What was your standard of living growing up?

[TazzyDrunk]

I would say it was fairly good , not overly impressive but no real financial problems that me and my brother noticed

Poor. Council housing, benefits, provident loans, hiding from the man who came to collect the payments. 2 holidays ever, school paid for all trips and uniforms paid for by the government. Always had food. Rarely had friends round. Chaotic life due to the my dad's addiction.

My mum struggled hugely, had some breakdowns (no one at the time knew that's what it was, not even her) but she always told me that she would kill me if i ended up like her, that she was only happy to go through it if it meant i would learn from her mistakes, and get out of that life. Something stuck, and i did get out of it. I'm now very comfortably off and make sure my mum wants for nothing.

I was born in the late 80’s, Dad was a fisherman and mum was a washer (like a laundromat, but by hand). She married down castes as she had a baby out of wedlock, so she received no financial help from her family. We lived in a small bungalow with another family, which wasn’t an unusual set up where we lived.

Dad moved to the UK when I was 7 and worked as a taxi driver and in a factory, we all moved over about a year later. Mum got a job in a shop and we shared a flat with a family that Dad had got to know quite well.

There was never spare money for anything, we moved into our own place when I was maybe ten I think.

We never ate out, I don’t think our clothes were ever new until we hit secondary school, we had to keep our school uniform on in the week as we didn’t have enough non-school clothes. We used to get a couple of very small presents for our birthdays.

Mum was very abusive, most of the family wages were controlled by her, the money was there to afford more, but she didn’t want to spend it on us. She also used to buy loads and loads of scratch cards every week and steal quite a few from where she worked.

Pretty good. Large 4 bed house, Dad had a fairly senior position with lots of overseas travel, Kim was a SAHM until we were both at secondary school then worked part time. 2 cars, annual Eurocamp type holiday in France.
The overseas travel lead to the death of their marriage though.

Oh and I was born mid 80’s.

Mum not Kim!

We certainly didn't live in poverty but we also weren't comfortable - I think my parents just about managed for the majority of my childhood in the 80s and early 90's. My Parents owned their house, dad worked and my mum was at university training for a new career, so I think that had an impact on our standard of living. We had enough food but it was fairly bland and repetitive. Our grandparents helped my parents out a lot, they paid for holidays for us and took me and my brother away for weekends which I think was a big help for them. We never felt we lacked anything though, it was a happy household with supportive family and if there ever were any serious money problems then our parents never let on to us.

Born late 70s in the south east. Definitely pretty hard up as young kids - DF had periods of unemployment and we moved around a few times for my DM's work. Basic 3 bed terrace houses in working areas. We could always afford to eat and pay the heating (at least from my perspective as a young child), but couldn't afford luxuries - rare holidays were UK camping, sometimes a little self-catering cottage. I never had the cool stuff my friends had, but I didn't mind beyond the initial disappointment. I remember getting a Sindy doll for my 7th birthday that was SO exciting. This changed as we grew up as my DM became more successful at work, but it only really had an impact on my life from late teens/early 20s. Parents are quite well off now.

My parents both came from good families but had made relatively poor life choices. Second marriage for both. DF liked to gamble, drink and race Ferraris. But he was fun to be around, planning weekends away and holidays. There were always lots of parties.

DF had been an officer in the Navy but worked as a civil engineer for most of my childhood. DM was a SAHM and never worked. It was the 70s. She used to take me shopping in small boutique children's clothes shops spending a small fortune.

We had holidays, ate out frequently, always had cars, house was always heated, and I never had to ask for anything. However they were either, and I've never quite decided which, lazy or just a bit bohemian. My mother encouraged me to read, debate politics and question things but was very anti mainstream education and as a result I very rarely attended school. Instead I spent a lot of time travelling, late nights around tables with adults, lots of cultural days out. My parents for some reason didn't see me as or treat me as a child that required parenting.

It was only later I realised they had no plans, no pensions, few savings and when my DF retired due to cancer they really struggled. This impacted me when i had to give up plans to go to university.

I've never had money, but i have encouraged education. My children don't go without the basics but its been a struggle at times. I will eat cardboard if I have to in order to support DS going to university.

Financially, really good. Both parents in full time work when many families had no income due to the big recession at that time.

Comfortable and happy, my DF had a middle management job, DM was a SAHM, had a nice, big detached house. Parents were involved and supportive. Eurocamp type holiday once a year, plus skiing as we got older (although I chose not to go)... interestingly my DM talks about those years and says they were quite hard up and she used to go out cleaning, but it never impacted on our lives. We didn’t have loads of luxuries (TV was a major purchase when I was about 8 ) but we never went hungry and always had enough clothes, shoes etc. They were (still are at 86 & 89 ) great parents.

Eating out was a rare treat - Berni Inn for birthdays; fast food or going out just for a coffee was unheard of. Occasionally you might have coffee or tea in a proper old fashioned department store restaurant if we were shopping for school uniform or something like that.

My DPs are the last generation to benefit from really good pensions (my DF has almost been retired and drawing a good pension for longer than his working life ) and it is nice to see that they can really enjoy their retirement years now - they are generous and give huge amounts to charity before anyone comes on to complain about the baby boomer generation .....

Comfortably off. But no school ski trips or dancing lessons (how I yearned for those!). And it wasn't for lack of money. Dad had a successful business. It was because my working class mother couldn't cope with the idea of mixing with middle class mums.

We were poor but didn’t know it. We lived in a council flat and everyone else was the same. Trying to pick themselves up after the war. One outfit for best, one for school. One pair of shoes. Just about enough to eat. Mum wasn’t a good cook but knew how to make things stretch. She never got into debt and saved from her housekeeping every week to pay the bills. Very few treats or presents but a lot of love and our parents viewed education, which they had been denied, as the key to everything. When my older sister started work at 16 things got easier. I have no idea how my parents afforded my school uniform for grammar school, I never went on any school journeys. Even in the sixth form I couldn’t afford to lose my Saturday pay by taking a day off.
My grandchildren have an extremely comfortable life and I’m pleased their parents can afford to buy them nice clothes, phones and holidays but I do worry that it all comes too easily and they have no real sense of the value of things or what it is like to have to have to work and save.

I had a lovely childhood , grew up in a big house with lots of space and animals and a pool .. Overall I had a fantastic childhood .. I know I'm lucky .

We weren't rich or really poor but I never had designer brands or holidays abroad. My parents owned the small terrace house but think my grandad gave them the deposit.

Quite poor, though better off than many others.
My parents were both from traditional working class backgrounds but upwardly mobile to lower middle class. The poverty was a result of having 5 children at a time when food and clothing were proportionally more expensive. Nevertheless, my mum worked very hard to ensure we had enough to eat and were clean. We had very few clothes and very little in the way of christmas presents and toys and we used to be cold in the winter, but we got by. It stood me in good stead because I learnt how to cook cheap but nutritious food and how to budget from my mum.

No food, no electric, no running water, no floor for parts of it, a truck or van for other parts. My mother was a heroin addicted new age traveller. I was literally starving at points - we were given sacks of dead squirrels by a farmer once to eat.

Then we moved to my grandparents home when I was 7 and it was safe and clean and warm. A middle class idyll. So a bit of both extremes really.

Utter grinding, soul destroying, poverty. One pair of shoes with homemade cardboard insoles to cover the holes worn through. One coat that the sleeves moved up the arms year on year.

I look at my shoe rack now (a shoe rack!!) and could cry sometimes - I own over half a dozen pairs of shoes - none have holes in.

Absolutely lovely, not a lot of spare cash, never ate out but it didn’t feel like anything but the norm as no one else we knew did either.

Dad was an engineer and mum a piano teacher who was always at home for us when we came home from school.

Lots of space, they bought a dilapidated farmhouse and Dad did it up. We had a two acre vegetable garden and Dad grew everything we ate. Mum was a fantastic cook, baked bread every day.

We lived somewhere incredibly beautiful. We used to walk two miles to a particular pub in the next village and have a drink and a packet of crisps on summer evenings because it was next to the village playground.

Holidays were in our touring caravan, we were away for six weeks a year. Dad had to drop us off and go back to work for a couple of weeks.

We all had Saturday jobs at 14/15. Mine was in Hillards on the checkout.

I had a lovely childhood.

I don't know if children question their upbringing. I know I didn't, things were just as they had always been.

Despite having well educated parents, in the 1960's/ 70's my father had a poorly paid position. My mother did night shifts once she learnt to drive.

We lived in our own 4 bed detached house in a fairly nice area. I think my parents sunk every penny into paying for it.

They didn't drink or smoke or have hobbies.

I was never hungry, and there was always one room kept warm in our house. But, I didn't have bought toys, and there was never any choice of food or food to spare. My mother made me a rag doll to play with.

I remember the house having precious little furniture. We had a kitchen table and two chairs, my dad who was good at woodwork, made each child a stool as they grew ( I still have mine some 50 years later). We had a sofa and upturned tea chests as side tables and that was it for the downstairs. We had a bed each and all shared a wardrobe, that was it for upstairs.

My mother was clever with her sewing machine and we would always rummage through the remnant bin in the fabric shops if I needed clothes. Clothes were slightly too big the first year, fitted the second year and were let out and hems down the third year. Then passed on to the next sibling.
Occasionally I would get hand me downs from an older cousin. My mother would unravel old jumpers and re-knit them, knitted hats, gloves and scarfs. She'd darned socks and repurpose jumble sale items. We were always dressed warmly, If not fashionably.

Mum grew all her own fruit and vegetables and meat was a treat for Sunday lunch. Occasionally we had tinned meat. We foraged for seasonal nuts, fruit and vegetables too, something I still do today. My parents were very resourceful.

The boiler was switched on for our one bath on a Sunday night that the whole family shared. I was the eldest of three. We used washing up liquid for shampoo and never had conditioner, I always had horribly tangled hair.

We had a mobile library van that came once a month and I enjoyed reading.

My father made a radio out of rescued parts probably from the tip and old wood. It was fashioned to sit on, and I can still remember listening to children's stories sat on top of it.

As a result I can sew well, forage well, cook well and make a house run on pennies. Habits don't die and even to this day I can't fill my bath more than 6 inches, but I'll happily use my husbands bath after him.

Things got easier as I became a teenager. It was the early 1980's and my father was promoted. We had a telephone installed, bought our first television and we started having proper family holidays, and toys! I remember asking for a tiny tears doll that was not age appropriate at all when I got her. I'd longed for her for so long I didn't care.

I would say a poor but resourceful childhood. It makes you more resilient. I look at the things my children enjoy freely today and think wow.

Not rich.
In early childhood,
-No inside lavatory.
-No bathroom.

• Living on borrowed money
• Running out of 50ps for gas meter frequently
• Overcrowding and shared beds
• Shared clothes
• Grimey at best. A smoke filled house and infrequent washing of clothes. A weekly bath in a tin tub at most. Swimming instead in summer.
• Foraging and hunger. My mother often went without to feed us. We picked from fields, from overhanging trees, from the beach.
• Some silly purchases as my mother had an inability to manage money properly. Cyclical poverty- buying coal in carrier bags as we’d never afford a delivery.

I was fortunate to be taken under the very kind wing of a Reverend Mother when I was accepted as a scholar at a private convent school that wasn’t academically strong but which taught me how to widen my aspirations and fit into a different world.

I look back on my childhood with fond memories.
But things were tight and I didnt have a lot of clothes especially early teens. We had toys not always what we wanted if it was too expensive but we never minded not getting things at Christmas etc. We had a small home that was owned by my parents and always warm in the winter and enough food to eat. With kind and generous extended family that helped a lot.

Reading this thread has made me reflect on all that I took for granted as a child financially. My dad was a business owner and my mum was a SAHM until she returned to work part time when I was nearing the end of primary school. We owned a 3 bedroom semi detached house in a fairly middle class area of London. The house would be worth around £800k now I imagine. We were never cold or hungry and holidayed abroad every year (sometimes more than once). Lots of presents at Christmas and on birthdays. I remember we had a cleaner even when my mum wasn't working. My Dad was quite extravagant and reckless with money at times, I imagine he sometimes spent beyond his means. Things changed when my parents divorced when I was a teenager and my dad had to provide for his new family.

Wealthy without being rich.

I had,a very mixed childhood. My dad drank, and never had any money, we often had the electricity cut off. But family members were better off, so we were able to stay in their country cottage for weekends, or a flat abroad for holidays ( conditions attached, obviously). I worked from a very young age, earning money from 11, and benefited from a free university education and post - grad qualiifications. My mum always worked, but back in those days women's salaries were very low, and we really struggled until she obtained a professional qualification when I was in my teens. Even a trip to the Wimpy was an unaffordable treat, we only went if another family member took us. We went to museums, but never for a coffee or lunch out, always took sandwiches. I do remember not Even asking if I could go on the school trip skiing, because I knew it was completely out of the question. I was at a grammar school in an affluent area, but don't remember any bullying about labels etc, although I didn't have access to the resources that most of my classmates did. I was excellent at finding bargains in jumble sales and quite nifty with a needle, so managed to present reasonably well. We were very good at making do and reusing/ recycling, didn't really see it as a hardship. I think that was down to my very resourceful mother!