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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think this is f*cked up?

200 replies

DHsdilemma · 08/04/2022 18:23

NC as my other username is for me personally.

DH has gone LC (NC really) with his mum and sister. It came to a head as he has always said he was treated differently.

Tonight we were talking and the topic came up about one time he thinks this really exemplifies being treated differently but I’ve been left thinking wtf?!

So the story:

When DH was about 13 circa 2004, he went on holiday with his older sister (1 year older), his younger brother (2 years younger), his mum and two aunts. They rented a small 3 seater hatchback to travel around Spain and bordering countries.

When they got the car it obviously couldn’t fit everyone in, so the decision was made that DH would have to get in the boot. They removed the parcel shelf so he could see out the back window but it was very much a boot. The reason was his sister was a girl and his brother was the “baby” and got car sick.

They used this car to travel hours - they went to Gibraltar and Morocco (the port) as well as around Spain in general. Whenever they hit border security they told DH to duck.

I asked DH whether he maybe was a kid who thought the boot was exciting. But apparently he vividly remembers being very angry and upset about being put in the boot (especially when they put the parcel shelf back to conceal him from security). He remembers mostly that he was so upset and disorientated from the experience that the drum souvenir he bought he dropped as he was dizzy and he was distraught about it.

Now I think this is fucked up. Mainly from a safety perspective and know my parents would have just rented a bigger car in the same scenario. He has brought it up to his mum who dismissed it as a bit of a joke and family tale.

Is this normal / funny? Or is this just terrible parenting?

YABU: it is just something that needed to be done, no one was hurt and it’s fine
YANBU: what the fuck

OP posts:
DragonMovie · 08/04/2022 20:47

All the people saying “I used to sit in the boot”… did your parents ever drive you to Morocco in the boot??? And was it 2004??? Highly doubtful!!

torquewench · 08/04/2022 20:51

Me and my brother used to fight over who got to sit in the boot of Dad's Vauxhall Chevette.

Another time, about 7 of us squeezed in a saloon car going on a night out.

Safety is only a fairly recent selling point/concern...

JudgeJ · 08/04/2022 20:51

@HairyScaryMonster

I've got lots of fond memories of me and a cousin or two sharing the boot and making faces at people in the 80s and early 90s. However it was for shortish journeys not an epic road trip.
It reminds me of the time my OH and I had taken my father to B and Q to buy three sheets of 8 x 4 wall boards. No problem buying it but then came getting it home, we had a large estate car but we found that the back seat had to be down. It finished up with OH driving, father passenger and me flat on my back with these wall boards on top of me, they weren't heavy and we weren't going far! OH was worried when there was a police car behind us at the traffic lights but then he said their faces were a picture when a disembodied arm appeared and waved at them!
WrongWayApricot · 08/04/2022 20:54

Around that time (00s) I got a lift to school with a family and a kid would have to sit in the boot. He loved it though and it was maybe half hour tops each way.

That your DH was in there for hours, didn't want to be, dizzy and distraught makes me think yanbu. If it was like above then I would say yabu, the past is past... Parcel shelf bit is really weird though, the family I knew never hid the kid. When I look back on it I'm surprised the mum was never tugged 🤷‍♀️

I also have family in another country where driving is absolutely fucking terrifying compared to here. Have been in a car with a toddler standing up because he didn't want to sit down or wear a belt (I'm still asking wtf to this day on that one). No chance your DH family is from a similar country/background?

LouLou198 · 08/04/2022 20:56

I thought you were going to say this happened in the 70's/80's, not 2004!!
How very odd, particularly getting him to hide when they crossed borders. I'm not surprised he is traumatised!

RantyAunty · 08/04/2022 20:56

That is shocking!
I really never knew anyone riding in the boot on purpose.

As a teenager a few times we crammed a bunch of us in a car to go a couple miles to a friend's house. One guy deliberately got in the boot and he was joking someone better let him out when we got there.
That's the only times I can recall.

It was more common to ride in the bed of a truck or back of a van as most were decorated with shag carpet and sofa or bed. 70s.

There were 4 kids and 2 adults in my family but my Dad always had boats as well called them. One was a 1972 Chrysler Imperial sedan and it had bench seats the size of a sofa! They all had seatbelts in them. I think my Mum's was a 74 or 75 Ford Torino. Another boat!

Gonnagetgoing · 08/04/2022 20:57

My mum had an old post office van in 1970s and we regularly (kids!) travelled in the back on bean bags or cushions! Less traffic on the road back then.
When I was 6 or 7, she got a proper car, she was at teacher training college then, can’t even recall what it was but definitely a proper car with seats and seatbelts but we were never encouraged to belt up or it was rarely. And she drove whilst tipsy too but I think that was the norm back then too. Compare it to now when I don’t even like to drive after - or 2 drinks though friends do.

Original poster
DHsdilemma · 08/04/2022 20:58

@WrongWayApricot my DH is white British - culturally very British too. They just went on holiday. I don’t know where his dad was either and DH doesn’t remember but he wasn’t there. His father was absent though with the excuse of breadwinner / important business man.

OP posts:
Poppins2016 · 08/04/2022 21:00

@Rumplestrumpet

Anyone normalising this hasn't understood the gravity - yes, in the 70s/80s parents were often carefree about car safety. We had an estate and would regularly put a beanbag and several kids in the large boot. But it was comfy and fun and not distressing. By the 2000s this was not normal.

And to put a 13yr old in a hatchback boot for hours at a time - even closing them in with the lid on! - is appalling. Unsafe and humiliating.

I agree with this. I (or a sibling) would sometimes end up in the boot of my parents estate car and it was a fun experience with cushions, blankets and a novel 'backwards view' (no parcel shelf in place).

In a smaller/enclosed space and without the fun element, it would have been a different experience altogether.

And then there's the safety aspect... in 2004 there really was no excuse.

Original poster
DHsdilemma · 08/04/2022 21:01

This came up as we are now discussing kids. I brought up that I want him to be very present for the girly activities if we have a girl. Rather than just the football which he is obsessed with (and really wants a boy) - I strongly apologise for how sexist this comes across but promise you we aren’t.

DH said how his only memories of holidays and weekends were being ferried around to the sports activity his sister did (she is The Favourite and they all agree this - everyone in the family calls her Golden Child) and how no one came to his sports (football and table tennis).
I then said jokingly “not in the boot this time” and he came out with the full story. I suppose I’d never really asked for detail before and now feel bad.

OP posts:
Doggirl · 08/04/2022 21:04

I have fond memories of doing voluntary work in Spain in 1993, and getting 15 people in/on a Landrover(that only had 1 working gear...), or 9 people in a VW Polo, for an evening in the nearest town. Difference with that was 1) we were all sadults 2) it was optional and 3) it was only for around 20 minutes a time. (We were remote enough to be unlikely to run into the police, and from what I saw of the local cops they probably wouldn't have been fussed anyway.)

Grasping at straws, but do the husband's family originate from outside western Europe? You only have to look at footage of street scenes to realise that even today, most of the world is far more relaxed than we are about what's considered acceptable in transport.

RewildingAmbridge · 08/04/2022 21:06

Thing is this is in the context of a dysfunctional/abusive family and he was clearly unhappy about it. Also it was 2004 so definitely not normal.
My parents had an estate car when I was young and we'd drive down to Cornwall over night, they put the luggage on the back seats and DB and I would have pillows and duvets in the boot so we could stretch out and sleep better! We loved it. In the context of modern safety it's unthinkable, but cars didn't even have rear seatbelts then, babies were held in arms in cars rather than state of the art rear facing crash tested car seats (like my own DS is with both us and my parents!). It was just the eighties and what people did. That doesn't sound like your DHs experience OP.

Lachimolala · 08/04/2022 21:17

I remember in the late 80’s early 90’s we’d fight over who got to go into the boot of our clapped out Volvo estate lol. But we all enjoyed it and it was the norm back then for trips to the seaside etc.

In 2004 in a tiny hatchback hiding? No absolutely not, I would never do that to any of my kids. I don’t blame him for feeling upset and stressed out by this.

diddl · 08/04/2022 21:22

I must have misunderstood-there were 6 people & a three seater car?

JesusSufferingFuck22 · 08/04/2022 21:25

That's not right. My kids were born in mid 1990s and not having your kid in the right car seat, installed correctly was frowned upon, never mind being in the boot!

Bigblunder · 08/04/2022 21:31

In the 80’s we had a 2 seater pick-up. The kids were put in the back!! We sat on the raised bit that covered the tyres and held on…..we even went on the motorway! It was terrifying.

whynotwhatknot · 08/04/2022 21:35

In the eighties yeah i mean we all done it i wa sn the footwell alot

but i dont think its about that really is it he was treated differently to his siblings

BOOTS52 · 08/04/2022 21:46

That is shocking and he must have been roasting hot and like a prisoner in there. Could he even see out. Why did they not rent a bigger car or take turns with the kids or squash the kids into the car somehow. That for me is abusive seeing as it is not the 80's where we all piled in and no seat belts. I think your husband needs to talk to somebody about this as it has stayed with him and it is a horrible nightmare memory. How are they with him now and has he ever talked to them about it and how it was just awful what they did. Not a holiday for him at all. Very disturbing, different if it was a short journey but not traveling around.

Getoutofbed25 · 08/04/2022 21:54

1970’s I’d say short journeys like this were common practice
2004 absolutely no way was this in any way ok

AtomicBlondeRose · 08/04/2022 22:00

Europe wasn’t some lawless desert in 2004! I lived in a European country in the early 2000s and the health and safety and driving standards were the same as they were here - and nobody was driving around in the boot! Maybe 15 years earlier (I remember this sort of thing when I was little, in the early 80s) but by the time seatbelts were in all cars it had definitely stopped.

Seabreeze18 · 08/04/2022 22:10

I’ve probably watched too much true crime but I would be doing a dna test to make sure I was related to these people. Shocking!

Octomore · 08/04/2022 22:20

The driving started each day in Malaga. He said they went to Morocco by car (him in the boot) by driving 1.5 hours to the port then they parked and were foot passengers for the ferry. I believe they came back the same day.

So where exactly do border crossings come into it? They didn't drive over any borders?

Sorry, but it doesn't make sense.

Octomore · 08/04/2022 22:21

(For clarity - they didn't cross any borders in the car, so no need for him to "hide at border crossings". A foot passenger on a ferry would be on foot, not in a boot.

Blinky21 · 08/04/2022 22:24

This was normal in my family, we used to argue over who rode in the boot!

HeirloomTomato · 08/04/2022 22:27

In the 1980s as a 7 year old I remember being asked to sit on the footrest in the back when there were too many of us to fit in the car - because I was the smallest in the family. It didn't bother me at the time but I do look back now and think, WTH, if we'd been in an accident I'd have been toast. My 7 year old only travels in the car with the correct booster seat and only ever in the back, fully strapped in etc.

So yes, in the 1980s parents did do daft things that were not safe but 2004?? I don't think so. Car seat education was widespread then and the boot is way way worse than the footrest. How did he even breathe? And especially in a hot place like southern Spain. Bizarre decision by the parent.