OP, I never got to do anything when I was a child. My parents didn’t know any better.
I was the youngest in a very large family where my parents were too busy doing grown up things like housework and entertaining endless guests from our community. People in the community would judge them if the house was dirty and messy or they weren’t home when they randomly visited. Our culture is also all about impressing others and not paying attention to the children.
Then there was the question of money. They didn’t have any to spare and had lots of mouths to feed. They didn’t have the time to take us out either.
I don’t remember getting any individual attention from my father and my mother only gave us basic attention like hugs, feeding us and washing us. I spent the majority of my time with my siblings. You could say I was neglected in some ways but I had all of my needs met.
I never got to travel or experience anything interesting. When I was old enough, I would take myself to the library and take out books, CDs and DVDs to entertain myself over the summer holidays. I had basic supplies like sketchbooks and cheap watercolour sets, felt tip pens for my colouring books. I would play with the children of my parents’ friends. We would sometimes go out on trips to the park, to fun fairs, to seaside places like Brighton and Southend. We would go strawberry picking and have barbecue picnics in country parks where we would play team games.
Because I was under stimulated I had a thirst for adventure and fun and spent my 20s and early thirties travelling and working abroad teaching English. I just wanted to compensate for missing out on adventure in my childhood and was kind of stunted. I was a very late bloomer because of my childhood. I also found it very difficult to adjust to the world of work and suffered from depression. My father had never worked and always claimed benefits so I had no good role models. I stayed in low paid employment despite having a degree.
I had a typical working class upbringing of ‘natural growth’ - in other words just living like a plant 😅🥲
Now that I have a DS, I am raising him according to the method of ‘concerted cultivation’. I am providing him with lots of books and reading to him. I take him to parks, museums, city zoos, the lido, splash pads. I have taken him to more places in his short 2.5 years than I ever went to in my first 18 years. We’ve taken him to Somerset, the Peak District, a cottage holiday in Lincolnshire, a beach holiday in Turkey and a city break in Europe.
The only thing I haven’t done is take him to swimming classes or baby classes.
He has plenty of high quality toys like lego and brio. He goes out into nature most days (I’m a SAHM).
Comparing myself with my parents, I speak fluent English, am Masters educated and feel more entitled to things- not in an arrogant way but I just know what resources are available to me and know how to make good use of them. I have seen and done a lot of things so I can see how others raise happy and successful children. I emulate them.