To ask were you smacked by your parents as a child, and do you forgive them now?

[blubberball]

I was smacked by my parents as a child. Sometimes they would completely lose their shit and smack me over and over, whilst shouting at me. Each syllable would be a smack. I remember wanting my dm to stop talking, so that she would stop hitting me. I remember being in the street and my dm taking a swing at my arse, and I managed to move to dodge it.

I guess it stopped at the "appropriate" age. 10 or something.

I have never smacked my dc, and would use time outs to discipline them. My parents moved with the times and followed my lead. I forgive them, and they are very loving and supportive now. It's strange to think that happened now.

I apparently was smacked, don't really remember or care. My mum said it didn't work so she stopped doing it.

Op you're describing abuse by an out of control parent. I don't agree with snacking but I don't think the odd smack by an otherwise loving and calm carer matters too much. That's not what your parents did.

@gingersausage 👍

If my mum had a bad day at the office or money problems or PMT or any damn thing then ‘smacking’ became an excuse to vent her anger and frustration on us. I put up with it at the time because that’s how things were back then - kids were hit. We lived in a state of terror as to what would trigger her next. Looking back I can see it went beyond discipline and I resent it bitterly. I do a lot for her now out of fear, obligation and guilt. I feel sorry for her because she is a bitter, lonely, unhappy old woman but I don’t like her or love her. I don’t know if I’ll regret this when she’s dead but at the moment I can’t imagine it.

I’m aware that sounds harsh. It’s not something I would ever say out loud but if I can’t be honest on an anonymous forum, there’s not much point in saying anything at all.

When I was a parent I smacked my DC (two of them), a total of three times. I regret every time bitterly and hope they do better than me.

I guess all of you pro-hitting are also totally for domestic abuse. I don't see the difference in hitting your child to teach them not to be naughty and hitting your wife to teach her not to step out of line.

The stories of us who were hit out of rage makes me sad, there is no lesson there, this is done for the parents benefit and to release their rage, not to teach.

I was smacked by my dad when I'd be going mental in the back of the car on long journeys. Mam never smacked me. I was never frightened as it was a last resort for him. I was a nightmare and I hated the long journeys.

I don't intend on smacking DS ever as I hope to do better than my parents. Just because I'm ok and wasn't emotionally harmed by being smacked doesn't mean that it was a good way of dealing with my behaviour.

I was, but never more than a quick tap.

Nothing to forgive, my parents did their best and like everyone else are products of their time. Obviously I wouldn’t do it myself, but the world has moved on.

I was smacked. (I'm mid forties). I never give it a second thought to be honest. My childhood was shit and dysfunctional and toxic, but not because of the smacking.

I have 2 children, one I've smacked a few times and the other twice in her life. I am actually against smacking, I recognise that any smacking I did was me losing control. It solves snothing. Doesn't mean I haven't messed up and done it from time to time.

We all do our best (well, most of us). Sometimes our best is below par.

I was smacked as a child. I recall a lot of anger in my childhood. My parents are wonderful now, but I find it very difficult to correlate how they are now with how they were when I was younger. My sister feels the same.

Do I forgive them? Honestly, I don't know.

Just thinking about different forms of discipline. A mum I know makes her 2yo face the wall if he does anything she deems naughty (normal 2yo stuff).
I actually am more uneasy about that than I was about seeing the same child's granny lightly smack his hand away when he was pulling a toy off another toddler.

There is a difference, even back then, between the use of light 'smack' occasionally, and full strength hitting of a child on a daily basis.

We were smacked all the time, pretty much every day, for whatever trivial transgressions we made.
I suspect those of you who think it was OK were probably only smacked a few times a year when you were seriously out of order.

My dad never smacked me but my mum did, frequently. I remember a moment - I was probably about 11/12 - when she went to smack me and then stopped herself. I was about the same size as her by that point. I remember thinking 'you bloody coward, you'll only smack a smaller person', and that really affected me. I wouldn't say that I need to 'forgive' her as such, but I do remember that moment and that feeling, and not in a good way.

Only twice. Once when I didn't look after my little sister and she fell off a high wall. It was a reaction smack out of shock. And the second when I played truant and my mum felt she had to. She said this will hurt me more than you, and she meant it. Neither parent shouted at us.

I've done the odd light tap on the bottom, but no, I don't smack my DCs as a rule. I don't shout much either. DS has adhd so he can be very challenging, but I usually keep it together.

Hitting children is counter productive. That's so obvious.

I cant remember being smacked, I do remember my mum hitting me with a hairbrush, the once.

I am guessing she was having a bad morning and I was being a real shit, she did it, looked totally shocked, I remember she was as white as a sheet.She walked out the room, came back after (what felt like) ages and apologised, made sure I was alright, I remember her saying she was having a bad morning but that was no excuse to hit anyone and it was unforgivable.

My parents had different methods, my dad was very shouty, you knew he was angry when he went quiet, my mum was very calm when she shouted you hid. I remember being put into time outs (in the 80s)

Actually, this thread is making me feel a bit sick just reading it. Takes my right back to how I felt as a kid. So I'm off!!.

I was smacked by both parents as a child in the 90s, usually with a hand but sometimes with objects such as a plastic stick (which was kept on top of the cupboard especially for when we were naughty) or items my parents had to hand, I remember my Mum hitting me across the back of the legs with a wooden chopping board for example or my Dad would hit us over the head with a serving spoon if we talked too much at the dinner table. It was often done in temper and without warning. Sometimes it was a single snack, sometimes I was put over a knee or made to bend over and smacked repeatedly. Trousers would often be pulled down so I was smacked on my bare bottom and it was humiliating as well as painful.

I don’t feel it was a reasonable punishment and didn’t at the time; often I was smacked as a consequence if I’d gotten into a physical fight with a sibling. The irony of smacking someone to punish them for hitting somebody else wasn’t lost on me.

In all other ways my parents did their best to give their children a nice childhood; we had days out and holidays and plenty of toys but the way we were punished when my parents lost their tempers was frightening and humiliating. As well as hitting our mouths were literally washed out by forcing bars of soap on our mouths, my Mum would often get in the car and drive away and say she was leaving home when she was fed up of us and I had threats of being put into care as well and sometimes fake phone calls to social services. We were just normal children, we were not awful or out of control.

I have somewhat forgiven my parents for all of this, certainly I can forgive the moments we were hit in temper. I find the premeditated hitting and the stick kept on the cupboard specifically for threatening and hitting us harder to forgive. Very very few of my friends were hit as children so I don’t believe this was common parenting practice in the 90s.

I have struggled with my mental health since my teens and I do believe it is in part as a result of my childhood which beneath the surface was often unpredictable and frightening due to my parents tempers and the physical violence I was treated with. I would never ever plan to hit my children and if I ever hit them in temper I would seek help immediately to ensure it didn’t happen again.

I was smacked often until about the age of 10. Only by my mother, though. She always left a hand print on my leg/backside which took ages to fade - I remember being quite fascinated by the perfect marks she left as I examined them after being sent to my bedroom.

Yes and the problem is not that I grew up terrified of my father, but that I thought it was normal to hit people smaller than yourself, which to my eternal shame I did when I was four. I genuinely will never forget this and it plays on my mind every week over 50 years later. That single act shaped a sense of guilt and horror at myself that has lasted pretty much a lifetime in spite of the fact that I know I am a loving and kind person who was very young and was doing what she had learned was normal in the environment she was in.

@TheLowry

Same. I don't know why I click on them really.

Some posts on this thread are so depressing.

"They brought me up properly"
"They disciplined me appropriately"
"I deserved it"

So, so many ways of disciplining a child without need to resort to physical violence.

No, smacking a child isn’t acceptable it’s bullying and abuse.

I was smacked as a child, with slippers, across the face. It’s a form of abuse and was wrong and no I don’t forgive my mother.

I dont think forgive is the right terminology 🤔

I don't hold anything against my dad, he only smacked me once though.

I’m NC with my mum (for other reasons), but she was completely unreasonable on punishment and smacked a lot. For the most ridiculous things. I have not let that go.

Mine smacked me. Nineties kid, wasn't the case with most of my friends, though a couple were smacked.

Dad loudly extolled the virtues of smacking to all our relatives, proudly proclaiming that if he said jump we'd say (and wait for us to respond), 'How high?'

They've not looked after my daughter yet, because 'You were smacked much less frequently when you were over two.' I remember being hit quite a lot, so who knows how often I got smacked as a toddler! It has left me with a complete deference to authority and a total inability to challenge rules. I think it was overkill tbh- I'm not a defiant personality and was never likely to go off the rails. DH was never smacked and is far more confident in his own judgement than I am in mine.

No wonder there are so many awful, disrespectful, disobedient children and young criminal adults these days if so many parents either don't believe in spanking their kids, or are doing it the wrong way. How depressing.

Having said that, what the OP describes is awful.

I dont remember being smacked. I probably was because I was scared of the threat, but dont have any memory of being smacked or fearing my parents. Although I look around sometimes at some brats and think they deserve a good bloody hiding.