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?

ShapelyBingoWing's post has struck a particular chord with me. 'Re-writing of history' so that mum feels better...

I know that mine did her best but her best really could have been better - but that's in my time now with what I know and what I have. I'm not in my mum's shoes with a gambler for a husband and constant stress about losing the house. That shaped her personality today, I'm sure of it.

As you say lljkk, I could have got up on my own and got breakfast, there was usually food in the house. Not always bread or milk (got shopping once a week, when it’s gone its gone) but generally something.

Obviously if we were saying we were hungry and she was refusing us food, I wouldn’t need to ask if that was bad parenting, but with our setup it’s not so clear cut, which is why I’m asking. Breakfast was just something we didn’t do, I don’t know when it stopped, I’m just saying 4/5 because that the earliest I can clearly remember. By then I thought it normal not to have it so presumably a while beforehand (if we ever had it), but I honestly don’t remember.

Maybe she thought if we were hungry we would have woken up and got something? I would get food out for a 4yo, or at the very least remind / ask if they had eaten, but maybe people didn’t back then and kids were just expected to be more independent?

The breakfast thing is so interesting to me. I mentioned earlier in the thread that I also was never given breakfast. My upbringing was in no way neglectful or abusive. We had plenty of money...we were fairly well off to be honest. We were well fed...My parents cooked me lovely meals. We just didn't have breakfast. I'd love to know why but both my parents are dead so can't ask them. It definitely set me up with bad eating habits though. I rarely eat breakfast now.

Though I always make sure my dc have a good breakfast. I wouldn't dream of sending them to school without breakfast, which makes me more shocked that my parents sent me to school everyday without being fed!

Oh and in answer to your question, mostly she was interested / involved in us, and like I said in some ways a great mum.

It was quite up and down, so she could be very intense with some things (eg. Decide I should do a brownie badge, and work on it every night for weeks) but at the same time ignore other area completely, like reading homework / not brushing teeth.

That was to lljkk, ^

Formerbabe – For years I didn’t see a problem with the breakfast thing either, it’s only since having DS that I realised there in no way I would do that. My eating habits are also all over the place, and I think my childhood plays a part in that. I eat most of my daily intake over a few hours (1.30-8.00) then have nothing for 17 hours and when I do eat I also have to fight the impulse to absolutely gorge.

My son was born in 94 I started work when he was 18months old when he was 3 I split with his dad i went to citizens advice for help and they told me I'd be better off if I gave up my job and claimed.benefits, I didn't but my parents and best friend looked after my son while I worked there was no help towards childcare, my friend was a single parents on benefits and could do lots of courses for free.

Formerbabe – For years I didn’t see a problem with the breakfast thing either, it’s only since having DS that I realised there in no way I would do that. My eating habits are also all over the place, and I think my childhood plays a part in that. I eat most of my daily intake over a few hours (1.30-8.00) then have nothing for 17 hours and when I do eat I also have to fight the impulse to absolutely gorge

I'm similar. I can go to about 3pm without eating then eat loads! I remember when I started secondary school, I put lots of weight on because there was a vending machine. I'd binge at morning break on chocolate as I was so hungry...no wonder as I had eaten nothing before school!

Lljkk- I can't believe I am having to explain this but it is a parent's responsibility to make sure their child does not go to school hungry!
Debates about whether a 5 yo is old enough to use toaster etc are a red herring.

My mum was a single parent in the 90s - I went to a childminder while she worked full time, everyone commented on how well turned out I was and how beautifully she dressed me and, although I remember a few times towards the end of the month when it was a choice between a tin of soup or baked beans for tea and we'd go round to Grandma's to get a 'proper dinner' because there was no money until payday, I never went hungry.

I stopped eating breakfast some time in secondary school and still don’t eat it now (I can’t eat straight after I get up, I usually eat something around 10-11am).

But there was always food in the house (I used to sit at the table and have a cup of tea, my brother always ate breakfast). And I wouldn’t dream of sending DS to nursery without breakfast. Even though he gets a second breakfast when he gets there (they only give them toast, he has cereal and yoghurt at home which has more nutritional value). I just see it as an indicator of decent parenting.

Why couldn't OP get own breakfast

Totally ridiculous and victim blaming. A young child may not even be aware they need breakfast or should be having it every day. These are life skills and habits we learn from our parents. A child wouldn't automatically be aware of such things.

My ds is 10...he'd happily skip breakfast if it was up to him, but I insist he eats something as I know he doesn't eat much lunch at school and will struggle if he misses breakfast. He also would forget to brush his teeth most mornings if I didn't remind him. Children really need their parents to help them with these sorts of things.

In answer to your question, yes standards were a lot lower in the 90s than they are now, but it was almost 30 years ago and I’m sure that in the 90s things were a lot better than they were in the 60s when our parents were growing up.

I was born in 1985 and my mum doesn’t drive and I remember going places with her, my sibling and her friend who also had 2 kids in her friends car so we mustn’t have been using seatbelts or car seats and I definitely remember travelling in the passenger footwell, my dad is a bit safety obsessed so I’m assuming he didn’t know about that! My mum also didn’t work and did a lot of (pointless) college courses but my parents are still together and my dad had an ok job so we were always provided for, but like you I do think if my mum had worked she and we would have been better off. I think a lot of my friends mums worked but I think mums not working might have been more common back then.
My parents did keep me pretty shielded from smoking so your mum did let you down there. We always had breakfast before school but I think plenty of kids didn’t and there definitely wasn’t the emphasis on healthy eating that there is now.

If your mum was working I can’t really see any excuse for you not having clean uniforms but a teacher friend of mine has told me that most kids have a weird smell by Wednesday because they don’t get bathed or change their clothes quite often enough.

Standards were a bit lower not a lot lower. Your children will be saying the same about your standards.

Seatbelts and car seats became the norm in the 80s but that said there was also squashing in as well at times, into foot wells and boots.

Not having breakfast before school was not normal. That’s not right. You must have been starving by lunchtime.

Am sure the "Clunk Click Every Trip" adverts must have got the message across to a large extent in the 1970s

For wearing seatbelts that is

The clunk click adverts only worked with some people. Lots of people still did not wear seatbelts until it became illegal not to, and older cars did not have them fitted in rear seats.

Breakfast? I didn’t have lunch at home until 1998. I honestly thought it was just a school thing.

Absolutely pissing myself laughing at a PP, suggesting there was no childcare in the 90's. Of course there was!

I had my kids in 1997 & 1998. They both attended private nurseries when I went back to work. They both had 15 hours free state nursery at some point. They both attended wrap around care at school (8am breakfast club). They both had baby carriers (that clipped on to a pram frame, when not in the car). They both had larger car seats for toddlers. They both had booster seats until they were about 10.

We are talking about the 1990's here, not the 1890's. Things were not very different (if at all) to now. We did not all walk around in hessian cloth, wearing clogs.

Oh, and we were not allowed to take the babies home from hospital, unless we had the required baby car seat. A midwife actually walked you to the car, and made sure it was all set up correctly. This was a normal NHS hospital in the Midlands. We also had the same Health Visitor home visits that you get now. And had to attend the GP for months and months, with a book that recorded growth etc.

1997 was very different to say 1991. In 1991 there was no regulation of childcare, I know I worked in it. There was no government subsidy, there was in many places few nursery places, and the quality of some of it was pretty terrible. Some places closed when standards were introduced as they could not meet them. Other places struggled to get up to standard.

Childcare provision varied by area too. Where I grew in the North there was one nursery, attached to the local school, with 30 morning places and 30 afternoon places for the year before Reception (so 3-4 year olds). If you didn't get a space, tough. There was absolutely zero wrap around provision, holiday provision, or after school provision. I know this because my mum needed to get a job and couldn't get any childcare, even our next door neighbour who was a childminder didn't know of anyone in the local area providing wrap around and holiday care for school aged children (she herself only minded preschool children from age 0-4). Mum wanted to take the job so at the grand old age of 11yo I became responsible for walking the four of us home from school three days a week, letting us into the house, and making sure no one died/was maimed/starved until mum and dad got home at 6pm. In school holidays I was responsible from 8am to 6pm three days a week, including making our sandwiches for lunch. We would ring mum at work umpteen times a day to complain about each other, ask permission to do things our siblings had refused to do ("mum says you HAVE TO get my bike out of the shed"), and to ask all the random questions kids ask. Luckily she had an understanding boss

The statement "childcare existed" doesn't wash because in some areas it really didn't exist.

The statement "childcare existed" doesn't wash because in some areas it really didn't exist. And even where it did exist, it was totally unsubsidised. Even with a well paid career, you could find the net contribution of your salary was less than £10pw once childcare costs were taken to account - if your future earnings didn't depend on an unbroken career, was it really worth continuing to work for 25p an hour?