AIBU to be annoyed at 'girl' judging our family dynamics.

[madchocolatemum48]

A group of friends of a neighbour and I were chatting at a party over the weekend.
We were getting acquainted with the usual "What do you do?" "How many children?".......etc etc.
I said dh & i have been married nearly 20 years, 2 children, I'm a SAHM. Ended with saying "You know, the usual traditional family"
A young woman who had already stated she had 3 kids by 3 fathers, never married, pipes up " Fuc#ing hell, didn't know people still did that old b¤llsh!t stuff"

Is it 'old-fashioned' to be a traditional family now? Maybe she just made me feel old, but I wouldn't have made a derogatory comment about her family dynamics.

Bwa ha ha at "posh village".

My mum lives in a Yorkshire town (TdF went through it recently) with some of the highest house prices outside London. But she is also not only divorced, but also living with a woman . They probably won't let her in Betty's anymore.....

I've had dreadful pg sickness all evening and this thread has cheered me right up

Oh, and in case anyone cares, I am married to my unborn baby's father, we don't own a tv, and we also have no pets.

Devere I think you may be misremembering. I'm not far off your age and went to a school in a very mixed urban area. The impact of the 1969 Divorce Reform act really wasn't felt for quite some while. Two girls out of a class of 30 in my school had separated/ divorced parents, and were though exotic, one girl's dad had just buggered off, leaving a mum with five kids to fend for herself. That was exceptionally unusual. This was London. I find it hard to believe that at your age a lot of your school peers were from divorced or separated parents. It just didn't happen that fast.

Violet no of course she doesn't have to not mention she's married. However I'd think, as OP seems to have gone out of her way to impart that information in such a self-congratulatory way, she has a chip on her shoulder.

Harrogate is lovely, (we were there for the TDF), but definitely not a village.

And be careful revolting, people will say you are bragging about your marital status.

It's not Hebden Bridge is it RevoltingPeasant?

Not sure why everyone is being so mean to OP. Is it wrong to have a traditional family?. Sounds to me like the " girl " has experienced some negativity about her situation and was on the defensive.

Tinkle you wrote "In my head, my default is that children have two married parents."
You also said some the teens have friends who have single parents but you don't know aay of them.

I'm 5 years older than ypu and I find your default setting quite extraordinary. Are you saying you're still hard-wired to that when you yourself go against it?

There's nothing wrong with a traditional family; what is odd is saying "You know, the usual traditional family"

What an odd expression.

I'm the oldest person here. When I was a child then maybe the expectation was that children had two married parents. But to assume that now is just insane.

And nobody ever even asked whether the two married parents were happy or living lives of quiet desperation.

Bit it's all academic, because the OP is a tissue of lies.

She as on the wrong, ignore her .

Move on from it.

Phaedra, my teens have lots of friend whose parents I have only met a couple of times, indeed, lots of friends whose parents I have never met.

And yes, I suppose it is a bit strange, DP and I have been together nearly 25 years, never got married, tend to forget we are not married, but move in circles where everyone else is mostly married.

Or possibly I am completely wrong, and they are just shacked up, but I am assuming they are married, as people seem to do with me and Dp.

I think it's a bit weird to walk around assuming every child you meet must have two heterosexual married parents.

How odd. Much like this thread.

There seems to be a bit of an over reaction on this thread. You made a factual statement about what you do and she was rather rude in return. I expect she was over sensitive about what you said. I'm sure your statement was made without thinking and without the intention to offending.

"Usual traditional" is obviously a massively loaded phrase. I must confess it had completely passed me by but I shall certainly avoid using it myself. Or else risk an apparently well deserved kicking from the most of Mumsnet.

"in past years (and not really the too-distant past) it was the norm, to have a two parent family, married, all same surnames etc"

But it was only ever fleetingly the norm to have two children in that kind of set-up. In the nineteenth century, for example, the average was four or five. Even in the early twentieth century it was three and a half or so. So that's not exactly "traditional". And for the vast majority of the population, traditionally, both parents would work (although mothers would often do piecework inside the house rather than go out to work).

I also doubt whether it's really "usual". 47% of children are born to parents who aren't married; of the remaining 53% whose parents aren't married, how many are two-child families with a working father and a SAHM mother?

As the OP's family setup is neither traditional nor usual it's not unreasonable to assume that she had some reason for insisting, in a casual conversation, that it was both those things. That reason might just have been "I know very little about social history or the composition of modern society" but as the OP clearly does see her own situation as inherently superior to that of a unmarried mother there's also a flying chance that some of that sense of superiority leaked out.

Marriage , what is it? Permission from the state to live together and you have to pay for the privilege.
Oh it shows a commitment , rubbish a commitment is staying together in sickness , times of crisis, sharing joy and sadness etc.
I am never rude enough to say this married folk who quiz me to why my partner of x long years are not married. They obviously assume everyone thinks the same as them.
Too many people make judgements about others, when they should concentrate on their own lives.

In addition to what Tortoise said, many British families in the first part of the 20th century would have been headed by a woman, single parent families or blended/step families because of the casualties inflicted by two world wars.

What the OP is describing is the nuclear family, not the traditional family and it's a pretty recent invention.

i c

oh balls
I come from a very conservative religious rrural backwater village. I'm still the 5th unmarried teenage girl to have had a baby in 18 months. I don't buy the idea that it's so rare, people assume it doesn't happen.

In terms of language used "Oh you know, the boring 2.4!" would be self deprecating. "Usual, traditional" sounds like you look down on anyone who doesnt have that set up.

No, you didn't mean to offend her, she was rude, in my opinion

How do you know the kids have different fathers? Did you ask her? Did she volunteer this information?

I got judged by a chavvy little gangsta-rap bitch that I had to work with once, I lived at home with parents at the time, when she had got her own council flat (so apparently people should respect her for being independent), but is was never able to say judgemental things to her, would have been thought really rude.

Traditional family,it does sound a bit ukip territory.very,call me old fashioned,but...
As an aside why are you amending your swear words?either fucking swear or dont
Fuc#ing hell is no less swearie,it just looks contrived

"You know the usual traditional family.." Sounds wanky.

Also why on earth are you referring to her as a girl? Is a female in her twenties not a woman?

YABU.

probably shouldn't tell the OP I'm in my twenties and expecting dc3