To think small children in boarding schools aren’t there because they want to be?

[SwearyG]

I am trying to unpick some of the gaslighting from my family at the moment and one of the things I am constantly told about being sent off to board at age 8 (I took the entrance exam on my eighth birthday) was that “you begged to go”.

I have no memory of this “begging” and neither does my DS (3 years older) but it is written into family lore and used by my parents as the reason that I was sent. I can’t make head nor tail of this as an adult as I certainly wouldn’t put that sort of decision in the hands of a child. It’s presented as my choice and nothing to do with them.

AIBU to think they’re gaslighting me and it was their choice to put me into boarding school, and not something any parent would do because their child asked or “begged”?

Everyone rewrites history to a certain extent. People remember events and emotions differently. It may be that your parents really do remember it that way, or they have told the story so often that's it's become their own truth. Clearly boarding was something they were in agreement with since your older sister was already there.

My 5 sisters and I were brought up in the care system. I was 10 at the time (I'm now 56). Whilst I clearly remember the reasons why (it was the right decision), my older sister chooses not to acknowledge it and my 4 younger sisters have little to no memories of life before care.

My mum has rewritten our early years in her head. She creates scenarios with family anecdotes that have become her truth and presents them to us as reality. My older sister and I have wildly different memories and she also presents hers as the absolute truth.

I made my peace with it all a long time ago. No matter how many times it has been discussed over the years, each of us remembers it differently - not because we want to make anyone feel bad but because that's what we each know really happened.

You won't be able to change the family folklore but you can change your own feelings about it. You know the truth and that's all that matters really and that's what you need to make your peace with.

I have an aquiantance. Who tried for 6 years to get pregnant, paid hundreds of thousands for treatment here and abroad had twins. A nanny / doula whatever from newborn to 6 months. Then straight into nursery from 7.30 am to 6.30 pm. Then off to boarding school. I just don’t get it. They think they are doing their best for their kids and the kids who are now early teens loved every minute of it. The best bit is she never worked.

They are the rudest kids I have ever met.

I had boarding school used as a threat throughout my childhood, from as young as I can remember right through to leaving school.
A friend's DCs were sent to boarding school at 7 or 8, she claims that they 'wanted to'; her DH was Army but they didn't move that often (3 or 4 times in 18 years and never abroad?), friend didn't work. DCs went to school in south of England, parents lived in southwest England, so hardly opposite ends of the country.
Her dc2 has never forgiven her, dc1 went completely off the rails from the age of 18, dc3 has very poor relationship with his parents.
Friend claims it was nothing to do with them boarding, but it makes me wonder if you only saw your DCs in holidays (grandparents did exeat visits).

My DH was sent to boarding school at 8 and has quite good memories of it - it was that or being dragged from military base to military base as part of a fairly dysfunctional family (unhappily married parents).

It's not for everyone, but he says he's fairly sure the alternative would have been worse and while he probably wouldn't have asked to go, his parents made the right choice. It was literally the only source of stability in his life at the time.

mrshathaway is spot on.

This has nothing to do with boarding school. It is is about the parents not taking responsibility for their own actions.

my husband was 8 when he went - he did want to go and he remembers saying he wanted to go - he begged to go. I wouldnt want my son going so early though.

Mil often trots out the story of how DH “absolutely insisted” on playing in the school football match when he had a raging case of mumps. DH remembers it as being told “you don’t let the team down”. The next day he ended up in hospital very ill. The in laws basically decided not to take responsibility for their stupid and irresponsible decision.

Op do you have children of 8 or older? I'm wondering if they look at them and think "Gosh 8 is so young. I can't believe we sent them away at that age" and then start babbling "You begged to go, you begged to go" in a fit of guilt.

Another thing I have noticed, be it daycare for long hours or boarding, is that the parents are often above average in their anger issues. So defensive. If both parents need to work then they haven't much choice, they are allowed to complain about this! Not pretend that everyone else is wrong because their children LOOOOVE being in the care of others.

SwearyG How easy to blame a child, how cowardly, how nasty. And to continue to blame you now. But you know, deep down they may know how horrid they are. I hooe they can't sleep at night. And another thing is that OTHERS know. They may not speak out because they too are cowards and don't want to face the wrath, but others knew and know that your parents are liars.

I think they have rewritten history in their minds - they chose to send you away to school, whether you begged them to go is neither here nor there, it was their decision to make. I wonder how old you are? As an adult you are now master of your own destiny - you can blame them (and they can continue to deny it), but the fact is they no longer control you. What you choose to do now is up to you. You are right, it sounds as if they are gaslighting you - but the very fact that you are aware it is happening means it’s not working very well. I wouldn’t even enter into a debate about it - what difference does it make now anyway, you’ve left school, you can’t turn back the clock? What you can do is move forward making your own decisions - they are no longer in control, you are.

Another thing I have noticed, be it daycare for long hours or boarding, is that the parents are often above average in their anger issues

This is so ridiculous it's funny... . As far as massive, stupid generalisations go, this has to be right up there.

unless we had no choice to go somewhere that was unsafe/war torn (we don't have that kind of job)

I looked after a child whose parents work took them rather near Chernobyl. Of course he boarded (and was very well adjusted fwiw). But I still wonder why they accepted that posting when he was so young still. I don't know how much choice they really had.

I know that some parents find it far easier to be good parents if they only have to do it one or two days a week. That's not something you necessarily know before you conceive!

Boarding, daycare, homeschooling - whatever. It’s irrelevant - the point is these are all decisions for a parent to take not a child. A child may express a preference - possibly for no school whatsoever - the parents decide what is best.

I wouldn’t send an 8 year old to boarding school, although I think it might be something an 8 year old would ask for (I read a lot of boarding school stuff at that age and remember saying a lot how great it seemed, I was in no position to go!). But an 8 year old could ask and think it sounds great but hate the reality so no I wouldn’t take them ‘begging’ to go as a reason they should. Saying that, my DH went to boarding school at 8 years old and he has always said he loved it, out in the country, lots of pastoral care, went home most weekends. He went for two years. He went again to another boarding school at 13-16 and had a horrific time, he hates that school
with a passion, so age itself doesn’t make it easier I guess.

I just explained the concept of boarding school to DS6, in completely neutral language. He thought it sounded great. Then I explained that some people thought it was a bad thing because it meant the kids couldn't be with their parents. He then said it was really sad. Then I explained that it was good for some people, and he is now ambivalent

Maybe I have a very easily led DS. However, it does prove some pp's points, that it's really not hard to get kids to say what you want them to.

I think there is always a problem in that it’s not even just that memory is unreliable, but also that different people can have different experiences of the same event. Perhaps you mentioned wanting to go with a sibling to school a few times - in your parents’ heads it became ‘begging to go’. There might be some self-delusion at work but they may not be actually lying/has-lighting: they now feel that you did beg to go.

I went to boarding school in my late teens. The main reason was that I was utterly miserable and having a nervous breakdown at my existing school, and the indie schools in the area were all high pressured too, so wouldn’t have helped to move to them. Therefore, boarding was proposed. I was quite keen to go (obviously I was much more able to make a rationa choice than a child ten years younger anyway). On this my parents and I would agree.

However, I would also say that my parents were keen to get rid of me - I wa depressed, working intensely, ruining their nice peaceful homelife with my dsis, and by their personalities (my mum in particular tends towards the narcissistic) they had no interest in and/or found it difficult to deal with my emotional issues as a teenager. Instead they were happy for me to go to school miles away and see a counsellor and continue having major emotional problems out of sight.

There is no way my parents would ever could countenance that additional information - as far as they are aware of their feelings it would all have been done for my good, not theirs. Now as it happens, I was far better off in that school and although I had some ongoing problems it did protect me from mental breakdown (far less pressured environment). And so my parents don’t have to really ever hear my extra information about my perception of their reasoning, because we can all happily go on accepting the wholly positive story as it had positive outcomes.

I’m not saying this is what your parents did, OP - it could actually be gaslighting. But I do think it’s possible for genuinely different memories of events or emotions to be genuinely felt by the people involved (even though I think mine are better). That’s why it’s good advice from PPs to stand your ground and politely say ‘that’s not what happened in my experience’ - don’t let them get away with denying your reality even if they had or feel they had a different one.

My 7yo DS is very aware of boarding because his dad works all hours in a boarding school and we live in a school house. He is in the Prep section and there are children who board in his year (Y3), some from abroad.

He is adamant that he doesn't ever want to board, but thinks he would like to do the odd sleepover when he is older. I think that is fine- not that different to sleeping at a friend's house really.

I am pretty doubtful any of the junior boarders are there because they'd rather board than be at home.

I loved Mallory Towers, somewhat romantically, when about 10 but no way would I outsource parenting like that. Even as an actual 10 year old I cried, homesick as hell when on a five day trip to Tenby in Juniors.

As someone unpicking gas lighting ( op you may like to read my saga, it might help) this makes me Fucking raging!
Let's say you did read the Malory towers books and get carried away by the idea of midnight feasts and jolly japes at boarding school. YOU WERE 8 YEARS OLD!! If you asked to join the circus would they have sent you?
This type of justification IS gas lighting and I'm glad you see it as such. Family lore really needs unpicking. I hope they one day accept responsibity that THEY were the adults and THEY made the decision, but don't hold your breathe..

I bought a second hand book once and in it is a letter from a child at the Dragon School, which takes up to 13yo. She's clearly just started boarding school, I think it's dated about half way through the term, and I'd guess from the language and writing she was around 8yo.

Two things spring out from the page. one is the love she has for her parents, and the other is how much she is enjoying being at boarding school.
I don't know if she begged to go or had to go because of family situations, but I suspect if she had a younger sister who got similar letters from her, or she talked like that when she got home, then they'd be begging to join her asap.

Our letters home were ‘checked for content’ before being sent.
We were told not to complain or write things that would make our parents sad.

I did find a few of my letters home when helping DM sort some things and they were very formulaic and jolly.

I wasn’t unhappy at school at all and much preferred it to home but, when I did have troubles, there was no way I’d have written them in the weekly letter!