To feel sadness whenever I go on a council estate?

[TheHolyToast]

I was brought up on a huge council estate. It was the happiest time of my life. I used to play out with all the local kids, every night after school and every day during the holidays. The older kids taught me how to ride a bike and i still remember the feeling. The ice cream man used to come around and the siren sent all the kids running to their houses for money. The neighbours thought nothing of feeding kids that were not theirs - you'd simply go back to your friend's house and the mum would be like "so and so's bairn is here, put some extra fish fingers in". We would go and explore the local woods, play in the overgrown gardens of empty houses, everyone was happy and carefree. Everyone was friends.

Then my mum remarried into money and everything changed. All of a sudden it was "common" for kids to play in the street and I was sent to organised clubs instead where I didn't like anyone and they didn't like me. I changed school and the atmosphere was different, everyone compared how much their clothes and holidays cost, nobody just wanted to have fun, it was all about showing off what you had. I started playing truant as I quickly became friendless. There was no more playing in woods, no more "sweet van", god forbid you turn up at someone's house uninvited, you'd be sent straight back home again. I hated it and longed for our old house.

Anyway, 25 years on and I'm a community nurse now. I'm often working on council estates and in particular, my old estate. The sun always seems to be out in these areas, like I remember it.

The other day I went into a house that was identical to my old house. The memories started flooding back. The brown corduroy sofa and cheap mahogany furniture, Jackie from next door and the swinging chair she had attached to the ceiling. I started to feel upset but carried on with my work. Then at 3.30 the kids came bursting in, dropped their bags, announced that they were playing out and the mum shouted "make sure you come home for tea, fish fingers and waffles" then bang. The door shut and I watched the kids running down the garden path with their friends all stood near the gate waiting for them. I ended up quite upset at this point and the poor patient asked if I was ok. I told her her house reminded me of my old house and it was bringing back happy memories. She laughed and said "you lived around here? I thought all you nurses were posh? Surely you can't miss living on here??!" But I really, really do.

Money doesn't bring happiness does it? I feel it's ironic that throughout our lives, the focus seems to be on improving our financial circumstances yet the happiest time of my life was when I was at my poorest.

AIBU to pine for this stuff when it everyone else's eyes, we were just another poor family claiming benefits on a council estate?

Op, I didn't grow up on a council estate and I played in the street all the time. No idea about this "common" thing you mentioned. Kids don't play in the street now, apart from anything else, because there are too many moving cars and parked cars. We always used to keep an eye out for the odd one but it is nothing like now.

As a kid I wasn’t concerned about money either.

There is no virtue in being poor, you’re struggling to help yourself let alone be able to help anyone else.

It’s true you can have fame, wealth etc and not be happy because of issues within yourself that are still there despite the glossy new coat.

What having money gives you is choices and freedom and for me personally, to never have to worry about bills, getting fired, missing out on stuff I can’t afford to go to, not being able to afford where I want to live etc etc. Give me lots of money!!

My area, and my DC's school, is almost literally split down the middle between the 'estate' families and the 'middle class' families.

I'm not up for cliquey stuff so I talk to everybody and am friends with everybody on FB. The estate mums have a far, far better support network with each other. I know money has to come into it but those mums have got each other's backs.

DH and I, born in the sixties, both had this sort of childhood. It was one of the reasons we bought a boxy newbuild on an estate of green spaces and cul de sacs at the edge of open countryside when all our friends were buying character Victorian houses on main roads.

Because our estate was mostly young families who all moved at the same time we had a great community spirit. The kids played out in packs. I remember DS1 and his little mate would call in at our house and his, decide who was making the best dinner and both eat there. Us adults had lots of barbecues and sat out in each others gardens socialising. Basically if it was a sunny summers evening we hung out in the garden with the neighbours.

We live on a posher estate now (needed a bigger house). It's not quite the same but younger DS(11) still plays out.

Until I was 10 I grew up on a nice modern housing estate where nearly every household had children, we all played out in the street and the woods together and I remember it being sunny every day. Then we moved to a big, old, damp house where there were no other children and I was miserable. It wasn't about being rich or poor, my parents were always comfortable, it was about being with lots of other children where could all play together and there was a community.

Hmm. This reminds me a bit of the 17th century when aristocrats used to idolise the 'simplicity' and 'carefreeness' of rural 'bucolic' lifestyles and Marie Antoinette used to dress up as a milkmaid and pretend on a specially built model farm.

In reality it was a very hard existent with low life expectancy, high infant mortality and frequent famine and lots of poverty.

It's very easy to view somebody else's lives through a rose tinted glass and not see the bad bits.

For example, one person's 'playing out' is another person's unsupervised children vandalising and behaving anti socially and being a general nuisance because their parents don't know or care what they're doing as long as they're not under their feet. It was certainly was when we used to have problems with anti social behaviour in my area. 'Please can you supervise your children so they stop setting fire to shared community facilities'. 'That's not fair, kids should be allowed to play out'. Or neighbours feeding others kids is 'Their mother never seems to bother to feed them so I feel like I have to give them something if they turn up at tea time'. Seen quite a few threads like that on here actually.

I feel it's ironic that throughout our lives, the focus seems to be on improving our financial circumstances yet the happiest time of my life was when I was at my poorest

You were a child, what do you know? bet your mother was much happier with money. And if you haven't made the best of the opportunities you were given, start now.

I grew up dirt poor. not compared to developing countries but Uk poor

Not enough food, not enough clothes (no wellies, winter coat, charity shop shoes). not enough heat/ furniture. certainly no books etc

but it wasnt all that was wrong. £ is only part of it.

family and community matters so much.

My nanna lived on an estate with my auntie. I had more relatives dotted around the estate too. I loved going there every weekend. Loads of kids to play with. Poor though, tiny house. My cousin still lives there with her family and I actually envy the closeness she has with her friends and the sense of how the community sticks together. I know what you mean OP. It's a time gone by that I miss. This, for me, was the 80s and 90s.

tbh I think you are being a bit patronising ,all those wonderful salt of the earth people living in council estates ,some are great some not so much

I totally agree with this. I also think you shouldn’t generalize. Your experience is not necessarily going to match other people’s, then or now.

Growing up I lived in a big detached house on a cul-de-sac. The children played out to a certain extent but we didn’t roam freely and we weren’t in and out of each other’s houses constantly. I now live in Zone 2 London, in an area you might call middle class although many of the people around here are even more than that. It’s a small street of about 40 terraced homes, about half of which are occupied by families with young or school-aged children. All of the kids except the ones from the weird anti-social family play out on the sidewalks and in each other’s gardens, and in the park across the street. Often after much pestering one parent will take a gang of little kids across the street to the park, and the older ones go themselves. We have a big street party every year, plus someone always hosts something for Christmas, Halloween, an Easter egg hunt, etc. I love it. We are renting right now (expats) but I wish we could afford to buy here. Unfortinately the houses go for around £2 million, which is never going to happen for us!

The point is, having money doesn’t mean you can’t have a close-knit neighbourhood with lots of community spirit. Many of the children here do organized clubs and activities but I don’t think most of them are overscheduled except the ones from the weird anti-social family and if you’re looking for a playmate there’s always someone hanging about.

Absolutely money doesn't buy happiness.
My DF married into money and has said, 25 years in, he'd rather live in a trailer park than put up with her much longer.
Every time I've been to the States the people who have been kind, welcoming and most importantly, genuine, have been the poorer people. The country club set are painfully false and mostly alcoholic.

I feel the same. I would go back to those days in a heartbeat, when we ate 'rubbish' food, played out, had cheap furniture, tacky Christmas decorations and lived rough. No internet? No surgically attached mobile phones? We strived for bigger and better things but now we supposedly have them we realise simpler is best and we didn't realise how lucky we were.

My old childhood home is about 15 minutes drive away. I often go there just to 'be' there. It makes me feel truly at home and I feel some of the happiness and peace I knew then.

There's a whole heap of research that shows people without 'social capital' (that sense of belonging, feeling like you matter and like you have a purpose) have poorer health. Whether there is more social capital on council estates (which have lots of social problems as well) or in nice cul de sacs or more generally in our society is debatable. But feeling like you belong, and that you are part of a community is incredibly important, and a lot of people do feel lonely now. There are frequent threads on it in MN and in older age people, loneliness is epidemic. I don't think the message is 'all live on a council estate' but countries without huge divisions between rich and poor and where people have a stronger sense of belonging do relatively well compared with those where there's a larger gap and more fragmentation (which arguably the UK has).

But isn’t it about finding your community wherever you are?

I grew up in suburbia (3 bed semi) - not a council estate. We played out all the time and would call on everyone in the street. If someone was having their tea so wasn’t allowed out until they were finished you’d be invited in and offered some. I don’t think what you describe is a council estate thing.

Problem is now you couldn't just ask Jane or Johnny to stay for tea for fear of them having food allergies or intolerances. Give them something that doesn't agree with them you could be sued.

I grew up in a beautiful seaside suburb which was teetering on the edge of being massively gentrified and then it was. We had wonderful childhoods building treehouses and racing through the Glen so fast we felt our legs would fall off and swimming at the beach and at each other's homes. Riding our bikes up and down the hills like nutters. I live about 40 minutes away from there now so only have cause to drive past a few times a year. I always feel nostalgic but its ridiculous for me to feel that way really. Almost all the houses are huge mansion-like things now with great big high walls and masses of security. I've never seen children playing in the street in the times I've driven past. Once or twice I've seen toddlers walking home from school with their mums but that's it. I think its safe to say that the world has changed and we need to remember that. You can't cross the same river twice as you both have changed. Its fine to feel nostalgic for a happy childhood (and I'm sorry you were miserable when you had money) but important to focus on the things that made it happy so that you can pass those things on to your DC (if you have any). I recognize that where I live now is a MUCH better place to raise children than my childhood home would be, despite what it was in the 80's.

I grew up in a remote terrace of houses, all privately owned. We played out relentlessly from dawn til dusk cos there weren't no telly. Fabulous childhood from which I have many happy memories.

The past is another country.

I don't know about council estates, but I feel the same nostalgia for my very different upbringing and childhood. The passing of time has a blurring effect.

I was poor growing up and I am relatively well-off now and I can confirm I am much happier now and so are my kids compared to me as a child. I wasn't unhappy as such but I was cold A LOT and I don't like being cold. I also felt embarrassed about having friends over as my housing situation was pretty crappy...outside toilet, damp walls etc. I was also scared my Dad would lose his job again which happened twice as factory work dwindled in this country.

We didn't live on a council estate though...maybe that is why it was a bit shit.

I mean this very gently and just to give an objective view.

I don't think it was your new wealth that made you unhappy but your mum's way of parenting you.

I grew up in a middle class house hold. I spent my days similar to you, playing out and returning for Dinner. I wouldn't just turn up unannounced but would ring first.

I transitioned from a state school because I was an absolute shit it would enhance my education and didn't come across any of the issues you had.

Ironically, there was a girl who joined my school who's Mum married a rich man. She loved her new life of holidays and horse riding.

I just remember always being cold and hungry, and being made fun of at school for wearing hand-me-down clothes and having had my hair hacked at by one of my parents because we couldn't afford a hairdresser.

Yes, I got to play out a lot, but that was because my mum used to shove myself and my siblings out of the door as soon as we got back from school so that we weren't under her feet.

I also remember the awful cheap frozen food that we had to eat. The only holidays that we had were when we stayed with my lovely grandparents, and I remember some of the grinding poverty that some of the children local to them had to live in, with alcoholic parents, and sometimes being left outside all night because their parents were too pissed to even remember they had children.

Made me damned determined that my children wouldn't have to live like that.

I think that for those of us who had reasonably happy childhoods we're always going to look back with rose tinted specs. The sun always seemed to shine, we played outside on the street, played hopscotch on the pavement and disappeared for ages playing as long as we asked Mum first and made sure to 'not go off with/accept sweets from strangers' etc.

Will todays children look on their childhoods, playing on computers and ipads have similarly happy memories? I expect that they will, it's just different as the emphasis is on different things.

As a child I spent my time with our ponies with my sister and our friends and we'd spend every waking moment with them: looking after them, brushing them, building jumps out of tree branches in woods or painting old oil drums and preparing for shows so plaiting them up and washing them.

There was always constant chatter and laughter with the naughty things the ponies did or the adventures we had. A pony is the perfect fluffy best friend with their soulful eyes, sweet breath, kind, quiet nature and give the biggest warmest, fluffiest cuddles.

We didn't have the money to buy our own to start with so we used to spend all our time helping out at the local riding stables until an old farmer gave us ponies on loan, later we rescued a foal from slaughter and trained it ourselves.

What it taught us was that hard work and discipline pays off and we were naturally fit with all the mucking out and exercise.

I definitely wanted my dc to experience that kind of childhood.