Aibu to think this isn’t what happens to most people?

[TurnUpTurnip]

I was kicked out of home at 16, there was no reason for this, my mum did it with all of her children, once you turned 16 you were out and we weren’t allowed back in, she made us go down to the council and I was put in the most awful hostel. My flat was broken into weekly, they stole everything and I mean everything, even my lamp shades. There was a druggy living above me with his partner and it was him who kept doing it. Police and council wouldn’t help and I was left with it for 2 years, I would come home and my door would be kicked off and the flat ransacked. I ended up getting kicked out of the hostel and evicted because I ran up so much rent arrears as I wasn’t mature enough to be responsible for paying for bills, I was suffering from depression and barely left the flat so before I knew it I was in rent arrears (I was getting HB but I think they suspended the claim at one point) I mentioned now as an adult that I would never throw my children out and they will always have a place at my house but she seems to take great offence to this and maintains that what she did was right, she also says it’s normal and happens to most people. She said most people kick their kids out and if my son plays up she will say things like “and you’ve never going to kick him out when he’s older” 🙄

Nope, that's awful, your dm does not sound like a particularly nice parent.
I would never have kicked my DD out especially not at 16, I'd never have had a minutes peace, plus my Dd's welfare and happiness is paramount to me.
My DD left home to live with her boyfriend at 19 then moved back home at 21 and stayed until she was 30 (saving for a deposit)
She's now engaged, getting married next year & owns her own home but she's welcome back home anytime, I'm her safety net, she knows if anything were to happen she can come home.
Same with me, if anything happened with me, my mum would take me in.

Good god, no OP, not remotely normal. I don't know any mother who would allow their 16-year-old daughter to live in a hostel and be robbed regularly rather than give her a bed in her own home. It's quite disgusting actually.

My 23-year-old daughter is currently living at home because she finished her studies last week and isn't sure of her next step yet. We love having her here, it's her home.

It used to be more normal. In fact there was a comedian on TV within the last year joking about it. He said "I love my kids to bits but as soon as theyre 18 theyre out of the door, no looking back." It triggered me quite a bit.

My dad and all his siblings had this done to them in the 60s. They think very fondly of it and its taken me years of therapy to realise that the world was very VERY different then. My dad did the same to my brother in the 90s and he (of course) died.

Relatively recently I argued with a thread on here about kicking your kids (esp male distruptive ones) out at 18. In the thread most were in favour of kicking the son out.

@Embroidery

It used to be more normal. In fact there was a comedian on TV within the last year joking about it. He said "I love my kids to bits but as soon as theyre 18 theyre out of the door, no looking back." It triggered me quite a bit.

My dad and all his siblings had this done to them in the 60s. They think very fondly of it and its taken me years of therapy to realise that the world was very VERY different then. My dad did the same to my brother in the 90s and he (of course) died.

Relatively recently I argued with a thread on here about kicking your kids (esp male distruptive ones) out at 18. In the thread most were in favour of kicking the son out.

Kicking your kids out at age 18 is terrible for sure. But at least they're technically adults then. This post is about being kicked out at age 16 when they're still a child! This has to be illegal, surely!

I do know a few friends whose parents were like this but they were shit parents and it’s definitely not the norm.

My mum has always had severe MH issues resulting in pretty bad parenting at times but she’d have never kicked me out at 16.

I know of someone who was kicked out at 16.
The 16 year old was extremly disruptive at home and in a major conflict with a step parent and very young step siblings were involved.
The parent rented a bedsit (16 year old refused to live with the other parent) for the 16 year old. SS had no issues with this. 16 year old stayed on their own in the bedsit but had to attend school. Food was provided and costs were covered.

Kid ended up apologizing and moving back home eventually..their behaviour dramatically improved.

I was not extremely disruptive, my mum done it to all her kids (just making clear it wasn’t me singled out) happened to all of us, a lot of people have mentioned step dads but there was no men on the scene really, not like a step dad anyway, She had one boyfriend when I was growing up who did not live with us though and was an ok man.

Going against the grain a little here. In some socioeconomic situations I do think it's quite normal. I cringe writing this because it makes me very sad.

The same happened to me, my mum chucked me out not long after she stopped getting benefits for me, and I think some of it was- well what are you going to do? You're an adult now..
At that point it was, well I get housing benefit, child benefit, income support- for my KIDS. You have to stand on your own two feet now, out of my house.

I know that it was fairly common amongst my mothers friends to do.

I was absolutely petrified and alone at 16, and honestly as my own child grows older, the situation horrifies me more and more.

I would never do that to my child. I just couldn't.

I think it was quite common for my mums friends too that’s what makes me unsure whether it was “normal” but all of them were teen mums so it was seen as normal to get your own flat then, my sister was one and she had her own flat at 16 with her baby, but I wasn’t a teen mum and I was very immature, I hadn’t grown up and I think a baby forces a lot of young girls to grow up.

I think its sort of more expected that a teen mum will leave home, but I do find myself wondering how many of those teen mums might have wanted to have stayed home for a little while with their families for support- I appreciate that it's not always possible. But I also have seen a fair few amount of teenage mums who have stayed at home with their babies and had their mums there for support. I wouldn't say it was normal as a teenager, but again, as a mother, I couldn't imagine turfing my teenager out with a baby.

I'd not be assuming the child as my own, but I'd be there to support.

I didn't know anyone with parents in a similar financial situation to us who wasn't out by 16/17, shortly after child benefit stopped.

It was just a fact of life, but I too struggled. I didn't know how to budget, it took years to crawl out of the hole I found myself in.

It wasn't considered to be anything bad by the people in a similar situation, but it caused me a lot of emotional issues. I remember feeling alone and wondering why I was so easily discarded

@Anonymous48 Believe what you want I couldn't care less. I grew up on one of the most deprived estates in Britain and this is what parents would do to make sure their kids was housed. Why would I lie about it . You'd go in a hostel for a few weeks then be given a 1 bedroom permanent flat.

It was common back then as I said it was dysfunctional families who done this not decent families. I didnt come from one and neither did many of my friends. I lived on an estate where there was 15 tower blocks in a ten minute walk in south London. It wasn't hard to get housed at 16. It's disgusting to be honest. I was lucky I made right choices but many of my friends are in prison now or just on there arses falling
To bits.

That's definitely not normal, it's heartless and cruel. I can't imagine putting my child into a harmful or dangerous situation like this. It must have caused you real damage and I wonder if you even realise the extent of that damage now. I can understand you wanting to keep some level of contact if your mum is your only family but it sounds as though she is still a toxic presence in your life so beware of the effect she will still have on you. I wish I could go back and adopt the 16 year old you and reset your life.

@TurnUpTurnip

Well I do know people that weren’t but she wouldn’t have any of it, she even brought it up again yesterday then turned to my uncle and said “did your mum kick you out” and he said yes and she said “well there you go say no more then, point proven!”

Only point she had proven is that the poor parenting is to an extent familial.

I understand what it is like to work so hard to parent better to correct the parenting you received and make sure the cycle doesnt continue, whilst not having any example from your parent as others do as to how to do things better. You are doing a wonderful job fighting against that. Ignore, go NC if you have to. But keep doing what you're doing breaking the cycle.

Definitely not normal.. and its inexcusable to try and normalise it

No it’s not normal

And tbh I wouldn’t have any contact with her once she pushed me out, siblings yes, her no

You say you don’t have much family other than her, but she’s not family in my opinion and doesn’t deserve contact with you

Inwould be walking away and leaving her to it, especially as she continues to comment on your child rearing, and doesn’t believe she has done anything wrong

I’m sorry OP. I can’t imagine how 16 year old me would have handled that.

I know of only one family that did that to their daughter in the 1970s and it was seen as a shocking thing for her family to do. I'm much more your mother's generation and it wasn't a normal thing for anybody of any class to do this in the 1970s and 1980s.

One of my friends was doing teacher training in the 1980s and her mother only "let" her leave home if she moved into a Catholic girls hostel for students. I guess some people left home relatively young because they got a job and wanted to move out but they weren't 16 year olds and they weren't living in hostels.

[quote VanillaIce1]@Anonymous48 Believe what you want I couldn't care less. I grew up on one of the most deprived estates in Britain and this is what parents would do to make sure their kids was housed. Why would I lie about it . You'd go in a hostel for a few weeks then be given a 1 bedroom permanent flat. [/quote]
This is a valid point to be fair. Making their kids homeless was a way for deprived families to set their kids up for life with a council house. What a warped world we live in!!

There is far less council housing now, so it is a much riskier strategy and 16 year olds potential being left in hostels for more than just a few weeks

[quote VanillaIce1]@Anonymous48 Believe what you want I couldn't care less. I grew up on one of the most deprived estates in Britain and this is what parents would do to make sure their kids was housed. Why would I lie about it . You'd go in a hostel for a few weeks then be given a 1 bedroom permanent flat. [/quote]
I didn't say you lied about it! I was just shocked that this was something that would often happen. I also assumed it would be illegal to kick a child out before they turned 18. (It should be! It's child neglect.)

@Jobseeker19

I think that is why they changed tax credits and child benefits to continue until you are 18 if your child is in education now.

Child and other benefits were still payable to parents of anybody staying on at school at least as far back as in 1988 too. I know this because I researched it as an argument for being allowed to stay on at school instead of leaving at 16 as she expected.

Turns out that she refused to check/tell the DSS I was at sixth form because I was 'lying to get her own way as usual'. Either that or her complaints that she didn't receive one penny for me and I was a parasite were absolute lies to justify being so unpleasant/make out to her friends that she was some sort of saintly figure whilst she pocketed the cash - she didn't feed me, didn't let me wash my clothes, all I could do was sleep there. So I moved in with the first boyfriend who would have me. Which didn't end well, but at least I was out - which was apparently always going to happen on my 18th birthday, so I just went in my time, not hers.

Anyhow, rant over. It's been a thing that families on benefits received the same right up until their child's 19th birthday (which has now been extended to the end of the school term after their 19th) for over 30 years.

No, OP, women like that were not normal and most people are actually cared for by their parents. Just not all of us, unfortunately.

@Anonymous48 Sorry about that just gets my back up if I think some one disbelieves me because my childhood was so shit and so many of my friends was too. And the hostels you'd get put in was disgraceful also. Even when you did get a flat you wasn't told how to budget or anything and most of the times kids would be in these flats with no food, no heating nothing and no furniture. It's just sad and disgusting

It wouldn’t have been a few weeks in my part of London, the waiting list was 8 months / year, back then, now it would be 2/3 years even with priority as the list is huge, I ended up being there much longer than I should have as I said I didn’t know you was suppose to bid, no one told me and I had no support with it, my mum left me to it and we weren’t in contact really.

Yes benefits were still paid but I’ve already said I left education at 16 so she didn’t get any for me after 16.

It's not normal, no but not unheard of either. In the late 80s/ early 90s I knew people this happened to.
One was a boyfriend of mine and his twin brother. Nice fairly normal family, the eldest 2 kids were adult and had left home under their own steam. Then the parents got divorced, the house was sold, the dad fucked off abroad and the mum got her own one bed flat and started reclaiming her youth and dating. The twins who were only just 16 were told to sort themselves out. They stayed in a friend's family home for a few weeks but that was only temporary. One then moved in with his girlfriends family and they quickly had a baby (both parents age 17). The other twin was taken in by a couple from a local church. I met him while he was living there. He then joined the army to try and make a life for himself but that didn't work out. Both lads very much drifted between homes, jobs and relationships from what I heard over the next few years. Their mum was a nurse and I saw her some years later tending to my own mum on the ward who'd just had an operation. She seemed so kind and caring that I found it so hard to square with someone who'd booted her 16 year olds out without a second thought.

The other person was a girl from school who got kicked out in the lower sixth. She was from a strict Catholic family with 5 kids (she was the eldest) and they were pushed for space and money. She had a paper round and another job and they took half the money off her from that. When they found out she was having a sexual relationship with her boyfriend they used that as an excuse to boot her out. She managed to get a council flat, stayed at school and finished her A levels. Apparently her mother realised she missed the extra income and free babysitting and asked her to come home but she wouldn't. Good for her I thought!