Was this “How things were” in the 90’s or was DM a bit Sh*t?

[ForeverBubblegum]

My Father was an absolute deadbeat who didn’t see us or pay maintenance (self-employed, cash in hand), so she was dealt a pretty crap hand. Because she was by far the better parent, I’ve always thought of her as a good parent, but since having DS I’ve started to realise quite how bad some of our childhood was. At the time it seemed normal, but now I’m not sure if it was normal for everyone then, or just normal to us.

A few examples:

Always poor but never worked – apparently there wasn’t childcare in the 90’s so she had to quit her job and say of work until I was in secondary school. Admittedly she had been doing shift work, which would have been hard to cover, but surly there were other jobs? Ironically she did do several interest courses at the local collage, so me and DSis would often have to wait in the garden or shed until she got in after 5 (didn’t want us to be latch key kids), but she couldn’t possibly have worked during the same time. This one is especially annoying as she is now playing the martyr because her pension won’t be very good due to all the time she “had to” stay home raising us.

Never had breakfast before school – not sure if it was a cost thing or a time thing, she’d shout from her room that we had to get up/dressed about 10 minutes before we had to leave, then get out of bed herself just in time to drop us off.

Always dirty – we had 2 set of school cloths to last the week, she would say she washed it every weekend but at least half the time it would get to Monday morning and it would still be dirty. We would then have to go in wearing the less mucky set whilst she washed the other, but then only have one clean for the next 4 days.

Congenital heart defect never diagnosed – it runs in the family and I had worked out I must have it by late teens, and later had it confirmed. However despite anecdotes such as I always used to turn blue as a baby and couldn’t stay awake more than 20 minutes until I was nearly 1, she never thought to get it checked at the time. Not much they could have done about it but at least if it was diagnosed I might not have got in trouble every week for not been able to run in PE.

Never used car seats, and often no seat belts – obviously don’t remember been a baby but didn’t have any at 3 or 4 when been dropped at nursery and my younger cousins definitely didn’t (remember holding baby in car) which didn’t seem odd at the time, so I suspect we didn’t either. I also remember her commenting how strange the neighbours were for using booster seats for their primary aged children. I remember going places with her friend and kids, so there would be four of us in the back seat (so can’t have had seat belt each), and also remember travelling in the foot well or boot, though less often.

Smoked like a chimney – around us in the house and car, would never even consider moving away from us or going outside. I’ve even seen pictures of her holding me as a baby, with a fag in her hand.

AIBU to feel she could have done better? Written down it sounds terrible, but at the time it didn’t feet out of the ordinary. Can anyone who remembers the 90’s tell me if it would have seemed bad to you at the time, or were standards generally lower back then?

It doesn’t sound anything like the 90s I remember

Hi everyone, sorry it took a while to get back, had to sort tea and bed etc.

Sounds like I should probably give her a pass on the not working, we lived in a smallish town so there may not have been great provision, or might not have been affordable. The college courses she may have been doing for the extra £10 a week in benefits, for us that would have been a lot of money (our weekly food budget was £15-20). It just seemed illogical to say she couldn’t leave us to work but could for study, though I suppose she would have had school holidays off, which she might not have been able to cover if working.

The uniform I don’t think we could have afforded an extra set, and maybe the washing had to wait until there was more electric on the meter? but at the same time she was never organised enough to hang stuff out, so it was the tumble dryer that was eating up power. I think she probably always would have been disorganised / lazy but would have got away with it more if we were better off or clothes were as affordable as nowadays, then there could be more cloths to wear between washes.

The breakfast thing is pretty bad, and looking back I can’t believe I didn’t find it odd or complain at the time. I suppose if we had been use to eating on a morning then stopped then it would have been more of an issue, but rushing out the house with no time to eat was just our norm. We could have got up by ourselves to eat but at 4/5 I never thought to, and by the time I was old enough to self regulate my body had adjusted to not want food first thing (still struggle to eat B’fast now). I don’t think it was her plan to save on grocery money by not feeding us, but possibly a welcome side. At one point she went through a phase of buying cereal bars for us to eat in the car (think my gran had said something) but it didn’t last long.

Overall it sound like my childhood was not typical, but maybe not as far outside the bounds of normal as it would be today, so went unnoticed? I’d like to think she didn’t notice either, because in other ways she was a great mum, so maybe it just all get too much for her and things gradually slid?

OP, regarding the babysitting I'm not sure it's fair to not let your mum babysit based on how she parented twenty-odd years ago in different and difficult circumstances. My own childhood sounds a bit like yours - left to get our own breakfast etc but my parents now make the most amazing grandparents. They are far more involved, hands on and I guess strict about things with the grandkids than they were with us. For example teeth brushing - we were given access to general/shared toothbrushes and toothpaste but otherwise left entirely to our own devices. I couldn't be bothered so I rarely brushed my teeth. Now my parents have at their house: individual toothbrushes with personalised holders for each child, toothpaste for each child depending on their preferences and most importantly they supervise every single tooth brush twice a day. They have multiple car seats for each child, loads of fruit and veg, safety gates, healthy cereal (again breakfast is supervised/made for the kids) and basically just a lot of stuff they didn't do for us. What I'm saying in a long roundabout way is that your mum may just surprise you with how well she looks after your DC if you give her a chance.

Also as a side note, what I'm picking up from the replies is that kids have five sets of uniform now. Is that right? FIVE sets?

I was born mid 80s. I remember sitting in the boot of car, or with 4 people in back of car or with no booster seat, not sure about car seats when baby. My parents smoked around us, we also grew up with no breakfast (which shocks my husband) my mum was at home due to childcare not being widely available. Our clothes were hand me downs but generally looked tidy. To be honest most of people I grew up around had simular childhood. We were generally allowed to watch lots of tv (my parents watched alot of stuff I would not let my children watch at same age) or outside. We entertained our selves alot. In holidays we do lots of stuff with children but I cant remember doing that as much growing up. We fit in more with adult stuff and I know husband had same. We were very loved but think parenting was just generally a bit differrent.

I was born in 1960 and didn't live like that except for bundling into the boot of a volvo with six others.

DC were born 94 and 98. Had car seats, health care, good food, no smoking - in fact we wouldn't take them to a pub or restaurant because people smoked there. Regular dr, health, optician apts. Books, clean clothes, regular baths.

TBF though DS went to a day nursery for three days per week and it was £650pcm! Didn't do it long because he kept being ill.

It was usual then for DC to switch to a booster at abput 2.5 though.

I think your upbringing was a poor one op and your mum didn't really know different. You were a bit neglected I guess but not from a bad place and it sounds as though you were loved. On a different note I had everything including a pony. But my mother, I realise now, was a narcissist, had no excuse and certainly made it clear that I was unwanted and not good enough.

I was born in the late 70s.
Breakfast was drummed into us as the most important meal. I think seatbelts etc became used for is 80s but no carseats.
My mum worked and at primary school I remember going to various people's houses before and after school as mum was at work. I walked to and from school and was a latchkey kid at 9. Smoking was prevalent but not in my house.
Dad worked so many hours he was never in (or at pub or at rugby) but she managed to work and do all the housework too. Not sure how she did that but quite frankly she seemed to be in a terrible mood until about 1998 so .....
I'm afraid your memories of the 90s are a bit sad to me. I remember that decade at high school and university fondly, albeit tinged with fag ash.

The lack of medical care- abuse/ neglect- unless your mother has learning difficulties.

Leaving you in the garden/shed after school- totally unacceptable, maybe a little different if she was working and had no choice, but to go to an ‘interest’ college course, is neglect!

The getting up late and not giving you breakfast was pure laziness! Why couldn’t she get up on time if she didn’t work??

The smoking was fairly common around children, but even though cigarettes were cheaper- 20 a day would have been a huge cost to a single parent. It sounds like she just chose to spend her money on smoking and had the wrong priorities.

“, I think parents back then just had very, very different standards”

In the 1990s.?

90s kid here but very different from your upbringing- although I did ride in the boot a few times, I did also have a booster seat

I was born early 80's. No car seats, we just were held or in a carry cot roughly belted in place. Traveling in the boot was common. There were 4 of us kids and we only ever had a 5 seater car.

My much younger brother had a cheap booster in the 90's. The rest of us didn't.

The rest is not good. I hope you are ok.

The medical thing is awful, she should have picked that up. I have dyslexia and that was missed and my parents feel bad despite the fact I know loads of people who had dyslexia missed, we always got took to the doctor, had dentists and had someone at home after getting back on school bus.

Born in 74.
I seem to be unusual as nobody smoked in my family.
Never saw a car seat or booster seat. But I do remember my baby sister having her carry cot in the back of the car. I sat in the front with the adult belt from age 4. As my mum was in the back with the baby.
Didn't have uniform at primary school, so a clean outfit every day.
Secondary, I had one skirt, one jumper and 2 shirts
I'm sure some people think my teen is neglected! I wake him at 7, 7:10, 7:15,7:20;7:30... ...8:00, 8:10 and he still gets up too late for breakfast.
I usually give him toast as he legs it out of the door.
Same with his uniform. He has 4 pairs of trousers, 6 shirts (they came as 2 in a pack) and 3 ties.
Every evening I ask for washing. But it never appears. So I start the machine as I don't leave it running when we sleep
So despite having more uniform than there are school days in a week, it's all in a big heap on his floor.
I remember my parents struggling. We had to go to work with my mum some days. But they were doing their best. And we survived.

Not sure how the heart thing got missed, she knows the symptoms because she has the same.

At the time she didn’t realise it was genetic so didn’t link the two, she just thought I would grow out of it, and to be far I did stop going blue. She has said that the midwife at weigh-ins always use to tell her she was overdressing me in summer (coat, booties etc) and she would have to explain it was to stop my feet going blue so healthcare professionals must also have been a bit pants not to follow it up.

I remember her commenting that I didn’t run round ‘like children should’, though more in a stop been lazy sort of way as appose to looking into why I wasn’t able to.

It doesn't matter about any of that stuff though now. It was was it was. You may have had a better or worse childhood if you had been born to someone else or in a different time or place. People who had better childhoods will tell you that yours was awful, other people would be reading that and wishing they had a childhood like yours.

You have the power to be the adult you want to be. Whether your mum looks after your child depends on how she is now and not how she was then. Circumstances change, people change, culture and technology change.

Sounds almost identical to my childhood in the 90s too. I idolised my mum but on reflection it wasn't great

Never had breakfast or lunch, unless I said I was hungry or got old enough to do it myself

Never fruit in the house

The vast majority of what we ate was oven food, or tin of soup and bread

No car seats either

The uniform thing - mine would often by scruffy/dirty still by Monday

My mum never did my homework with me, or checked I'd done it

Could never afford my school trips, or nice clothes - but smoked 40 fags a day and she and my dad would get through a bottle or two of whiskey a week

She never once read me a bed time story

But for all of this, there was a million things she did brilliantly and I never once felt hard done by or 'neglected.'

Child car seats and seat belts were widely available in the 70s, I used them for DS.
Breakfast was served regularly here, it was often porridge, nothing fancy.

In the 70s & 80s smoking was widespread, smokers were in the majority, and saw it as their "right" but by the 90s things were starting to change very.slowly, smoking at home was still the norm though.

It sounds as though your Mum was a bit lazy and not well organised, usually putting her own needs before those of her children. She could have got a job if she'd wanted to, but more fun to go to college!

I was born early 80's and recognise a lot of this.
Not working: Before tax credits, it could be very hard to move off of benefits into work, especially for lone parents. The cost of childcare could easily have been more than the job paid.
Clothes: Were more expensive. Primark and clothes in supermarkets weren't a thing.
Car seats and smoking: people were much less concerned about these things than we are today.
It does sound like your Mum was a bit disorganised--but some of it is the times.

Who remembers Tufty the squirelly and Green cross code man - they were all efforts to improve road safety about crossing roads but also in car safety - My Dad was a Road Safety Officer in the 70s, we all wore seatbelts had boosters and never were allowed to go in the boot etc.

I was the eldest of 6 and we were not quite dirt poor but had to often stuff newspapers in shoes and wait for payday or wear wellies to school instead of shoes. BUT we always had breakfast, were fed plain but cooked from scratch food (couldn't afford ready made and no microwave till late 80s maybe even early 90s) I remember the novelty of the Vesta Curry with added raisins.

Mum stayed home after I was about 4 and sister1 was 2 she did nightshifts before then and swapped with Dad not sure how thy managed it as she didn't drive and we lived miles from a hospital.

I think there was a level of neglect in what you are saying but it wasn't that far from what others would have been doing and there is always variance around the norm

oh yes I had a Tufty,,, but I picked all his weird foam off , leaving just a bit of wire for his tail.
then I dropped him in the blue john caverns.

AdaColeman It only became legal for new cars to have rear seatbelts fitted in 1986. So there were plenty of older cars in the early 90s that did not have rear seat belts. Before then it was an optional extra when you bought a new car.

Who remembers Tufty the squirelly and Green cross code man

For a house point, what famous character did the Green Cross Man become?

Im not sure about the work thing, as people say childcare could have cost more than potential earnings and i think it's fair enough to want to attend some special interest courses. However the other things sound a bit neglectful to me although i think being a single mother must be hard but washing clothes etc isn't that difficult.

"For a house point, what famous character did the Green Cross Man become?"

I know! I know! It's Darth Vader!

Not sure if childcare was subsidised by wftc in the entire 90's.
My mum was a lp in the 80s and there was no help. She used a minder (She paid in full)for my little sister then i would collect her and heat dinner (i was at high school).

I didn't tell anyone she was an lp, everyone else had 2 parents with money.

She did amazingly given the shit circumstances and no help from my dad.

Cut your Mum some slack. Parenting is hard. Lone parenting must be extremely tough.

No breakfast, unwashed clothes , lack of medical care for a blue baby/ breathless child , waiting in the shed/garden after school and lack of car seats sounds like neglect to me .
Car seats have been a thing since the late 80’s . I say this as a midwife and health visitor . A lot of people smoked around kids in the 90’s . It seemed to be more accepted then .
Do you think your DM may have suffered from depression ?