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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel a bit sad my Dc isn’t having a British childhood

131 replies

Remembervoguingatschool · 03/09/2023 16:38

Just looking at the Instagram pics of friends in the U.K. from their holidays, from places like Wales & Cornwall. Just remembering the caravan stays of my childhood, the windy, rainy beach walks, finding little coves with fishing nets, having chippy for tea most might, arcades etc etc.
We live overseas and my dd has a wonderful life, but it’s very different to the one I had, she’ll have very different memories. Is it weird to feel sad she don’t experience the same things we did? (Dh is from the same area and had a similar childhood)

OP posts:
Original poster
Remembervoguingatschool · 03/09/2023 16:39

*Most nights

OP posts:
jallopeno · 03/09/2023 16:39

Can you afford to bring them here to go on a caravan holiday in Wales?

Hiddenvoice · 03/09/2023 16:40

No definitely not wrong for feeling sad, you always want to share a bit of your home or favourite holidays with your children. Would it be possible to book a holiday in Cornwall or Wales in the future?

Original poster
Remembervoguingatschool · 03/09/2023 16:41

@jallopeno Not really at the moment. When we come back, we stay with our families. Maybe it’s something we could save for and give her that experience one year. Or swap homes with someone in that sort of area

OP posts:
Ozgirl75 · 03/09/2023 16:41

I felt like that for a bit. I grew up in the U.K. and moved to Aus as an adult and have two children over there. Mine isn’t so much around holidays but around things like Christmas. But basically, they know no different and their childhood will come with its own memories and traditions.
You don’t feel sad because you didn’t have (say) an American or a French childhood, because you knew no different, and neither will your child feel like they missed out, as they’re having their own experiences.
Also, I think sometimes this feeling can come from our own nostalgia about missing our own childhood when things might have been easier or before we lost parents etc?

Brexile · 03/09/2023 16:43

It's normal to feel nostalgic, but wind and rain on holiday isn't great, and nor are seedy arcades or most seaside chippies I've been to. Time to start some new family traditions!

DD1 (18) would sympathise with you though. She keeps reminiscing about Cromer holidays and asking to go back to the UK.

Original poster
Remembervoguingatschool · 03/09/2023 16:43

@Ozgirl75 Yes, it’s strange, I don’t usually think this about holidays, where we live is where people pay to come on holidays and is incredible in the summer…weird. But yes, I often feel it hugely at Christmas

OP posts:
Original poster
Remembervoguingatschool · 03/09/2023 16:45

@Brexile Did she grow up in the U.K.? My Dd has no real connection aside from us, all she knows is where we are.

OP posts:
Brexile · 03/09/2023 16:52

Yes, we only moved in 2020 so all three DCs grew up in the UK. DD2 is 14 and doesn't seem overly nostalgic. We often joke that she's gone native!

MidnightOnceMore · 03/09/2023 16:54

Its not wrong to feel nostalgic and a bit sad, but I think the correct response is to live in the moment and focus on what your DD does have. You can't compare a real present with a memorialised past.

The British childhood is not special or that great for everyone - what you are remembering is a feeling and wherever your DD is you can give her a similar feeling, of relaxation, happy holidays, carefree childhood?

Mustthinkofausername · 03/09/2023 16:57

I could've written you post but from the other perspective. I grew up overseas and moved around a lot but am now back in UK. My children are born and raised here and I often feel like I've let them down having to grow up here as it's so lacking compared to the memories of my childhood. We travel overseas as much as possible so they can experience some of the things I did at their age. The thing is they just don't really know a different childhood than the one they have had but I feel like my childhood was so much better. I mostly feel bad they have lived in one place/country their entire lives and by their age I had lived in several places and loved moving around a lot. They don't feel they've had a bad childhood which is good. I am hopeful they leave the UK for Uni so they can experience more.

Hopefully it's normal to feel this way!

ForthegracegoI · 03/09/2023 16:58

Both my kids have grown up in France with British parents. Tbh we’ve gone back often enough that any nostalgia for a typical British childhood is tempered by the reality 🙄. My kids would not consider a chippy tea every night to be a treat, though we have done plenty of seaside things here in France (with better weather 😂).

Families create their own traditions and routines, and for your children the ones they’ve made with you will be the real deal.

NalafromtheLionKing · 03/09/2023 16:58

Remembervoguingatschool · 03/09/2023 16:43

@Ozgirl75 Yes, it’s strange, I don’t usually think this about holidays, where we live is where people pay to come on holidays and is incredible in the summer…weird. But yes, I often feel it hugely at Christmas

Sounds like where you live is way better! If so YABU

Gymmum82 · 03/09/2023 17:01

My DC are growing up in the U.K. Though not where I grew up and aren’t having similar holidays.
We had basic breaks in b&bs or eurocamp when we were older in France.
Our DC go to AI resorts in Spain/Turkey etc something I’d never done until an adult. Camping/caravan holidays which again I’d never done.
Everyone’s childhood experiences are different even if you grow up in the same place. I wouldn’t be sad about it

CurlewKate · 03/09/2023 17:04

My dp is currently in Great Yarmouth for a work thing. My 26 year old dd, who had been on about a million exotic holidays by the time she was 10, is reminiscing about the long weekend she spent in a Great Yarmouth guest house with her grandparents when she was 5 with chips on the beach and freezing paddling. I suspect you can't win!

Puffinshop · 03/09/2023 17:08

I'm also an immigrant from the UK and I know exactly what you mean. It makes me feel a bit wistful that there are all these cultural touchstones that my children don't share with me.

Even though I do believe they are having a great childhood and many things are better where we are, it's a bit sad knowing that your children don't have the same national identity as you.

We do go the UK frequently so they have a bit of contact with it, but there are a lot of little things that just aren't part of their lives.

Ididivfama · 03/09/2023 17:09

Where do you live? I feel the opposite. I travelled so much as a child, particularly Europe. We had so much fun. Being in the uk all the time isn’t everything I promise you!

Ozgirl75 · 03/09/2023 17:12

Interestingly we’re currently spending a period of time in the U.K. and it’s not even the same for me! I think part of your feeling is just missing what the past used to be.
We recently went back to a Greek island that I went to as a child and loved. It was still lovely and we had a brilliant time, but it wasn’t the same as I’m not the same and neither is the place exactly the same.
Ive found as I’ve got older almost a feeling of homesickness for the past in some ways, but it can be quite damaging, I have to pull myself out of it and remind myself that I’m here NOW and in another 30 years (hopefully), I’ll remember this time fondly too.

Puffinshop · 03/09/2023 17:13

I also think it doesn't have much to do with how great or crap it is to live in one country over another. That's not the point really.

I think it's a part of being an immigrant and raising children in another country, maybe not a universal part but I bet it's very common.

M4J4 · 03/09/2023 17:18

Sentimental nonsense. If you had wanted them to have a British childhood, you would have raised them in Britain.

This one foot in, one foot out hand wringing is annoying.

Rewis · 03/09/2023 17:38

I feel you. I kinda have lately realised that when me and my partner have kids they'll grow up in the UK and will have totally different activities and memories. It's not better or worse. Just different. I'm already feeling a bit nostalgic about it on what they won't get to experience. But I guess the key is to concentrate on the things they get to experience because of the location that we never had the chance

chariotspades · 03/09/2023 17:39

Where did you move and does your country not have countryside?

Happyhappyday · 03/09/2023 17:41

I would say I feel the same about my DD, I did not grew up in the UK but lived there for 15 years and felt sad about the idea of my children not getting to experience what I did. BUT as someone who grew up not in the UK, my holidays as a child were skiing, Disneyland, Hawaii, camping in sunny places with beautiful clear, warm lakes/rivers, my grandparents house at a beautiful, hot lake town with the best water slide park ever. The windy/rainy beaches sound absolutely shit to me. Long way of saying, often what you grow up with is what feels great, so she will probably love what she has and might not even enjoy what you’re describing.

reluctantbrit · 03/09/2023 17:51

DD doesn't grow up in our home country and does experience different holidays than DH and I did.

What we do is, doing regular holidays in our home country outside visiting family. We go for either our annual one and spend it in an area we don't know well either or we are somewhere we have been during and want to re-visit it.

Or we add a couple of days to a family visit and play tourist before flying back.

I think it's more about giving DD the opportunity to learn about her other nationality and culture than having to re-live our childhood holiday experiences.

HuckleberryBlackcurrant · 03/09/2023 17:55

Yes, I know exactly how you feel. We live in the US. School uniforms, conkers, Guy Fawkes, Pancake Day, Easter, Nativity plays.... Makes me sad they will miss out and not feel British