Do you resent your parents for not educating you privately?

[Ghoulwithadragontattoo]

Obviously I mean if they could afford to but decided against it?

No-I would call it sensible.

I spent some time (language trip) at possibly one of the nicest private schools in the country, Quaker school, completely nurturing place, with excellent teaching too. There were girls there who resented it. They weren't necessarily girls who were doing badly academically or were being bullied or in any other way unsupported. They were girls who felt their parents weren't listening to them. I suspect they might have felt equally discontented anywhere until that basic problem had been sorted.

As long as your children feel listened to, it is likely that their resentment will be within the normal bounds of "of course everything is your fault because you are my mother". (my dd says this to me frequently because I won't let her audition for theatrical productions- she knows perfectly well she is not ready and her health is not currently good enough)

No. I would only resent my parents if I had been utterly miserable at school (whether it was state or private), if I had made this clear to them, and they had ignored this and not given serious consideration to alternatives.

I was, in fact, utterly miserable in one state school when I was eight - so miserable that that year is almost entirely erased from my memory - and there were no local alternatives. My parents both changed jobs and moved the family a hundred miles so I could be in a better school. I have always been grateful to them for that. What's more, they didn't want me to feel guilty that I was the cause of the family move, or under pressure to love the new school, so they never mentioned the reason for the family move until I was grown up. That's love.

Thanks everyone.

Riversidemum thanks for that. I think what you say is sound. I need to stop second guessing myself and just carry on doing what I want confident in my decision. As you say the decision needs to be taken in the round.

In my view children only have one childhood and if school fees are going to leave you so stretched that you can't have any fun then what is the point? Also they will be mixing with those who do have holidays and all the extras that the school runs.
It must then put a huge burden on the DC -I am glad that my parents didn't send me because, even if they didn't say it, I would feel they struggled and sacrificed to send me so I have to deliver the results in order to justify the expense.

I feel slightly resentful that my parents sent me to faith schools rather than the best performing (and closer) state schools. I don't practice that faith anymore and would have got better results had they sent me to the near state schools. I have caught up since but it was a slog. Private was not an option financially.

My children do go private because the state schools near where we live are not good.

I went to a private school as did my brothers and sisters. I think my parents resented paying huge amounts of money to get the same results as their friends children who went to state schools.

Resenting your parents for not sending you to a private school on the sole basis that they could have afforded to is as pathetic and shallow as resenting them for not buying you designer clothes just because they could have afforded to. Yes, of course, if I'd gone to a colossally expensive public school I would have had a lot more offered to me on a plate (hey, I might have become a world fencing champion or Olympic rower), but I would not have been offered anything that wasn't available to me outside of school time if I had the will and family support to do it. It's not as if well educated, well off families aren't aware of the opportunities out there and it's not as if they aren't capable of taking advantage of them.

If I'd been sent to a school where I was utterly miserable, bullied and bored, I might well resent them for having the means to do something about it but choosing not to, but what sort of a person would I be for resenting them for sending me to a school where I was happy and did well, and for encouraging me and supporting me in my hobbies and interests? It's not as if the money they saved by not educating us privately was spent on making their lives cushy at their children's expense. Yes, parents who send their children to private school through fear of the state sector will think you are taking a gamble, but that's their fear talking, not common sense.

I don't resent my parents for not sending me - but I regret that they didn't. My parents chose to move house to a small-holding, which meant they were very strapped for cash. They sent my brother to private school, but not me because I was a girl & it mattered less. I got sent to one of the local state comps, which was very mediocre & I did reasonably well, but I know that with some good teaching & encouragement, I could have really excelled. I feel sad for that.
I on the other hand, am selling my house to send my DCs to private school!

No, I am glad that I had the secondary education I did. As it was it was a bit of a culture shock for me to go from a 95% white fairly middle class comprehensive in a wealthy city, to a college at the University of London. I felt a bit naieve, inexperienced and molly-coddled compared to a lot of the people I met there, and I don't want my children going out into the world at 18 having spent all of their formative years surrounded by children from the wealthiest 7 - 10% of families in the country.

I bludgeoned my parents to death and buried them under the patio during the first week at my state grammar.

Should my crime ever come to light, I'd fully expect the jury to understand how I was provoked; the polyester blazer was the straw that broke the camel's back.

The only thing that I would resent my parents for would be if they had decided to Home Educate, especially if they did it from the start.

I would be fine if they asked me when I was old enough to have experienced it, and know the choice, but if they did it because they were projecting their own experiences on to me, or it was part of their philosophy of bringing up DCs then I would find it unforgiveable.

DH rather resents being sent to a mediocre private school when he lived in an area with loads of good grammars which would have suited him better. He can't figure out why they did it. The upside was that the 6th form teaching was so crap he had to find the syllabus and teach himself and his mates, so he found university a doddle compared to us cossetted state school types - he was stunned by the quality of my A level physics notes

I'm glad mine didn't because it means that I am comfortable sending my DC's to state school when I know friends who are struggling financially to send their DC's to private schools because they have no personal experience of state and are nervous of making the leap.

Hugely unfair to project your experiences onto your DC-they are not you.

Surely the key here is not private vv state but is your child happy at the school? It is possible to be unhappy at either type and I would resent it if I'd had problems and my parents had not moved me or tried to remedy them. I have seen parents leave an unhappy child at a school because it is "the best", but they are considering their own social status and not their child's happiness.

A few months ago, out of the blue my dad told me he had always regretted not being able to send me private, he felt I'd have had more chances if I had. I, on the other hand don't really miss what I didn't have but DH hated his local crappy state school and has really searched out the school that he thinks DD would be happiest at, and so far, she is very happy indeed.

I think that you need to do your best to suit your DC to the school, depending on your income and where you live. If you are put first you can't be resentful. I think that I would have done better at a different school but it was never in the equation. I think that you are only resentful if you are being made to fit into a parent's separate agenda.

My parents-in-law still resent my DH for the money they spent on sending him to private school ... especially for his failure to a) be fawningly and continually grateful for the experience, b) be massively successful and c) send his own children to private school to validate his parents' choice for him....

I think if parents do pay up for private education they should realise that it was their choice and that the DC may still fail and they do not 'owe' them.