Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To find people reminiscing about their hard childhoods somehow repellent?

97 replies

NeoMaxiZoomDweebie · 18/08/2013 23:42

I know my thread title makes me seem horrible but bear with me please.

I had a particularly poor childhood but in a very loving, stable home...but sometimes we were extremely poor...fine...that;s how it was and I don't remember minding too much because we all had such fun etc. My Mum also had a very hard childhood and not such a loving one as I did. But again...she's come to terms with it all...she's wonderfully balanced and loving etc.

MIL however LOVES talking about her poor childhood. She's the same age as my Mum and she gives anecdotes about things which happened or things she went through which actually aren't THAT bad...things like her Mum having to hand sew all the kid's knickers because they couldn't afford to buy any....nothing shocking and not half as ingenious as some of the things my parents made through necessity...and I grew up in the 70s when this kind of thing wasn't even that common,

She tells these stories with a sort of tragic expression on her face...and she's expectant of sympathy or shock...and I can't give it...no more than I could tell her some of my experiences as A they're too private and B it would appear that I am competing for "poorness"

Right. That's off my chest. I feel better already. Fire away! AIBU to not respond much at all during these long, self indulgent diatribes about her childhood and NOT to go "Aaaaah...." at the end?

OP posts:
KellyHopter · 19/08/2013 00:17

Good lord, I've just realised this is all about my mother! I genuinely never clicked before...those things that bug me are all things talks about endlessly.
Gosh...

ThatVikRinA22 · 19/08/2013 00:25

i keep my childhood fairly close to my chest in real life so as not to provoke the same reaction, but i think you are being a bit hard on your MIL.
perhaps she doesnt regard her past with the fondness that you do?
maybe there is more to it than she tells you?

This makes me slightly uncomfortable knowing i have spoken of my past on here. It wasnt to score points or play 'my childhood was worse than your childhood' it was just fact.

Poverty is quite subjective - my early years were much more cash poor yet i was happy. My latter childhood years were worse because the money was there yet my carers chose not to spend any of it on me, and i went without the basics such as underwear, as well as being neglected and abused.

I dont talk about it anywhere in RL. But - is that right? should those of us who had bad experiences during childhood feel that somehow its wrong to air that?

givemestrengthorlove · 19/08/2013 00:32

It's not wrong to air it at all!

waddlecakes · 19/08/2013 00:33

I think there are a lot of people who managed to claw their way into a middle class lifestyle through talent, grit and intelligence - yet then find themselves in a middle class world without the points of reference. I think there are some people who are living the good middle class life but deep down it feels alien to them: and so they tell these stories as a way of holding on to their past and reminding themselves of their origins, to feel comforted and like they still have their identity.

You may roll your eyes and I can definitely see how it would be annoying, but think of it from that POV.

BlackeyedSusan · 19/08/2013 00:37

"Someone I know had a poor and unhappy childhood and she wouldn't have anything second-hand for her children."

I think this explains why i am knee deep in toys.

some thinngs are more embarressing than others, some things affect people more than others. how people feel about a situation is complicated. you are trying to be too simplistic and measure on equal terms. the emotions behind these things arre very complex. being teased over knickers or shoes, can go really deep and last a lifetime.

thecatfromjapan · 19/08/2013 00:38

Vicar, don't let it get you down.

nokidshere · 19/08/2013 00:46

Bottom it's not the reminiscing but the expecting sympathy for a childhood which was pretty idyllic. I tell tales of nice times...I think that's something which came of treasuring the nice times.

Well that's all well and good OP if you have tales of nice times to tell eh!

Vicar I never talk about my childhood in RL unless I am specifically asked but I have on here before when it was relevant to a thread. I never feel its wrong to be truthful about it.

DanicaJones · 19/08/2013 00:55

YANBU to be irritated by your MIL as we all get irritated by family members sometimes. YABU to find people in general reminiscing about their hard childhoods repellent. Do you find it repellent when people on Mumsnet talk about their difficult childhoods? It's a bit lacking empathy if so.

japonicabumsplatt · 19/08/2013 01:10

To quote Barbra streisand;
"My family weren't poor poor, we just didn't have anything".
I am interested in peoples lives, the journeys they take and how far they move from the original point. The most basic point about a childhood in poverty is that the child has no choice. That is the most humiliating part of it, not being able to do much about it. This is how I felt as a child so as soon as I could I started to earn a little bit of money for myself. A few bob here and there babysitting from the age of 12. It made a difference to my self esteem and liberated me from my mothers worries about money. Though I discover now, her own tales of an impoverished childhood are embellished and her continued claims monetary peril are somewhat undermined by the more than healthy states of her many bank accounts according to my sister.....mmmmmm

Morloth · 19/08/2013 06:58

YABU.

People process things differently, it is OK that your MIL wants to talk about her experiences and it is OK that you and your Mum don't want to.

DS1 does sometimes think I am exaggerating the poverty of my childhood and there is an element of 'when I was a girl'.

But mostly I want to him to understand that he is lucky very bloody lucky and he should know that.

meditrina · 19/08/2013 07:10

I think that, as you have decided MIL's early life 'wasn't THAT bad' then all you can do is (politely) change the subject. For you seem to be in a world of 'comeptitive misery' (pitting her v DM) and MIL's experiences aren't touching you. It would be better for her to share with someone who cares.

Emilythornesbff · 19/08/2013 07:16

Good post thecat.

YAbu op. you just don't like your mil. Just because you don't want totalk about your experience doesn't mean that she shouldn't be able to reminisce.

DontmindifIdo · 19/08/2013 07:31

Morloth- be careful not to try too hard to make him feel lucky and grateful for not having your childhood. My mum did that, she wasnt happy just to tell us about her childhood and how poor she was in relation to the nice middle class childhood db and I had, it was important we were told we were lucky and should be grateful. All that did was make us irritated. Why should we feel lucky for having from what looked like to us to be a very normal childhood, if anything we were the poorer than our friends.

By all means tell him about your childhood, make it clear that a lot of people live like that still, but leave it to him to come to the conclusion that he's lucky by himself, far more effective.

wigglesrock · 19/08/2013 07:32

Well, I bore with you to the end of the OP and I actually think your title is even more horrible.

If your mil irritates you, then she irritates you but you're judging her for relaying her experiences about her childhood. Maybe it was worse than she's saying, maybe this is her way of reconciling herself with it. As posters have said there is this air of poor but happy, sometimes its just poor and unhappy. Some peoples lives especially women were shit, stuck in poverty, proper poverty. Just because you can see the good times doesnt mean other people have to.

If you dont enjoy her company, you have my sympathy Smile, but focusing on this part of her personality is very small minded.

izzydazzling · 19/08/2013 07:37

YANBU. Some people love it and will read, for example, book after book of misery-lit you're not one of those people, don't feel bad about it. How much of it is genuine compassion and how much is just rubbernecking?

I'm not a touchy feely 'hun' person and someone over sharing in RL just makes me uncomfortable.

ithaka · 19/08/2013 07:44

YANBU, my MIL is the same. She actually had a far more affluent country childhood than both my parents, particularly my lovely father who grew up in grinding urban deprivation in the Gorbals during the depression.

However, my lovely parents are not whingers & my MIL is. Everyone loves my parents, my MIL is fairly friendless & just tolerated by her family. It is not her background, but her personality that is the problem - no one likes a whiner.

middleclassdystopia · 19/08/2013 08:02

I sometimes like to talk about my abusive childhood. After keeping silent about it for thirty years it is hugely therapeutic.

Your post does sound horrible Sad

ILetHimKeep20Quid · 19/08/2013 08:09

thecatfromjapan I think I love you!

Altinkum · 19/08/2013 08:09

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

cory · 19/08/2013 08:14

I am usually fine with this sort of thing, but used to get very embarrassed when my mum rolled out her "oh, we had to be ever so careful when the children were little" in front of SIL, because we all knew that SIL's family were actually poor, whereas we had a modest middle class lifestyle where penny pinching would enable you to save up for nice things: hardly the same thing.

So I can see where the OP is coming from: it must feel hard to be expected to sit there and exclaim in wonder at somebody else's courage and ingenuity when you know that your own parents had to cope with so much more, and yet you can't mention that without seeming rude.

I didn't mind so much when my granddad did his stories of childhood poverty because at least his family were poorer than mine and I was able to reflect that listening to a few boring stories was probably a fair price to pay for not having had that childhood. And acknowledging that his childhood was different didn't seem like disloyalty to my parents, because it was true; they didn't have to cope with anything half as bad.

Altinkum · 19/08/2013 08:16

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

TheOrchardKeeper · 19/08/2013 08:26

This sums up what you're talking about Grin

Trills · 19/08/2013 08:26

my background is 70% of the person I am today

I feel as if mine is far far less than that. I think "who I am" is more made of the choices I make.

Trills · 19/08/2013 08:28

OP I think I can see what you're getting at, but I also think you've said it in a not very nice way.

Have you tried actually talking to your MIL? Or are you unable to do this because you regard your childhood experiences as "private"?

Are you mainly made uncomfortable because MIL is saying publicly things that, if they were your stories, you would consider them to be private and not to be said in front of people?

It seems like if you could say to her "MIL, we actually had some hard times too, but I prefer not to talk about them, is there any chance we could not talk about this subject?" that would probably help.

Morloth · 19/08/2013 08:47

I disagree dontmindifIdo. Both my DS's live a life of extraordinary privilege, not just in comparison to my own childhood but in comparison to that of most children on the planet and even in our own wealthy country.

They should be aware of this privilege.

Every advantage there is to have, they have. That is great and what DH and I have worked hard to obtain (quite apart from them being white males in the first world), I think they should know that this position is unusual.

I don't expect them to be grateful, but they should be aware.