What normal things did you not have or not have in your house growing up?

[Fairypowder13]

We ran out of kitchen roll today and it got me thinking, growing up we never had kitchen roll in the house. I can remember visiting people who did and thinking that it was quite posh.

I grew up in a very poor home and we were always warm, clean, clothed and fed, but also lacking so many basic things. My parents always had money for cigarettes and alcohol though 🙄

I can remember having to have my hair washed with washing up liquid at times, I had very long hair and my mum never bought conditioner so you can imagine how knotty my hair would be. I did eventually get access to hair conditioner after begging my mum after I’d seen it advertised.

No cushions on the sofas.

No family holidays or day trips. Didn’t see the sea until I was 16.

No fabric softener for washing.

Never had a bed or mattress of my own, had one that was given to us until I was old enough to buy my own, it was all broken in the end but it didn’t occur to my parents to buy one.

No birthday cake or celebration, we’d get one small cheap present but nothing beyond that.

No stocking for Christmas. We’d put out one of our socks.

No winter coat, I had to wait to be given one by my older cousin.

We had fruit but microwaves, duvets, home tumble dryers, showers in "normal" houses, and suncream as in sun protection and factors didn't exist. Central heating was for the massively rich. I think we had our own brushes and combs but they were "gift" items and not necessities.

I grew up in a pretty wealthy home. It was a vast house. Big gardens. Music room. Ponies. Ski lessons. Private education etc

Things we didn't have that were normal I think in the 90s

• a TV
• any gaming devices
• take aways/McDonald's etc

I think my parents felt they were doing the right thing for us but it made me feel really excluded from a lot of conversations and I used to spend a lot of time at friends houses so I could experience these things

Oh yeah and no double glazing till I was in my late teens so frost flowers inside the windows for half the winter! I quite liked them but I didn't like going to bed in a hat and coat ! (Vast rooms with high ceilings and big windows so even with central heating it barely made a dent in the temp)

I’ve never had double glazing.

Paracetamol.

My mum would buy one pack if I was at deaths door with flu - not a cold or a headache, had to be full flu.
Otherwise, she thought all pain killers were "junk" for posh people and wimps.

I suffered badly with period pain. It wasn't until I got to university and a boyfriend bought me a pack of Feminax that I realised I didn't have to suffer.

I buy paracetamol every single week in the shopping now. In my bathroom I currently have 32 boxes of paracetamol, plus boxes of other pain killers, and a box of paracetamol in every handbag I regularly use 😬I'm making up for lost time.

I think a stable existence really. I'd lived in 4 different towns, went to 4 different schools before age of 11. 3 in Cambridgeshire and 1 in Lincolnshire. Nothing to do with moving jobs either ie job and property come together, like farming for instance.

Once we moved to Lincolnshire, we stayed in 1 town 👏🏻 👏🏻 but I lived in 6 different houses. Went to same secondary school 👏🏻 👏🏻 Over a 10 year period for the house moving.

None of the houses were RENTED by the way. My mother was just never satisfied with anywhere. I actually think she's mentally ill.

My late father probably died from the stress of constantly working and decorating houses. He passed when I was 20.

It's definitely affected my education and I had trouble making friends in my early years. No Internet around then..

Not one of the houses had a shower though lol

Double glazing (not until I was in my teens).
Central heating (ditto, or maybe a bit sooner), we made do with an electric fire.
A car (only while I was a baby when my dad rode only a motorbike! We had one later).
Holidays abroad (never- didn’t set foot on a plane till I was 20 and didn’t fly with my parents until 2022!)
Fabric conditioner- yeah, us too. My dad hates it.
A shower- baths only until I was about 15.

I had a very happy childhood and not impoverished. This was the 80’s.

Actually this! My parents had a thing against painkillers too. I don’t know how my poor mum managed period pain as I rarely saw her take a tablet when I was growing up. I guess she must have. I shudder at the thought of no painkillers for period pain. My dad finally started buying me painkillers when I went pale and nearly collapsed in front of him with period pain when I was 14.

Didn’t have
kitchen roll
tin foil
proper lunch box ( jam sarnie was just thrown in the bottom of an empty Mother’s Pride thin sliced white loaf bag or brown paper bag)
no cheese or ham for sandwiches
usually had a tiny really hard cox apple
no flask or squash

I'd say safeguarding was practically non existent in the late 80s/early 90s(I'm almost 43 now). Black eyes and bruises were forever explained with my apparent clumsiness like bumping into things or falling off the bunk beds

How do you stop your clothes from.being full of static without Softener?

When I was a child (1950s-1960s), literally every penny counted. So things like cars, holidays, new clothes, TV, visits to the theatre or cinema, meals in restaurants or drinks in cafés were just things that other people had. And no landline phone until I was in my mid-teens.

Even travelling by bus was a rare treat. One of my earliest childhood memories is of standing at a bus stop, and my mum holding out a handful of change and saying "Look at all the money we'd save if we walked."

My mum had a thing against tampons. She was horrified when she discovered that i used my pocket money to buy tampons. We never had a toaster and i never had a winter coat or a duvet. We didn't have double glazing either. Yet my mum always had money for sky sports and fags.

No fitted carpets or central heating. Just coal fires.

No bathroom until I was 18 and my parents bought the house. The loo was at the bottom of the yard

No telephone until the 1970s. I got one for my first flat in 1966

Neither of my parents had bank accounts. I had one at 16 because I was paid by BACS.

No car - neither of my parents ever drove

No passports - I had one at 20

No washing machine, fridge or freezer. We did get a 12 inch TV for the coronation i 1953.

I am 59. We didn't have mains water (came from a well) until I was about 12, and no central heating at all (open fires). Parents got central heating about 10 years ago.

Same here. When I was very young had outside toilet and a tin bath! Eventually my parents moved up the (council) housing ladder a bit but no fridge freezer, colour tv or telephone until the early 70s. I feel a Monty Python sketch coming on….luxury!

We didn't have kitchen roll either (70s). We did have cloths. Lots of cloths for wiping every surface including us. When we went anywhere, Mother had a damp cloth in a plastic bag so she could give us a quick wipe (hands and face) to ensure we were presentable at all times.

We also had napkins tucked in to protect our clothes. It's a habit I still have.

We eventually got a VHS machine when Mother did an OU course as her lectures were broadcast at 03.00 on BBC2. Of course, we weren't allowed any tapes for things we wanted to record.

I don't feel I missed out on anything. We were taught not to compare ourselves to others and be grateful for what we had. I was fortunate to have decent parents, who worked hard and made sacrifices for us.

My mum is a bit of a hippy so we didn’t have any technology, no microwave, no toaster, no white bread, no sweets or chocolate or fizzy drinks.

Had a fab childhood and we were firmly middle class.

Ooh the cold… frost on the inside of bedroom windows on winter mornings, my dear Mum pushing wet washing through a mangle in the garden in winter, freezing cold bathroom with a Lino floor so you waited until bath water was nearly cold to get out.
My tangly hair being brushed through after washing it - agony! No hair conditioner in the 1960s. Secondhand clothes from jumble sales and older cousins were the norm.
I still think of kitchen roll as a luxury and can only bring myself to buy it occasionally, and use it as a ‘treat’ at Christmas or when entertaining!

Grew up in the 80s. Didn't have central heating in the house and in the winter, ice would form on my bedroom windows. I'd rush downstairs on a morning before school and get dressed double quick in front of the gas fire 😂We lived in a pub so mum would never buy crisps or pop from the supermarket as we could get them in the bar, but all they sold was the basics and I wanted prawn cocktail crisps and Cream Soda dammit!!! 😂
No foreign holidays but we always had a week away in Scarborough or similar.
No shower, only a bath. No video recorder or Sky TV (was very jealous of my friends who had both). No microwave. No car as neither parent ever learned to drive. I loved my parents and they both worked hard, too hard, plus they enjoyed the social aspect of having a pub, so I guess the thing I most missed from my childhood was them being present. That was very hard.

We were poor until I was seven, and Dad came into a small inheritance. Mum used to buy clothes at jumble sales and cut down and remake them for my sister and I. Also washed, unravelled and re-knitted cardigans and jumpers. We were always very well dressed. Does anyone remember having to take Beecham's Powders? They had to be mixed with milk or water, but the powder always settled out. They were disgusting.

Your childhood sounds more like neglect than just poor!
Our house was full of old mismatched furniture that was all second hand. But it was always warm and clean. Most of our clothes were hand me downs from cousins or family friends but we were always clean and looked after. We didn't have a car, sky TV, or a dishwasher but never felt we went without. Money was prioritised on days out in the school holidays and after school clubs. We learned the value of money and to live within our means.

I'm a 1981 baby and my childhood was no central heating, no telephone, no Internet or computer. I used to give he local phone box as my telephone number!
But my childhood was wonderful two fabulous hardworking parents, lots of cousins, lots of free days out, lots of love and good basic nutritious food, camping holidays when possible and lots of freedom to just play. My sister calls it "trauma" but she doesn't care never had it to give, they both worked and saved bloody hard. She is just incredibly materialistic. I love the fact I had very little growing up it makes me desire very little in adulthood and as a result I'm not in debt, I buy good second hand clothes and I own my house. That is all because of my parents.

No TV, and did not get a fridge until a fly laid some eggs on a joint of meat.

Yes, no duvets. The sequence was: sheet, blanket(s), eiderdown, counterpane. And your outdoor coat on top if it was really cold. No phone, but someone up the road got a Trimphone. It was quite exciting if you were outside and heard it ring in the distance.