to think this is f*cked up?

[DHsdilemma]

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

It’s not just about the car safety though is it? It’s about being the one singled out to not be included. The baby was special, the girl was special, he was the one they could stand to lose.
They were literally pretending he wasn’t there and hiding him at certain points.
And they are still laughing about it because considering his feelings isn’t important, they don’t care about his feelings.
I had a similar role in my family. It stays with you.

@DHsdilemma

Thanks for your comments and for validating DH’s feelings.

I know the story has come up a lot when DH has tried to give examples of the issues in the family. DH is currently deciding whether to get back in touch with him mum and dad. I think he feels a bit lonely / missing that side but then also remembers they haven’t accepted what they did to him.

I suppose the boot story is a slight red herring as there’s a lot more to this. But in my opinion it is one of the stories as a child that really shows to me how deep it all goes.

He has always been very tall too, taller than his other brother and his sister is very small. That’s what I don’t understand. They put the tallest child in the boot. DH never wanted to be in the boot because it was seen as a punishment.

He has one aunt who is wonderful, very motherly (the other and his mum are alike and not very motherly) and it does surprise me but the two aunts have said that they had an argument with the mum about his treatment - they never went into further detail though as they don’t want to cause more family fall out. The aunts all fell out 10 years ago and now are only just on talking terms

Whether he was tall or short isn't even relevant - he was the scapegoat of the family and he's right to resent that.

LC or NC is the way forwards.

That (imo) falls way below not being maternal though.

I mean there's not doing your utmost all the time & not giving a fuck!

When my daughter first put our dog in the boot of the hatchback I was "really?-Is that safe/good enough?"

He had his bed to lie down in & could stand up & turn around.

We were travelling for about 15mins!

It's interesting how our standards change over time.

@Helenahandkart

We regularly had to sit in the boot in the 70s/80s. Safety wasn’t invented til much later. This sounds pretty standard to me.

@Helenahandkart this was 2004 so your tale is hardly relevant!

@MySecretHistory

in the 1970s the entire cub football team fitted in our ancient estate

as a baby my brother went in the boot of the car- early 1970s

@MySecretHistory did you read where it said this was 2004? Times change!

@Girlmumdogmumboymum that's really, really not normal at all for early 2000's!!

@Dacquoise

It doesn't really matter what other people think about the ins and outs of the scenario the fact it caused your DH trauma and upset is enough to class it as poor parenting. Combined with the mother's subsequent minimising and dismissal of your DHs feelings about it confirms a lack of empathy and compassion.

Yes this. All these tales of reminiscing about 70/80's childhoods in vans doesn't matter a hoot because (a) it was 2004 so very different expectations of safety and (b) it matters to HIM.

And I'm a gen-xer who also remembers lying across the back seat to sleep on the way home from family parties in the 70s as there were no back seat belts, but that's NOT relevant here.

@TwiggletLover

Very normal to have one or two kids travelling in the boot when I was growing up in the 80's/90's

And again, this was 2004. So you point is?

@mycatisannoying

Normal for its day.

@mycatisannoying

2004?
British family?
Really?

It was very dangerous and completely illegal and NOT acceptable in 2004.

"If it had been 1970 I would have said this was standard parenting but not in 2004!!"

Very much this!

Although I have a teen and pre-teen I also have two older ds's born in 1989 and 1991. This kind of arrangement was most definitely not standard, or even approved of, in the early 2000's.

When ds1 was born in 1989 I'd saved hard and bought one of the first Britaxcar seats that was rear facing for a baby and then forward facing from about 9-12 months. It weighed an absolute ton!! But gives an indication of how things were then, never mind 15 years later.

Actually dd was born in 2006, and the correct car seat was imperative and I'm assuming law by then.

I went in the boot a few times as a kid and I'm 33, so would have been late 90s. We thought it was great fun to be honest! But we actively wanted to go in the boot and the parcel shelf wasn't ever put on top. As students we also stuck people in the boot as there wasn't enough cars and had 4 people in the back instead of 3 all in like sardines. Its not great parenting but it's not terrible imo!

@Grantanow

It's interesting how our standards change over time.

Standards change for many reasons. Technology changes, which means it’s now much easier to keep people safe in a car. Knowledge changes, which means we are now much more informed about risks/safety. Also the environment changes… in the 70’s, there were far fewer cars on the road. Fewer opportunities for accidents. I was taken home from hospital when I was born in a carry cot on the back seat of the car. Of course we wouldn’t do that now, as we have safer alternatives. Those alternatives didn’t exist back then.

I had two children in 2094- this absolutely was NOT the norm!!! The norm was kids strapped into car seats on actual seats in the car!

2004!

@Helenahandkart

We regularly had to sit in the boot in the 70s/80s. Safety wasn’t invented til much later. This sounds pretty standard to me.

In the 80s this was definitely a thing (I remember being one of three kids in a boot) - but for v short trips / rotated etc not just the same kid. Also the 80s - people just weren't so safety conscious. I like to think that by 2004 people really should have been aware this is not safe (not to mention comfortable).

@DHsdilemma

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.

This bit is important.

He needs to talk about this - because if you have a girl, she cannot be on the receiving end of the issues his mother and aunt (and father, by not being around/disinterested/whatever) have caused.

If you also have a boy and he suddenly becomes #1 Best Dad Ever to him but uninvolved or worse, treats his daughter less kindly because he 'doesn't want her being spoiled' or whatever, that's just as bad as his mother's attitude towards him. Or if a boy has no interest whatsoever in football or other 'manly' pursuits, turns out to be small and not as tall as he was, etc, that he isn't a good father because the boy isn't made in his own image.

You cannot have him replicating the Golden Child dynamic with a future son at the expense of a future daughter. He doesn't get to think he's righting the wrongs of his childhood by creating a mirror image in your own family.

Yes, he was treated appallingly. That part is absolutely true - they knowingly endangered his life (and hid it from the assorted officials, hence having to hide - it could also mean that they hadn't even bought tickets for him). But now that's been validated, he has to sort out in his own head that, like him, it will not be the fault of his future children and they can't be used as a proxy for his trying to redress the balance in his head.

@NeverDropYourMooncup agree here. Luckily DH is of the same opinion - he wants to learn make up and hair to help behind the scenes at dance shows (we are purely reflecting on our own childhood hobbies - our kid might love something we have no experience in!) and I will continue to get involved in football.

The football thing is that he is OBSESSED (his team is non league because they’re terrible) and he remembers being put on the supporters bus to go to away matches at 10/11 without a parent (I don’t know if this flies these days!) but his dad showed no interest and he desperately wants the bond.

I will be sure to remain aware in the future of any potential filter through of preferential treatment. I don’t want his mother near any of our children - mainly because I don’t agree with her parenting. I think I realised this years ago when she kept feeding my dog sugar cubes as a treat despite me asking her not to (IT IS A DOG)

WHERE in the world was this acceptable in 2004??! I do not live in U.K., I'm an American so perhaps there's a bit of a cultural difference? Because here, this would be something you would hear about happening and being NBD at the very latest in the '90's! And even then only where I lived, in a lower socioeconomical area. Genuinely curious, not trying to be disparaging.

Terrible. This really struck a chord because my DH was treated badly in comparison to his siblings and it makes me so cross.

For me it's terrible for 2 reasons, one is the safety aspect (in 2000 and fucking 4!!!) and one is the deep and bitter unfairness of being the one singled out to experience it. Its terrible.

I really feel for him.

I'm not sure. In the 90s we would often put the back seats down to make a 'bed' when we went on holiday and all three kids would be in the extended boot area. In the late 90s I would regularly be driven to a hobby by my coach and often sit in the boot area of his estate car, and me and my friend would get driven about in the back of his dad's work van stood up in the pitch black for fun. I know 2004 was a while after this but it's not that long after. I kind of get the selection process too - the smallest child with exceptions for one who gets travel sick (travelling backwards would be awful for this). While the whole story makes me think damn those adults could have prepared a LOT better for the type of holiday they were intending on, it doesn't scream child abuse either.

Not going to read all responses but first reaction of this is to remember it doesn’t matter if you’ve been 15 ppl deep in a car boot in 1980and had the time of your life the fact is the op DH is upset by his own experience . It’s maybe not the actual event that’s the trauma but his own experience of it- especially given that maybe he felt unloved, uncared for, shunned etc and it’s been laughed off etc since.
Hope he can process some of his thoughts about this xx yanbu

My God, that's so awful. Your poor husband, I feel like crying for him!

Much of Asia. (And probably many other developing nations)
It was after 2004 that i travelled through an Asian country in the boot of a 4x4 (I volunteered, I had a cosy nest in the sleeping bags which was more comfortable for altitude sickess and car sickness). It was the kind of country when you book a tour and there's 6 people for 5 seats, you don't argue with the powers that be or you'll be at best stranded. The real hazard was plunging off a mountain rather than being rear ended.
In many developing countries the vehicle stock is pretty ancient and people can't afford a car with seats and seat belts for every person in the family. Progress can be slow.

The law change that every person had to have a seat and use a seat belt in the early 90s was a gear changer in the UK/ Europe, but it takes time for the vehicle stock to change and culture to adapt, so it took time for some of the outliers to catch up. 2004 was unusual for British people to be fine with continuing car-overcrowding, but not totally unheard of. (I had "words" with some grandparents sitting outside school around 2017 who ignored their car seat and drove off with a toddler on grandma's lap, I'd seen them pull off previously and next time I saw them reminded them to use the seat- and told school who advised 101 if I saw them drive off like that again)
The car scrappage scheme of the late 2000s took a lot of "old bangers" off the roads improving vehicle safety.

The real issue is his needs and feelings being minimised and the scapegoat golden child dynamic. Having survived the holiday without an actual incident, it's the ongoing emotional treatment that's the real issue. Otherwise it would just be a "can't believe we did that" memory.