Did they get a night off

[Blueblueyellow]

I'm 32 my eldest sibling is 40,in all those 40 years my parents never had a night out. My OH can't belive this. We were poor and to me this is normal. Aibu or did your parents have a "night off".

As a kid in the 60s/70s, I remember being taken to see Sound of Music, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Oliver at the cinema, then one pantomime as well.

My Dad played golf and went to the clubhouse every saturday night, but my Mum and us kids just stayed at home most of the time. We did have a good childhood though.

I suspect that in those days men controlled the family finances as most women did not work.

Mine went to the work's do at Christmas and then to parties at the neighbours or out to PTA fundraiser type things maybe 3 or so times a year. There was a flurry of parties for a few years when their friends were turning 40. We had a babysitter. She used to let us come down and play board games once mum and dad had gone out.
I used to go to my nana and grandad's quite a bit. They went to the social club every single night. Sometimes I'd go or sometimes my uncle who was then in his late teens /early 20s would babysit and fill the house with his friends and music.

I wonder what age/generation the parents who either didn't go out or socialised separately are?
Clearly for lots it seems socialising or having any time away from children wasn't important

I was a young child in the 80s. I remember that someone was babysitting us when I was about 3 and our dog died.

My mam & dad split up when I was very young - the night they split for good they'd been out and came home drunk and arguing. After that, my big sister l had to spend every weekend with my dad so my mam had the Saturday night "off". She worked in a pub though so she wasn't off out drinking.

When my mam and step-dad had my younger siblings I don't think they had a night "off" for a while, until they were a bit older and then they got babysitters in - I remember her complaining that the babysitter kept running up the phone bill and hid the phone in my bed!

When my big sister and I were teens, we were the babysitters and unofficial childminders. I hated it, especially when my big sister left home at 17 and I was trapped in the house every weekend, bank holiday and New Year's Eve between the ages of 15-25 (because when nephews and nieces came along I was kind of expected to babysit them until I blew up and refused one night).

Now I have my own children I rarely get the night off because no fucker is willing to bloody look after them and that stings. I now point blank refuse to do any childcare for my siblings' kids (they're quite a bit older than mine, but still either at the age where they need looking after (late primary school) or have additional needs where they're not able to be left alone) because I got sick of them taking the piss.

Mine went out every Thursday and Saturday night together once I was about 12 onwards. Just to the pub to meet friends. Same on Bank holidays.

I forgot to add that in the weekends when my sister and I were at my dad's, who was/is an alcoholic, he used to go out, leaving us on our own, until he came back absolutely pissed in the early hours of the morning. He'd then spend the morning hung over so we had to be quiet (sometimes we'd just go out, by ourselves, to the park down the street even though it was completely wrecked and full of broken glass and God knows what else) until we walked the 4 miles to my nan's where, again, we had to be quiet because she was old and didn't like noise.

I thought all this was normal until I had interpersonal therapy for depression after my youngest was born and I mentioned it as an aside. The therapist said something about me, as a 6 year old little girl, being left alone, scared and worried about her dad and having so much responsibility, and I just burst into tears! I had no idea how much it upset me!

We need to talk about goat club cmot!
Come back!

When my parents were together they went out every weekend and we stayed at GPs. When they weren’t together my dad took us out on Saturday nights and mum went to work at a pub on Fridays (but stayed out till god knows when) and we’d stay at GPs. After my dad died we continued staying at GPs at weekends and other people’s houses midweek so that mum could work. So while she wasn’t out out, the pub closed at 12 and she’d be home by 6.

All in all it was a steaming pile of shit and the only constant stability in my life were my GPs.

What an interesting thread, I also never had a babysitter but I had heard of them and wondered what it would be like. My parents only went out together once, and my grandma looked after us. Since we've grown up and left home my parents have maintained their once a decade schedule for going out, so it was nothing to do with us, they just don't like going out or have now where to go.

Placemarking purely for Goat updates

Goat club is just as it says on the tin really! At one point my dad was a member of: The British Goat Society, two breed specific clubs, the Chilterns goat society, a Berks Bucks and Oxon one and there might have been another local one as well.
I have very fond memories of all the characters at these (we saw a lot of the same people during the summer show season) as they ranged from newly moved from London for a new life in the country to proper old school country types like the one who got a caution for drunk driving a shire horse and cart

I am so happy that it wasn't a typo

@CMOTDibbler as pp said, so happy that it was not a typo - I want to go to goat club.

That sounds amazing cmot, who knew there were so many societies for goat owners?

CMOT did he own a goat? Was there a criteria to join?

Mine never did, but they were weirdly antisocial and took a perverse kind of pride in the fact they had no life.

All my friends parents went out regularly, at least once a month. Some were very broke, but they babysat/organised sleepovers amongst each other and did cheap activities.

Anyway, I'm mid forties, my parents never went out as a couple when I was a child. When I was small there were lots of power cuts, and strikes, my parents were very poor and they worked very long hours, sometimes my father worked away. We did have babysitters sometimes, but they were so my mum could work in the evenings (she worked at a night school at one point). DH's mum was a single parent from him being tiny, so she never got to go out other than to go to work . Her parents died pretty young so she had no help with child care etc and money was very tight.

DH and I rarely go out as a couple either, probably more linked to the patterns of our childhoods than cost of babysitting.

I've just skim read the whole thread just to find out about goat club.

My parents were always out, usually at different times so babysitters were rare, although I wound sleep at my grandparents and was left alone from reasonably young. Come to think of it, I'm not sure my parents ever spent and evening at home together.

Interesting question. No, I can't recall them going out together alone.

We always did things as a family. Never had a babysitter. Evening meal was always at the exact same time and everyone sat at the table.

We played lots of board games, did things outside in the garden, etc.

We did take a lot of holidays each year as a family.

When my mum learned how to drive she would take us out shopping. :)

Didn't have fast food until I was a teen.

I don't know if you had to have a goat to join tbh, but everyone did. Dad started with one goat when I was 9, and must have had 20 or more at the most. All Saanen or British Saanens (white, short haired apart from males), and we had a lot of milk, cream and butter! Mum was awful at making yogurt and cheese so we'd swap for other peoples cheese. Dad would buy triplet lambs and young calves and piglets, and I'd raise them on spare milk till they filled the freezer. One of the goat club people was good at food smoking so that would be exchanged for some skill or produce

This is my dad at a goat club show

I love goats. I think they're lovely animals.

My elderly MIL still mourns the pet goat she had as a child who jumped over a fence and got caught on the fence and died

Mine never went out and we havent been out together without the kids since we married, if you count going to our own wedding as a date!

We even took all 4 kids on honeymoon with us!

We did have a pet goat as kids though 😂

My parents used to go out (I'm early 40's). I remember Mum going off to keep fit or Tupperware parties (!) and leaving us with Dad. My Dad never really went out without her, but he's just never been very social.

As a couple, they often went out for meals, and my grandparents or uncles/aunties used to babysit. And I remember staying with grandparents while they went away for weekends.

I can't imagine never having a life outside of home or work. It doesn't sound very healthy!