What made your parents paranoid when you were growing up?

[BeCraftyFatball]

For myself -Danger when leaving the street

Mine were convinced that if they allowed us anything we asked for we’d end up ‘spoiled’.

If we ate outside of mealtimes we’d get fat. Being fat was unforgivable. They still judge people for being fat now - in their 80s. It’s some kind of moral sin.

Getting too close to the TV would ruin our eyes.

Being allowed to record stuff off the TV using the video recorder would be some kind of catastrophe, I can’t even remember what that logic was, but anyway that wasn’t allowed.

Being driven anywhere would just make us lazy and spoiled (again) so we waited on the main road for the hourly bus that often didn’t arrive.

Allowing us to go to the school we wanted to go to was simply unthinkable, and we should just go to the nearest one because it was most convenient for everyone, despite it being absolutely appalling. (This rule did not apply to my brother, funnily enough.)

I internalised and believed most of this, and most of my 20s were a massive struggle trying to live up to my own expectations of myself, without actually having been equipped to do so.

Bouncy castles.
Having pristine matching socks

They didn't seem to mind that we placed that paper with gunpowder that you put in kids' guns on the electric fire to make it go bang.

Not accepting sweets from strangers (risk of being abducted). Cleaning teeth thoroughly and not eating lollies or sticks of rock. Absolutely not allowed to scream unless in danger.

Watching 18-rated horror movies when I was 12 (had already seen some of the worst which she didn't know about). Earlier, we weren't allowed to watch Grange Hill in case we ended up with that accent or got ideas (we did live in Essex, so right part of the country). Tried to turn the volume down for the opening credits but mum would come in and switch it off.

Not paranoid because it's sensible, but both parents very hot on farm safety. They could have invented the SAFE acronym before it was a thing, and they didn't hold back. Agitating slurry in the slatted shed ? One breath and you will be unconscious and DIE in seconds. Slurry lagoon? If you climb in there you will DROWN. Imagine drowning. In slurry. You will sink down like quicksand and be gone. Get within about 40 feet of the PTO shaft of a tractor? Your arm could be RIPPED OFF. Etc etc. I have replicated the gory, dire and horrific warnings for my own children because they work.

Any mild, common, self limiting childhood illness.

I was at the doctor's all the time. I could tell sometimes they were annoyed, even as a child.

Now I never visit the doctors. I would have to be on deaths door to go there.

Oddly, me being friends with anyone who didn't got to the same nursery. Not just when I was nursery age, right through to my teens. If I name dropped someone who had gone to that nursery, even if they had then gone to different primary and i hadn't spoken to in 10 years, they were considered the 'right' type of friend, so no matter how outrageous out party plans were, it would be approved of. However if I wanted to do something with anyone who didn't go to that nursery (even if they moved to town after the age of 4), they were probably a wrong-un who would get me into trouble.

Rabies ,when i went abroad as a child my mum wouldnt let me near any cat or dog , as i grew up and went on foreign holidays without my parents it amazed me other people would happily stroke cats and dogs .
I was watching an episode of call the midwife recently featurung rabies and i think there was a publc information film about it in the early 70,s ,i was born in 1973 so that msy explain her irrational fear..

How old is your Dad?
Im 52 and very cautious on escalators because of 1970,s public information film.

The possibility of high fuel bills.Heating was always on low so the house never warmed up properly. The cardinal sin was leaving the immersion heater on longer than absolutely necessary.
My dad left a substantial inheritance so it was more of a moral princple than lack of money.

Microwaves.
And popular culture through tv.

My parents didnt see any danger at all in anything

We could have swam in quicksand/climbed electric pylons/played on train tracks/started a fire/jumped off a cliff and they wouldn't have batted an eyelid

My brother has very bad asthma it never entered their heads to stop him doing anything that could have triggered an attack

However,they where both terrified of the sea (not swimming baths,going swimming was fine)

We could not go for a paddle in case a wave swept us out,those rubber dingy boats that where sold everywhere (this was the 80's) would have us sail away to India (and then we'd drown) or we'd get stung by a jellyfish and die

We spent every single holiday sat on the beach for 12 hours a day (for the 7 days we where there) just looking at the sea without being allowed near it

Once in the week on holiday we would go out to sea on an organised boat trip and they'd both sit,clutching the side of their seats,white as sheets and not letting us move a muscle-just a line of us sitting there unable to move

Years later,they both had a fit when I took toddler dd for a paddle in the sea-I didnt hear the end of it for years

I was 17 when I first had a paddle myself and found it wasn't much to have missed out on

Those swings chair rides at fairs (chairs may break).
Lolly pops (might choke)
Seaside rock (break your teeth)
Motorbikes (dangerous)
Tattoos (common)
Belly button piercings (get infected)

Push pops.
My mum heard some story about a kid getting their tongue stuck in one and I wasn’t allowed one after that.
I was devastated as all my friends were allowed ti eat then and they were delicious!

Early eighties. Aged sixteen. I’d saved up my cash from my Saturday job and had booked a hair appointment in the nearest big city (normally went to the lady round the corner) for highlights and a cut.

Massive lecture over why I shouldn’t be doing this and how I mustn’t have a ‘male’ hairdresser / what if you get a slight cut and there’s blood, etc (Aids was just getting a lot of publicity at the time and there were many misconceptions around it).

Both my mum and my nan were paranoid about boys and me "getting myself pregnant". At 16 I had a really lovely boyfriend, very sweet and respectful and never once mentioned sex. My mum kept making "funny" little comments to him about keeping his hands to himself, keeping it in his pants etc. On his 18th birthday she loudly told him in public in front of everyone that he'd better stay a boy as far as her daughter was concerned and funnily enough I never saw or heard from him again after that. Ironically a few weeks later I ended up getting pushed into losing my virginity to someone not nearly as nice. I wish she'd been able to keep her big mouth shut. When she found at I was sleeping with a boyfriend at 19 years old she called me a dirty little slut, thanks mum!

My brothers were allowed to do what they wanted cos you know "boys will be boys", no use trying to stop them! She'd never say a word to their girlfriends, they were even allowed to stay over and she'd be sickeningly nice to them. She never fretted about her precious boys getting anyone pregnant!

For reasons I don't understand my mum was always warning me not to become 'the school bike'. Her words not mine.
I had a couple of boyfriends at school (1980s). But I was quite a long way from being promiscuous 😂

Also, I remember her classic advice when I was about 15/16. "I dont mind what you do as a job when you're older Additup, as long as it isn't a stripper or a prostitute" 🤨

I can only assume she was uncomfortable with my burgeoning teenage self and had a few hang ups of her own.

I've never shown and interest in stripping or prostitution.

Parents: not much. Typical 80s laissez-faire parenting. Did a lot of climbing very big trees, falling off horses, grubbing around in dirt picking up interesting worms etc - all fine. My mum's only thing was NO TAMPONS due to terror of toxic shock. Bought some at 14, didn't know there were two kinds, bought the applicator kind, couldn't quite figure out how that was meant to work and got a painful injury. Gave up on the idea, had lots of embarrassing school incidents bleeding through skirts and in beds in other people's houses etc and didn't try again til my twenties. I still hide them if she's around. I'm 48.

Grandma: no eating in the street, going out with damp hair will kill you even if it's 30 degrees out. Women don't go in pubs alone or drink pints. A drink within a foot of the edge of a table requires a reminder to be Very Careful at least twice a minute.

Tbf rabies is a terrible disease. It would certainly put me off stroking any passing stray animal abroad.

Sugar, and not eating everything on your plate. They were absolutely terrified we'd end up 'fussy eaters' and wouldn't buy anything vaguely sweet or processed. It wasn't just a preference, it was a real moral failing if you liked the look of something with, say, icing on. My mum will still pull faces of absolute disgust and make comments if someone buys or eats something ready made.

Education. Everything had to be educational. A huge amount of so-called 'holidays' had to involve educational trips plus grim amounts of follow-up checking we'd understood it all. Lots of homework at home, going over what we'd done at school. They try to do the same with all of their grandchildren - if they come up they'll always want to bring educational activities and sit down to drill the children in maths or whatever. When I was 18 and had just passed my A Levels (5 As, off to Cambridge, not really a disappointment) and they were completely dismissive about it. I remember being genuinely surprised when my boyfriend's mum asked hadn't anyone told me I'd done well or said congratulations. It was a real turning-point moment for me, because she wasn't terribly keen on me really and wouldn't have said something nice for the sake of it, but she was quite shocked. I always tell my DD how well she's doing and try not to put pressure on her, and it makes me so aware how damaging it is to push children like that.

OTOH they were absolutely blase about physical danger or anything like that, and the idea of eating disorders went straight over their heads.

My Mum was and still is extremely fixated on my iron intake.

Both of mine medical so -

bike helmets always
strange Issue with wearing scarves if walking on roads with Lorry going past fast
very very wary of paracetamol usage or overdose by paracetamol (lots of horror stories about that)
couldn’t play in houses or have sleepovers if parents smoked (fire risk)
No hot drinks around kids/babies
Knew which neighbours were medical incase in house on own and choking

But then free 80s upbringing with few other rules, no care about what people thought, curfew just when last friend came home, penknives, treehouses, playing out for all hours etc, chilled about drinking, open house for friends etc

My father was the exact opposite.
He wouldn't go in a swimming pool or allow me in one because he grew up in the era when they were a common place to catch polio (pre-vaccine for polio) - even though by the time I was born you could be vaccinated against it and swimming pools were a lot safer.
However he had no qualms about the sea - he'd swim about with me on his back and by the time I was about 6 I'd learnt to swim in the sea on my own. (Obviously it's a lot easier than learning in a pool because you are so much more bouyant.)

Meningitis, a boy in my brother’s class died and my Mum was paranoid and every time we felt poorly she would hold our neck and force us to look at the light.

I was one of the kids who was caught by a lace and dragged down the escalator in the 70s. Didn't know there was a public information film though, was it shown on tv?