprentice had to lend him his only pair of shoes. That's why he wasn't at work. His brother was wearing his shoes...

This makes me so cross. How about the landlord replaced her carpet?! So awful…

It does make you realise that for all the problems in society nowadays, some things are definitely better as a result of the loss of deference/respect.

I'm renting and still landlords are crap with carpets. I only recently had a 20 year old carpet replaced (private rental) due to a sewage leak. When the fitters took it outside it was so thin they could see the sunlight through it!

The new one feels like a huge luxury in comparison. The old one was bloody awful.

That’s appalling. I hope at least you weren’t made to feel that the thinness of the carpet was somehow your fault, unlike this poster’s poor mum?

buying too much food, fridge and cupboards are always full

it they are not I feel slightly panicky, also over eating because my nanny could provide lots of food for us she always did as she had often gone hungry

cup of tea with dinner 😁offering a cup of tea used to deflect from having an important conversation/the answer to a difficult situation

Yeah it wasn't quite that bad thank goodness.

Although when I'd previously asked for a new one to replace it, the landlord said he thought it was fine....so it was only the sewage that pipped it! I'd hated that carpet since I moved in!

He did tell me off about stains in the living room(on the old carpet that had been through several tenants). I had a young child, and the carpet was old. I'd kind of given up in a way. should have just probably replaced myself but to be shamed about stains on an old rental carpet, when you have a young kid was also really humiliating. I was a lone parent struggling through PND and working so hard, but he made me feel like a complete slob (I'm not, and had painted the whole rest of the house for him for free, he's never painted it himself in 12 years since I've been here).

For everything else he's a pretty decent landlord though.

Hate renting TBH. You lose your dignity.

I suppose my mother was worried about being charged for wear and tear so she tried to make it look like the carpet was not wearing out. That was the least of our worries, considering the other difficulties we faced.

Interestingly, that carpet enjoyed a charmed life. It followed my mother to another house she lived in some years later after my parents had split up. Maybe she nicked it when she moved out! Perhaps after all that work she felt she deserved it.