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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask what thing your parents did, that you will/have actively tried NOT to do when raising your own DC?

154 replies

ollieplimsoles · 04/04/2016 19:07

I'll start,

I love my Mum to bits and we have a wonderful relationship, but I had a very serious phobia of needles growing up and I was a very anxious child. She wouldn't tell me I had to have an injection til the very last minute (she would just show up at school or we'd walk into the doctors) and I would have a panic attack. I wish she would have told me a few days before that I was going to have one and why, then I would have been able to make peace with it. It just meant that I couldn't relax when she took us out or at school, it made my phobia worse that she felt she needed to keep me in the dark about it too, like it was something she was also afraid of.

With DD I'm going to avoid doing that and try to be upfront with her from the start.

OP posts:
Ironfloor · 04/04/2016 21:09

Smacking
Emotional blackmail
Scaring me out of a sulk by saying that when I turned around, there will be a huge, scary devil-like man standing behind me (I'm still scarred by this one; shit myself if I have to walk into a room by myself at night, it any other time).
Force-feeding

cantgonofurther · 04/04/2016 21:17

My mum used money as away to show love. eg She would say "if I didn't care about you, I wouldn't have got you those trainers" So if she brought my siblings something and not me I would think she loved them more. If I didn't get something I asked for, I would feel rejected. I think it is because she was from a poor family and everything she owned as a child was donated from charity.

I am careful that my children don't equate how much I spend on them with how much I love them.

RaskolnikovsGarret · 04/04/2016 21:25

Never automatically tell off the older child if there is an argument with a younger sibling.

Sorry to all of you who had to deal with much worse. Flowers

MeredithFrampton · 04/04/2016 21:35
  • Keep encouraging / almost forcing my kids to eat even when they are visibly overweight. I have had eating disorders since the age of 15 and struggle not to be anorexic or bulimic even now, in mid-30s. I am a healthy weight, BMI 20, but my mum will STILL say I look 'far too thin' even now and 'accidentally' buy me chocolate.
  • Spoil/ overindulge / overprotect / live life on behalf of any of my children. I'm fiercely independent but one of my siblings, in her 30s, is like the biggest, most useless, spoilt, overgrown hideous child because of my mum doing EVERYTHING for her. Literally. She doesn't work. 'Can't' go to the shops because of 'panic attacks'. My mum pampered and babied her through every step of her life, my sister can do no wrong, it's always the doctors/teachers/lecturers/boyfriends who are ALL so unreasonable if they complain about her. As a result my sister is the most hideous creature with no life, no job, no friends, everyone has given up on her because the degree of narcissism that my mum has nurtured in her. My mum on the other hand is a supremely competent, intelligent, experienced, worldly woman who is currently on safari on the other side of the world. My daughter is only in Reception, my second child is a toddler, and I make both of them do as much for themselves as they possibly can. Above all, I want them to be independent and self-reliant. The idea of either of them turning out like my sister makes me physically sick.
  • Use my kids as a battleground between me and my partner, to punish each other through the children.
  • Expose my children to the endless 'will they won't they' agonising about whether or not to get divorced. My parents have now been married for 45 years and first announced they were getting divorced 25 years ago...
BudsBeginingSpringinSight · 04/04/2016 21:40

I won't continually tell my children how much they resemble other people, particularly myself. I celebrate them as themselves, each a completely unique individual

This is interesting why have you picked this out? I think its common to compare dc, although PILS do it "excessively" with my DC and it drives me mad every single thing they do is related back to which one of them has the same trait, even down to liking chocolate.

but my psychiatrist and my clinical psychologist label it "traumatic" because of the "microdisappointments" piling on top of each other for years

Again interesting, DH had this, constant disappointment to his DP. I wonder if this is also connected to the constant comparing?

scarednoob · 04/04/2016 21:44

My DM was v healthy. We were never allowed crisps or sweets unless it was a special occasion.

As a consequence, I went to university, could buy what I wanted - and piled on 5 stone over 3 years.

With DD, I will let her have it in moderation as part of a normal balanced diet, and if she works for it. Nothing too major, but if she wants a chocolate bar, we will go for a walk first, that sort of thing.

Krampus · 04/04/2016 21:45

Nitpicking.

sweetbabyray · 04/04/2016 21:52

Let my very pale child out in the sun with no SPF so she can "build up a tolerance" to the sun. And then get angry when she can't move properly because of the sunburn and "ruins the holiday" with her sunstroke.

More than once. Still have to wear 50+ so that clearly worked!

redexpat · 04/04/2016 22:14

Oh Id forgotten the sunburn. Factor 8. On a redhead.

QueenofLouisiana · 04/04/2016 22:26

DS won't grow up think sex is dirty and wrong, I was told that having sex would make sure no man would marry me. Hmmmm- no mother.

It's left me with a few issues though.

Actually not sure what's worse- the idea that not getting married would be a disaster, or the "sex is wrong" message Confused. Even more odd is the fact that she told me this as a divorced single mother with a live in boyfriend (at the time, now my -lovely- step dad).

Cantchangeusernameback · 04/04/2016 22:42

Tell them they should eat everything on their plate and guilt-trip them if they don't want\don't finish something I have cooked.

DramaAlpaca · 04/04/2016 22:48

I have made a very conscious effort to be a completely different parent to my DC than my parents were to me.

So many examples on this thread resonate with me.

EverySongbirdSays · 04/04/2016 22:53

Play siblings off against the other, and manipulate the way they feel about each other to get the upper hand thereby destroying any hope of them ever having functional relationships with each other. Allow one sibling to isolate and victimise another endlessly.

Stay with an abusive DH/Father for a good decade longer than I should have - so that my children "will know him for what he is"

Almost give a SN child up for adoption and refuse to admit it even 30 years later

Teach a child really bad relationship with food and feed them absolute crap, allow rest of family to criticise weight in front of her, tell adult child she needs to lose weight repeatedly despite having caused the cycle.

Refuse to teach SN child essential life skills they need and are capable of learning because I can do it quicker and its too much time/ hassle.

And as for DF : be a raging tempremental alcoholic egotist who blames all around them for their own frustrations with their life.

kipperydippery · 04/04/2016 23:24

Send my Y5 daughter to boarding school, & refuse to send my Y4 daughter away for another 3 years in case it "upset her". Grrr.

A long time ago now, my DD1 is now Y5. It made me realise I haven't forgotten how it felt. It has brought it all back.

MNetters who assume people with a private education have everything on a plate. they don't. Some of us wished with everything we had we could go to a normal school & be kissed goodnight by our Mum

AbernathysFringe · 04/04/2016 23:28

My mum is my best friend, that said I would

a) never put my own looks down in front of her
b) push her to do things (my mum was very liberal and I was very lazy, not the best combo)
c) put ribbons in her hair. feckin' ribbons.

AbernathysFringe · 04/04/2016 23:30

*c) correction - NEVER put ribbons in her hair. All my school photos I'm in frilly dresses and ribbons. :/

JeanGenie23 · 04/04/2016 23:37

I like my mum most of the time but I have to frequently stand up for myself, she seems to enjoy being a bitch Blush thats the most horrendous thing I have ever said about my mother

I have not not will I ever;

  1. smack
  2. put my child down in front of others. (My mum used to call me fat and stupid in front of my friends and their mums)
UterusUterusGhali · 04/04/2016 23:57

So many of these ring true, but those of you saying "I wouldn't get divorced", you don't always have a say in that, you know? :(

Alisvolatpropiis · 05/04/2016 00:00

My parents divorcing has had no detrimental effect on my life, better apart and happy than together making everyone miserable.

EverySongbirdSays · 05/04/2016 00:09

My parents divorce was one of the highlights of my childhood and I'm not being sarcastic.

The relief I felt!

UbiquityTree · 05/04/2016 00:34

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Kaddy · 05/04/2016 00:53

My parents were warm, loving and fun but never had any rules or expectations of us. They did the whole benign neglect thing times a million. Im a bit more involved with my DC.

dentydown · 05/04/2016 01:12

Smacking. My mum used to smack until I cried. I made myself not cry one day, and she smacked and smacked and my dad intervened.

Not letting them walk to school on their own. I was walked to school until I was 14. Was told that I wasn't to be trusted and I could get up to anything. All the other parents were neglecting their kids.

Not letting them move out. I tried and tried to move out, but it was made very difficult. I was made to pay their full rent, not just a portion of rent, so moving out would put them in a difficult position.

Suncream. I believe kids will be ok with about 30mins of unprotected exposure, but they need suncream if playing for long periods of time. Not cheapy moisturiser.

Smoking. I don't smoke. Smoking took priorty over everything. My clothes consisted of jogging bottoms with holes in, t-shirts and sweaters. All bought from market stalls.

Allowing them to go to parties. I have aspergers and literally they are hell on earth. The last one the DJ makes the parents join in. I managed to get through it.

Going on about being an "apprentice human being" all through out my teenage years she kept going on about it until I snapped.

Being odd about going on the pill. I had horrendus periods, I bled everywhere, felt faint. I asked, and asked. Apparently I would sleep around and hormones arnt good fo you.

Stop being so odd about mental health. I had undiagnosed aspergers, but they Wernt allowed to diagnose me with that, just anxiety. I wasn't allowed medication. Looking back, I needed medication, I was going through hell at school.

Wizzles · 05/04/2016 04:05

Seems v minor compared to other posts, but here is my two penneth:

  1. not compare siblings. Or at least not publicly. DM once introduced me & DSis to someone as "Wizzles in the clever one, but
NerrSnerr · 05/04/2016 04:43

Talking about sex and periods. I will always make sure there are plenty of sanitary towels/ tampax etc in the bathroom.

I will let my daughter shave her legs and will make sure she knows how (or any other defuzzing of choice).

I will give my children a choice over clothes and not buy the cheapest so they get picked on.