Did anyone else's abusive parents dress them like a boy?

[BlueSpotty]

My parents, mainly my dad, were emotionally, verbally and emotionally abusive with me. My mum was abusive to a certain extent, presumably to please my dad, but was also a huge enabler. I am now NC with them both.

My dad has always seemed to really hate women and women who dress in a feminine manner. I have one sister and until we were both of high school age he made us both have hair cut short like boys, and wear mainly boyish clothing. We were both quite girly and so this was horrible. He claimed to hate long hair and said that women with long hair were sluts. My mum then used to get annoyed with me for not being femininely dresses!

Once I was at high school I was allowed to grow my hair and dress more femininely (although both parents used to hate me spending any time on self care and used to go nuts if I did) but I was repeatedly called a slag and slut by my father.

I was just wondering if anyone else had a similar experience? I have two girls, who are late teens, and I can't imagine forcing them to dress as boys when they were little and getting annoyed with them if they wash their hair or put on make up.

I am a lot more 'girly' now but even now at 43 I have a very minimal self care routine as it makes me feel guilty.

I think it is sad that some PP are chattering on about how children were dressed differently in the ‘70’s without acknowledging the sustained extreme sexualised verbal abuse inflicted on the OP as a v young child - it looks like her experience is being minimised.

@Gutterton many of us identify with the boys' clothes but the sexualized verbal abuse is (hopefully) much rarer, which is presumably why most other pps haven't mentioned it. I don't remember my parents using any language cruder than "bloody hell" and that was usually not aimed at anyone in particular. I hope we haven't minimized the abuse the OP suffered, which must certainly have been very hurtful.

Yes, my mother did. She dressed me in a very feminine way when I was a small girl - lots of frilly dresses, pink even though I didn't really like it - but when I got a bit older it was all boys' clothes. I think that she had some sort of issue with me going through puberty.

It was awful because I was growing hips and breasts and wearing clothes that weren't cut for them. At the time I didn't realise this and thought that my body was lumpy, fat and ugly because of the way the boys' clothes hung on it.

(She lost custody when I was 13, for unrelated reasons, and after that I could dress how I wanted).

Gutterton the way the first few posts went was quite disturbing though, with people suggesting that the only way not to be abusive is to dress children in accordance with extreme gender stereotypes.

I acknowledged the verbal abuse whilst pointing out that in the 70s clothes and toys ironically weren't anything like as gendered as they are today. It's really quite worrying that today people feel girls have to wear pink sparkly stuff and boys blue stuff with pictures of diggers (and indeed that if a child is dressed in blue trousers it means that they are dressed "as" a boy, as if "boy" and "girl" are costumes).

The sexualised misogynistic language the OP's parents used was abusive but (as has been explained) many, many children in the 70s wore neutral clothing and had short hair.

The reasons have already been discussed - people didn't generally understand that it's broadly a good thing to give children choices. People generally thought that parents had every right to make any and all choices for their children, including clothing and hairstyle choices especially for pre teens. That was culturally normal in the 1970s.

I think a lot of us posted because conflation of verbal abuse with not dressing children according to strict gender stereotypes is pretty disturbing.

However in the 1970s most of us dressed like boys

That's not true at all. I was born in 72 and wore a dress every single day. I used to wish I could have jeans. In the summer holidays I got shorts but always girlish ones....it wasn't until I got to ten that I was allowed a pair of cords and a pair of jeans.

Looking at photos I was dressed beautifully for sure...none of my friends dressed like boys....we all wore little dresses from Marks or from the little drapers shop on our high street...."Aunty Mary" down the road made our party dresses which were always floral and always long.

OP your father was clearly abusive with the name calling and shaming. No doubt about that. With your mother wanting you to be girly, you and your sister were stuck right in the middle. It was a no win situation. Dress one way and get the wrath of the other parent. Yes, they were both shit about it.

You father might have had some warped idea that he was afraid he'd be sexually attracted to you and your sister if you expressed your feminine side. In his warped mind, maybe it made him feel better if you 2 looked more like boys and that boys wouldn't be attracted to you sexually.

Regardless of his motives, I hope you seek counseling to work through what was done to you in your youth and be able to recognize your value as a woman and to feel ok expressing yourself if you want to.

This happened to my Mum. She had two brothers so her alcoholic Mother used to take her to the barbers with them and get them all the same haircut. She’d also be made to wear her older brother’s hand me downs. My Grandad worked 24/7 but Grandma would spend most of the money on booze. She’d give my Uncle’s bus fare to get to school and back (it was a 5 mile round trip) but didn’t give my Mother any so she’d have to walk. My mum also went to school with carrier bags on her feet to stop them getting wet because her shoes had big holes in the soles. Gran would laugh at her when she was dressed up as a teenager too. Awful, callous abuse. We don’t speak to my Gran and haven’t since I was very young.

This is interesting to read. My dad is a misogynist and always complimented me when I dressed in tracksuits and jeans as a child. He couldn't deal with me looking like a girl.
It made me feel very uncomfortable.