To ask if anyone else's parents sort of stopped parenting them as a young teen?

[HennyPennyHorror]

I love my Mum a lot...she's in failing health now and my Dad died when I was in my 20s....over 20 years ago.

My own DD is 14 now which was a very hard age for me and I keep reflecting on my own childhood. I had a happy one in the main....not a lot of "stuff" but a holiday once a year, siblings and many happy memories.

But when I hit 14, my Mum just almost totally stopped providing for me. I remember having barely any clothes for example and my only pocket money came from my Nan (Dad's mum).

I get emotional thinking about it. It didn't really improve at all and by the time I was 16 I was expected to pay for all of everything for myself. Well really from 14...but I just couldn't at that age due to not earning a lot at my Saturday job.

I had times with no sanitary wear....one pair of shoes with holes...all my siblings were much older and had left home at this age...14....so I was alone. My Dad was wonderful but worked very long hours and I couldn't ask him for clothes...we didn't have that sort of relationship. Mum worked too so money wasn't an issue.

Why did she do this? I suspect she didn't have a great childhood herself and the weird thing is that I know she did and does love me very much.

Sorry it's a bit much reading that but yeah was a shit shit childhood and yet my parents say now we didn't do to bad you've all grown up well. I have bad anxiety and don't like being on my own really but I get on and do have loads of good days. I sort of feel sorry for my parents In a way I have no idea why though. They both drink heavily and just basically dragged us up

@anitagreen

These stories are so sad. My DM could be rather oblivious at times and wrapped up in her own activities but she was always there to talk if needed and basics were always provided. I'm shocked at the stories of families who had money but let their teens walk to school with broken shoes, didn't buy them any clothes after age 14 etc. I'm all for independence/resilience (and I do think part-time jobs are good for older teens) but there has to be a balance. A 14-16 yr old still needs a lot of help and guidance IMO.

Emotional support is extremely important at those ages I think, there's so much potential for things to go wrong. I knew lots of kids with EDs, self harm issues, MH problems etc etc. They all needed help and support from family.

My Nana was great though she still is now she phones me daily to talk and her and my granddad adore the kids and spoil them which is lovely , but they are getting on now at 76 & 79 and it terrifys me to think one day they will be gone their like a proper set of parents to me

This thread has made me cry. As I posted earlier i was lucky it was lack of emotional care in my case, not physical care, so we nevertheless talk about anything important, or difficult without anger and nasty comments. Lack of communication after my dear grandfather died caused the harm to me, and my dm being so incredibly self absorbed sNow my dm wonders why I am distant with her, but I can’t be any different. I wonder how my life would have been if my darling grandfather hadn’t died when I was at such a vulnerable age.

Yes I felt a bit like this in my teenage years. It made me appear independent whereas actually I didn’t have a clue how to look after myself. I think it was an extension of the ‘benign neglect’ of my childhood which was quite freeing and made for a happy childhood but as a teen I needed more. My siblings were older, not sure if that makes a difference. I have this thing where my DC always have to have enough pants/socks, the right coat on etc!

Yes some awful stories but some where I just sounds like the parents were overwhelmed and had little resources. Parents are human too. Still some sad tales on here all the same. Not being goady it's called an opinion. Not having a full drawer of shoes like your wealthier friends doesn't mean you are being neglected.

I can relate to so much of this. Lifts was such a big thing, they were big drinkers and really resented me asking to be taken somewhere. After 8pm was a no, mum would offer to walk me there instead 🙄 no thanks. We lived in a village/edge of a small town with no close public transport.

She gave me a pack of sanitary towels ready for when I started my periods. But then used them herself when she ran out and never replaced them. When I started she made me go to the corner shop myself to buy some more as she said it was too embarrassing and I was now old enough to deal with it.

Clothes were birthday and Christmas gifts, I still don't think of them as essentials which explains the state of my underwear drawer/lack of socks.

When I was about 10 I had a row with my dad, no doubt because he was being a drunk arsehole. She came to find me and told me the reason we didn't get on was because I reminded him of his ex wife - opinionated and always had to be right. I should just agree with him. Doubt she remembers that and would deny it happened anyway.

I was regularly/daily told I moaned constantly, was a negative person, thought I was better than everyone else.

Have since moved away and cut nearly all contact with school friends.

I'm not even sure how bad these things are. Sometimes I think it was normal, but then my boyfriend will tell me it was not.

A book someone recommended on another thread: Adult Children of Immature parents. Except I have found it so hard to read...

It's taken me years to realise that my parents basically stopped parenting me when I was about 12. I 3was that child who was always out and about way after bedtime. My hair was a mess, I was never dressed properly because no one helped me find my clothes, always looked scruffy. I am obsessed with my appearance now.

I remember being sexually assaulted by a much older man. I was 11. I told my mother and she just turned away and didn't say anything .

I loved her very much and miss her terribly- as a person- but would love to be able to ask her now What the FUCK she was thinking.

My dm seemed really cool at the time as she would buy me and my friends alcohol and let my friends smoke. This was probably from age 13. I have my own 13 year old now and I am horrified. I would never do this. She seemed in hindsight to just give up parenting me at this age in fact she would buy us alcohol and we would stay in and babysit my younger db at this age. We now have a very strained relationship as I have realised how dire my upbringing really was.

From age 15 I was just expected to manage on my own. Basic meals at home & I was given a few pounds a week but I had to buy ALL my own clothes, toiletries plus pay for anything else I wanted to do. I looked a total mess, I have curly hair that needs a lot of attention but I didn't have a clue. My dm's view was to say "well nobody's looking at you" which has led to a few issues over the years. As pp have said, as my own dds have reached 15 I just can't believe how harshly we were treated. I clearly remember f telling my older dsis to never phone him for a lift ever as he wouldn't ever do it. Anything they were expected to attend for school was mocked & ridiculed. I was on a YTS after school but had to give them half the money whilst still paying for everything myself. They had money, we weren't poor at all. There was no arguing with them, we wouldn't have dared. They could be completely unreasonable & I would NEVER treat my dds that way. My f was particularly cutting & unkind. They saw themselves as more intelligent than everyone else & it was truly awful and embarrassing at times. I spent a lot of time with my best friend who's dm had no money to spare but made me feel so welcome. LC now with dm, see her to keep dsis happy. She's still trying to please them 35 years later. Try v hard to have nothing whatsoever to do with f & absolutely dreading them needing care. Thoughts for everyone on here today, it's bought back quite a lot.

To pp yes we had money too, but nobody gave a shit. I can see how some less interested and invested parents let it happen. Re sanitary towels etc my family could definitely afford them, but there was no attention to my needs. I’d ask for money and my mum would say, quite correctly, that she’d have to go to the bank. My kids now I constantly go through their pants and socks and get rid of holey ones and order new, even that is a bit of a chore, same goes for their millions of clubs - of course I don’t WANT to go out in the rain and dark to pick them up from bloody creative writing. But I do it. I pick them up with an umbrella and a flask of hot chocolate and tell them they’re doing so well and hold their hands walking home. I also make sure they have raincoats and waterproof footwear and lovely gloves and cosy hats for winter. In the winter it feels like every few days someone loses a glove or scarf or something and of course I groan at the thought of having to get another, but it gets done ASAP. My mum just... didn’t, and my dad was best at arms length and did none of that type of stuff anyway. More of a source of madness, fun, money, and the occasional McDonalds.

Mopping up the tears of sobbing, distressed child costs nothing. Hugging a child costs nothing. Saying "I love you" costs nothing. Showing interest in their education and feelings and development costs nothing. Well, other than an ounce of empathy and a smidgen of humanity, of course.

There's a world of difference between struggling to provide for your children because of your straitened financial circumstances while still giving them love and warmth and care and support, and failing to provide the basics because you just can't be bothered and your children just don't matter. There's also a world of difference between having a drawerful of shoes and loving parents, and having a drawerful of shoes but parents who are too cold, uncaring and selfish to attend to your basic emotional welfare.

Neglect comes in all forms. Emotional neglect leaves invisible scars - nothing visible you can point to, like a bruise or a black eye - but scars nonetheless.

For the benefit of any doubters, that's what this thread is about. And if you still don't understand, consider yourself one of the lucky ones.

As much as reading these stories makes me sad, I am happy OP started this thread. I have wondered so many times in my life if I was BU for resenting my parents for this and if others from middle class families experienced this unneccesairy kind of neglect too. Now I see I am not alone and I am also not the only one being obsessed over appearance as a result of this kind of abuse. for everyone here who has been trough the same.

I remember having to "buy" bigger school uniform, hockey boots etc from the lost property that they would sell off at the end of every year asmy parents never seemed to bother - despite my mother getting a haircut and massage every Saturday so not short of money, and she always had new clothes herself.
I had absolutely no input into careers or further education and just took myself off on my own to university interviews, and got myself to my halls all on my own. I actually cried when I got there and realised that everyone else had had family drop them off.
It wasn't that they couldn't afford anything, they just didn't care. Silly things like never going to a parent's evening ever. Never checking if my PE kit needed washing, never letting me do anything after school as it would involve them having to pick up / drop off etc. Ditto parties. I had one birthday party when I was 6. Then another when I was 18 and I was allowed 3 friends round to the house but they had to be gone by 10.30. 3.....
FFS.

If I try to talk to my mother about it she just cries, or denies it, or mentions the fact she paid for a private school. And what long hours she worked. Yeah but private school is shit when you are stealing uniform from lost property and never allowed friends because that would take effort....

Not having a full drawer of shoes like your wealthier friends doesn't mean you are being neglected.
Hey, that's my friend's drawer :) Couple of points: a) they were not actually wealthier, I just presumed that - in fact "we" were just as well off, if not more so; I just had 1 pair of shoes while my friend had e.g. summer and winter shoes, sports shoes etc. And b) I didn't say I was neglected: I said I was lucky compared with other people on the thread.

I was allowed one bath a week and my hair was absolutely disgusting and saturated with grease by the time it came round. I smelled too but there was nothing I could do about it. There was a boiler with limited hot water and my Mum got that and no way on earth would it be switched on again to refill.

Clothes were Christmas presents. When I started working full time I bought my own but my Mum would take them and wear them and I never got them back. On occasion she screamed at me for being so extravagant and buying too many tops - two jumpers - then took them herself after a few weeks.

I did the majority of the housework and was looking after my younger sister all day during the school holidays from the age of 9. Babysitting to the early hours once or twice a week.

No help to access FE but told how useless I was when I failed all my GCSEs and had to get a job.

I just remember feeling disliked. Like an irritant. Total family punch bag when anything went wrong. My Dad could barely look at me. He read my diary when I was sixteen where I described some of this stuff then he told my Mum and no one in the family addressed a word to me for four months. Not one word.

I do overcompensate with my kids but they're not spoilt, they say thank you and hug me and show gratitude for every thing I do or get for them. I told my dd once that I had never had any help with homework and that I always wanted to help her because I know how hard it is and how you just want to give up when you can't understand. They know some of what went on in my childhood and my dd gave me a massive tight hug when I was describing something not particularly shocking to her. She just couldn't understand it. Neither of my children are bothered about their grand parents, which is just as well because their negativity towards me was trickling onto my kids and I had to go NC in the end.

I read some of the threads on here about ensuring your children are independent and a lot of it rings true but there's always several posters on those threads who remind me so much of my parents and I do think some who bang on about independence go too far and use it as an excuse to be shitty to their children because they resent them.

I was brought up in a relatively affluent household but I had no idea even though I lived in a big property. It was like I was a poor kid. Really odd. My brother was very much favoured - I am the scapegoat - and my father lived vicariously through my elder brother. My mother says we had exactly the same childhood and cannot understand my pain.

My mother colluded with the violence, vile teasing and sexualised abuse from my brother, which goes way past the norm and has rewritten history. I apparently bullied this older, stronger male brother.

She only begrudgingly bought me one bra - apparently I didn’t need it. My mother also didn’t have many clothes herself and reckons we didn’t have enough money. I know this is complete bullshit she just cow towed to my father, who didn’t see the value in things unless it was to make money, boys toys or animals - supposedly his hobby etc.

There was also no value put on our education even though my mother went to an elite school therefore we were left to go to the local failing school and unsurprisingly I did not flourish. I spent most of my life holed up in my bedroom with the few books I had been bought and passed to me from adults. I had a love of reading but had such little self awareness and awareness of life that didn’t think to go to the library. I wouldn’t have dared go in there anyway as an unaccompanied child until I was doing my A levels as I didn’t know I was allowed. And when I did it was a frightening experience. The shame of not knowing how a library worked. The shame of asking for help etc. This shame was replicated in many many areas.

I’ve had plenty of therapy. I overbuy on everything. I panic if I don’t have enough clothes for my dd or enough food or anything really. And as a result my shoes / clothes buying for dd and me has spiralled. I have already bought Sanpro for my dd in case. She’s 10. I was expected to wear my mothers loop / belt sanitary wear. My friend took me to the shops and she showed me to buy some stick on towels. I can’t remember if my mother bought me any thereafter.

I don’t remember getting any kind of advice from either parent. I never felt loved or cherished and didn’t know the concept of unconditional love until well into adulthood.

I was fed and most of my basic needs met. So I was more fortunate than many of the sad tales above.

I'd always thought my parents were great but when I had my own children I realised that actually its a bit odd to send your 6 and 4 year olds off the day with no supervision (even in the 1980s) or leave us home alone while they worked.

I was the oldest, I had a brother 18 months younger and two more siblings with a big gap (12 years between me and youngest) so there were two little ones needing physical attention, my brother was in hospital for a long time and I could more or less look after myself. Both my parents worked full time, but my dad managed to spend 000,000s on his hobby and took the view that he worked hard so was entitled to come home and park his arse on the sofa and stay there. He was totally disengaged. Mum tried, up to a point, but preferred the benign neglect approach and always had something else to do. I could more or less cope, particularly after I started PT work when I was 16.

My daughter has just started secondary which is a point when I just couldn't cope. My evil abusive narcissistic grandmother had homeschooled me and my brother to try and get us into grammar school - it worked, but I had never mixed with other children. It was like coming out of a religious cult. I was weird and bullied and bullied about my parents being weird. I hated it. School kept trying to meet mum but I don't think she turned up often...

She was much more engaged with the youngest two.

I give my dd a hug every morning and say words so she knows how special and precious she is.

My mum was a fucking pain and my dad just did anything for a quiet life. I’d be here all day if I started in about my teen years.

If mum told dad to beat us he did. If mum told dad to do x dad would do x. My mother does not say sorry, ever, and however hard you try and she doesn’t it’s never her fault. My parents are racist, homophobic and god knows what else. My mum is a raging misogynist, everything a man does to a woman is the woman’s fault, even when it’s her own daughters. She knows exactly what she’d have done in that situation despite never having been in it. She’s had three lengthy affairs to my knowledge, including with my primary school teacher, yet she calls my sister a ‘hot arse’ amongst other delightful names. My dad would call my sister a slag, he called me fat and ugly. They’re just bloody hard work. I keep up the pretence but gave up any emotional engagement years ago, but not as many years ago as they did.

Materially they provided for us well enough, but emotionally they were inept, worse than inept.Both me and my sister ended up with awful husbands and I’m not even straight. I got out and came out and haven’t looked back but she continues to go from one arsehole to the next. The worst thing is now I see her raising her daughter to be exactly the same, where as her brother is a whinging little shit who does as he pleases while being mollycoddled and indulged.

More and more repressed memories are being brought out whilst reading this thread.
I need to get a copy of the book mentioned up thread. One of the hardest parts was deciding what I wanted to do with my life with absolutely no help and guidance, there was very much a just do whatever attitude but then if I stopped getting straight A’s I was somehow a failure and I was going to fuck up my life. Very much reaction parenting. How one is expected to get good grades with such a horrible home life I don’t know. The expectation was that I would look after younger siblings and used as a scapegoat for anything they did wrong. I tried so hard to please it was never enough, so I ended up going off the rails for a bit, pretty much fucked my own chances up and then built up to where I am now from scratch after I got kicked out of 6th form.

I was always compared to other people’s kids, DM still does this today. They were always better, less lazier, clever, prettier (that was my DF). They stopped once I was old enough to call them out on it but I still get ‘so and so’s life turned out better as she is more blessed than you’ ‘so and so just has it all, unlike us/dealt a bad hand’ etc. etc.