when I was 8 years old

[irrationalme]

my mum worked and got home at 5.15 - 5.30ish. I came home to an empty house, no brothers or sisters.
I could knock on the neighbours door if I needed anything but I never did. One dark winter evening, I walked to where my mum worked to see her.
I cannot imagine leaving my DC who is 8 now in this position he's still so young.
this was the norm in our house as I grew up and I feel now its affected my whole life in the form of relationships where I always seem to allow others to take advantage, always try to keep them happy at the expense of myself and my needs.
Don't really know what I'm asking here, just feels like same shit different day

Were you brought up in the 1970s?
I was left in charge of my siblings from age 11 (siblings were 9 and 7) until 6 each evening.
I had to get them their tea etc.
It has had long term effects in my relationship with them now we are approaching our 40s.
It is also the main reason I am a sahm.

You sound like my DM Coffee.

I love my parents but, yes, inadequate parenting sums it up.

Yes this was the 1970s

When I was 8 (and younger!), I was frequently left in charge of my 4 younger siblings (including baby DB) as my mother had had to go back to work full-time to feed us and my father was an alcoholic who went out to the pub at every opportunity. My first caring responsibilities for siblings were from about age 5. My father deemed if "character-building". Like Badvoc, it has influenced my life choices a lot.

I would never do it to another child. The responsibility was frankly terrifying. I spent so much time in such fear for my siblings' safety, knowing that it would be my fault if anything went wrong.

It has actually coloured my mental health state now, as I have frequent horrible vivid images of all the things that could go wrong with or happen to DD3 and to a lesser extent now with her older siblings. Only last night in the long two hours before I finally went to sleep, she died in three separate and horrible ways.

I think it is hard, because standards were different back then, and we can't judge by today's standards.

My mother didn't work when I was 8, but amongst those friends who did, they were latchkey kids, that was the norm. I don't think it was neglect or abuse back then, because childminders and after school clubs were unheard of, I don't remember any of my friends using them. They just went home and let themselves in. And we played. If you worked, you asked a neighbour to keep an eye, and that was that. I remember my own mother doing it. When she got a day job (when I was about 10), she worked and I stayed at home (in the holidays alone). My nan was close by if there was any problems, but no one kept an eye on me, and I didn't want that - that was babyish, as I was used to having so much more freedom. It wasn't neglect, it was the standards back then. Just like parents used to go out of an evening, and leave us asleep in our beds. Now that's unheard of, back then - the norm.

My dad used to walk himself to school (over a mile) alone from the age of 5/6. I did it from 7/8. At my DDs school, they would frown on it now. Standards and rules change. When I thin back to the freedom I had compared to my own children, it is totally different. I would roam all day, coming back for my tea. I went miles, DD is only allowed to stay in our estate. Our mothers never knew where we were or what we were up to, again that was the norm. Today, that wouldn't be acceptable. Standards change, but I don't think we can necessarily look back to the 1970s with 2010 standards. And I have to say, whilst I wouldn't go quite as far as the freedom I had in the 1970s (playing out in the street at 3!), sometimes I think the 2010s has gone too far the other way, but that's another thread.

Sorry, didn't mean to introduce a paper bag in the middle of the road moment.

It's important to remember that standards were very different in the 1970s. In many ways we have all benefited from that extra independence and control over our lives compared to our children who unused and not allowed to do anything alone until much later. We were brought up before the introduction of modern values on reliance on others, team work, etc... If we wanted something, we had to make it happen. That was actually a good thing.

Also it's important to bear in mind that our parents were brought up in wartime and the postwar period and were even more neglected than us in many cases. My father (b 1939) grew up in Wimbledon but used to routinely walk up to the Thames to see the boats go by, trawl through bomb sites looking for shrapnel and spent every day out and about by himself. My lovely friend and neighbour (b 1946) could get herself from her village in Norfolk to her father's place of work in Norwich by bus, by herself, at age 4.

cross post with lechers!

Judging todays actions by yesterdays standards is foolish.

If you were to go back another generation, to grandparents, you'd find they were playing in and out of bombed out buildings and rubble, ah I'm about ot cross post with duchesse and lechers

I do think we (society) tend to over bubble wrap children today though.

I walked home from school and let myself in from the age of 7. Mum wasnt back til 6 ish and my old brother was out and about. This was in the '70's ( true latch key kid) and I often think about the huge amount of childcare costs I would save if I could the same!! ( I wouldnt !!)

We were fine though and it made me independent and self reliant ( okay maybe a bit too self reliant!!)

It is just how times were though.

Duchesse...yes. I totally get that.
My parents decision - which of course I had no say in whatsoever - has affected me in ways I probably don't even realise and has coloured my own parenting and not always in a good way.
I am the eldest of 3 of an Irish catholic family.
I will leave you to guess what my main motivators in life have always been.
But guilt and responsibility are at the top :(

As one other person has said, it's the context that counts.

This situation in the context of an overall stable, loving and nurturing family doesn't seem in itself damaging. However these same actions in a relationship which is unstable and damaging, can obviously lead to a very different outcome.

There is nothing wrong with you feeling like this, and im a bit concerned about the message you might take away from this thread.

I do wonder if it's worth digging around a bit more to think about what else might have been going on at the time in your life and family relationships.

Being a latchkey kid wasnt the problem, that was normal, what made it bad was how you were treated the rest of the time.

I think you need to look at why it affected you and it's still affects you now.

Was it the being alone in the house? Were you expected to do chores?
Were you not heard when people were in the house? Did you ever express your feelings but they were dismissed?
Not sure what you expected your parents to do differently. Arrange someone to take care of you, or your mother to stop working?
What was your father doing? Presumably, if he was at home, he also worked. Did you feel abandoned by him too, or just your mother?

Just trying to find the correlation between you being alone at home (and for how long) and your current feelings.

In any case, try not to dwell too much on why, but on what you can do to address your emotions now.

it sounds like the thing you got praised for was being independent and not having needs therefore you've ended up learning that that approval is dependent on not needing anything. OR maybe when you expressed needs it was seen as a bad thing and so you've learnt it that way. maybe a combo of both.

for me the latch key bit didn't bother but in all likelihood that's probably because it was actually better for me to be home alone than around my mother. so as others say i think it is the wider context that influences ones experience rather than just the isolated issue of spending an hour or so at home alone after school.

it certainly wasn't considered neglect back then and single mothers had little choice under thatcher - nor will they again soon if things continue down the path being forged politically now.

She had to work and was single, fgs. What was she supposed to do, put you in care?

I was a latch-key kid, and I have nothing but admiration for my mum working to keep a roof over our heads.

OP, you need to stop feeling so sorry for yourself.

DD had to come home alone for an hour or so aged 8. She, at nearly 13, still has to be at home for a few hours before I'm back from work. That's the reality of me being a lone, working parent. Is she neglected? No. Will it do her lasting damage? I doubt it. Perhaps having no money and no roof over her head might be infinitely more problematic for her well-being if I got rid of the job and stayed at home .

Not saying you didn't have a crap childhood for whatever reasons, but being at home alone briefly is hardly the crime of the century.

Hi OP. You don't have to stop feeling sorry for yourself at all. You feel the way you do and there is a reason for that and it is inevitably rooted in your childhood experiences. You are now trying to get to the heart of it and that may take time. I think it's likely that being left at home is one part of a bigger picture and you don't say what other aspects of your relationship with you mother were like.

The book "They Fuck You Up: How to Survive Family Life" by Oliver James is a good intro to how the neuroses we experience in adult life are rooted in our upbringing. I think you might find it enlightening.