to ask the older parents on MN

[VegetariansTasteLikeChicken]

what you did in your day that would have got you sacked from MN today and potentially a visit from ss

I slept on my tummy, mother smoked when pregnant. .. and my nan thinks asprin is the best thing to give a baby for teething. And rice in my bottle from probably day one to get me off to sleep

Aargh he slept on his back as recommended then.

I was born in '87 and I have memories of sitting in the footwell on the way to and from friends.

I have my 'red' book (pink paper) and I was weaned at 2 months and my mum had my 5 year old brother do the night feeds and nappies

Ds2 is 6months and has always slept on his front, he wouldn't settle on his back and it's the only way to have any sleep (8hrs a night minimum since birth!), wish we'd done it with ds1

If we had a garden I'd leave ds2 to sleep out there (not today, he'd blow away)!

Did my A levels in 1982 and we used to smoke in the classroom!!

I did mine in 1988 and smoking wasn't allowed in the classroom but was in the common room. There was a permanent fug just under the ceiling and I used to come home stinking!

I know I was in a carry cot on the back seat of the car. I don't think I had a car seat, my brother did. No idea when we were weaned, probably slept on our fronts. Were smacked.

I was born in the early seventies.

As far as we were concerned, sun cream came in number 2 (for my parents) and number 4 (for me). I was very pale skinned and freckly and number 4 did nothing for me. We had a disastrous holiday in the Caribbean when I was about 5 and I burned horribly. DM thought she was being very cautious by using number 4 on me. :(

I was left in hotel rooms as a baby and small child when my DP went for a walk on the beach or out for a meal. They still don't see anything wrong with this.

No seat belts in the car until it was made compulsory. Actually, DF made me wear one. DM didn't believe in them and still doesn't. She thinks it's a lot of over reaction. We had huge arguments about strapping my DC in car seats, as she really didn't think it was necessary.

My DP ran their own business, and I was left in my playpen as a baby for hours while they worked. My DM popped through now and then to make sure I was ok. The front door was open to clients, and anyone really who wanted to come in, and the front door and waiting room were in-between the room where my parents worked, so they couldn't hear me or tell if anyone came into the room.

I don't think my DM gave up alcohol when she was pregnant, but they were both very anti-smoking, and I don't think I smelled cigarette smoke until I was about 10!

Dsis had her oldest child in 1972, she was the only woman in the whole maternity ward to breast feed her baby. She had to pull the curtains round her bed when she was feeding.
By 1981 when I had my oldest child bottle feeding was frowned upon. I must admit I never read any of the books and just let myself be guided by what the baby wanted to do with regards to sleeping feeding etc. My HV was lovely and just let me get on with it.

I did have a sling for my oldest but hated it as it was like being pregnant again. I remember wearing it going round Sainsburys and leaning into the freezer to get a bag of peas, I nearly fell in!! It felt very unstable, I'm sure they are a lot better now.
DH carried DS1 about in it when we were on holiday in Germany, he got a lot of jaw dropping stares from mainly German men , but from the women as well

I was born in 1960; we used to go to Norfolk for our summer holiday with a trailer for all the kit attached to the back of the Singer Vogue and after we had got there and it was all emptied, the children used to be transported to the beach (via main roads) crammed into the trailer.
Also my dad used to come to get me and my friends from teenage parties (the dizzy heights of a Datsun estate now) and to get us many of us in as possible to drive us home, we d put down the back and just all lie like sardines in the car! Madness, looking back ...
Even in 1996 when I had DD, my mother generously bought me a carry cot for the back seat of my car, and thought I was being very fussy when I changed it for a baby seat ....

I travelled in my Grandparents converted Dormobile standing on top of the bunk with my head poking out of the chimney cut out. How I wasn't decapitated or had my windpipe crushed in an emergency stop I will never know.

My daughter slept on her stomach for the first few months then Anne Diamond's son died and everything changed....

We were told to stuff them with food at 12 weeks because it'd make them sleep better. I waited until 5 months though.

My OBGYN told me that less than 4 cigarettes a day had a negligible effect!

Everybody drank but fortunately being teetotal, I didn't. I stuffed my face with calves liver, pate and soft cheeses though.

I went to full-time nursery at the tender age of 3 months . Dm had post-natal depression, which of course, was not diagnosed nor treated (in the 70ies).

At the age of 2, I was left alone with relatives I didn't know in another city for several weeks..... To allow dp to sort out a complex house move.....

I have a great relationship with dm and df and they are the most supportive and self-less people I know but I wonder if my anxiety issues stem from these early experiences. .

Yes teachers staff rooms billowed with smoke when the door opened and I remember cadging a fag off my English teacher once when in my O level year.

The good old days.

And you could do really well in your University exams by sleeping with the lecturers when I was at university. I got a first and not by shagging for it although i was no angel in many other ways.

Sunscreen was available in the early 60s, as I can remember my 'd'm using Ambre Solaire at the outdoor baths.

I can also remember her not bothering to put any on me when we went to visit the Arizona state museum in August and my nose peeled, taking the freckles with it.

I was born in '75 - my mum was 21. She had a home birth, breastfed me until I was three, co-slept, was vegan (we were all brought up vegetarian) & carried us in a sling-type thing which she brought back from Afghanistan (where she got pregnant with me!) on the hippie trail. You can imagine what the midwife & HVs etc thought of her! (she's a HV herself now)

My parents smoked ( heavily) in the house. They gave me tea in a bottle from the age of one.
I was always put in my cot after a feed, on my tummy - my mum thought that safest.
I was smacked if I was 'naughty'

Ooh, and DH is 37, MIL was 27 when she had him, her first and was an older mum, mw asked why she left it so late to start a family.

My Nan had her first at 29 in the late 50's and was scolded for not having him earlier and daring to work after he was born.

your mum sounds fab phlebas!

My mum; Put baby rice in the baby bottles to help baby sleep thru the night!

Leaving baby out in the pram in the garden, cold or hot!

Putting baby to sleep on its tummy.

Taking us to a relatives house where there was a thick smog of cigarette fumes in the lounge!

Letting us play out on our bikes all day without being able to contact us, we were 9&10

Giving me bits of raw sausage to eat when she was cooking the tea

I was born in 81, parents had read the continuum concept so co sleeping (one big futon no less!), ebf then home made organic fruit and veg. Slings for df, mum was 17 and about 7 stone, and we were all such fat babies I don't think she could carry us long. She popped my dd1 in a pashmina and cleaned the kitchen the first time she came after I gave birth though so must have learnt that somewhere. My mum claims she invented rooming in by becoming so upset when they tried to take me to the nursery on my first nihht causing several other ladies to ask for their babies back too please. My dad tried to buy a plastic cot from the hospital so that I would always be able to see them and apparently used to take me to the park to swish me through the long grass when I was a few weeks old. It is a lot to live up to!

I grew up having absolutely nothing to rebel against

Our kids have such boring, safe lives compared to the ones we had, don't they

Or should that be in the spirit of Good Parenting?

Let me guess you're a banker or a lawyer now phelbas?

The health visitor recommended whisked raw egg mixed in with milk when my baby was six months old and needed fattening up.

Didn't work very well because the squiggle used to block the hole in the teat.

Mignonette, luckily shagging one's students is now not required, or else I think I'd find another job given what I would have to endure.

bitofkipper and mig for that matter!

I had forgotten about volunteering to go in the boot. That was a treat in those days.

(Starting to sound like a Monty Python sketch)