Were these aspects of my childhood 'normal'?

[dootdoot]

I'll start by saying that I have an excellent relationship with my parents now. I love them very much, we're very close and I don't hold any of these things from my childhood against them but there's certain aspects of it that, as I get older, I don't think are normal. Also, my parents weren't flush with cash when I was a child but we had a 4 bedroom detached home and went on at least one foreign holiday a year, usually a U.K. based holiday as well.

Firstly, hygiene. My mum constantly told me off for using too much shampoo/conditioner. I remember this from early primary school and if she felt I'd used too much too quickly she wouldn't buy more until she next felt like it. I also wasn't allowed face wash once I started getting bad skin because it was too expensive. I was never taught to wash my face at night, never chased up about teeth brushing etc.

When I first started to wear bras my mum only bought me one because she felt that was all I needed and bras were expensive. I wore that bra 7 days a week, to school, to PE, to sports (no sports bras either) and it rarely got washed because I had to wear it.

I was expected to make my own packed lunch from about 8 onwards. I wasn't allowed to get school dinners because they were too expensive. If I didn't make it I didn't eat lunch which happened often.

I don't know how normal these things are or if I'm building them up in my head because i see other parents on here discuss the way they treat their children and it's very different? There are other examples of similar things but I don't want to overload this post. Basically I feel my mum was sometimes really tight about basic things that I don't feel should've been places to scrimp

Yes you definitely suffered child hood Neglect of your basic needs with the school Lunches thing !
(going to school without packed lunch sometimes.!

As your mother should have checked that had right nutritional food products put in there,

Hoever
i do not see anything wrong with you doing your school packed Lunches !
Just the lack of supervision by your mother or Dad or a much older sibling to check it !
(your mother might have assumed you were having free school meals on those days
you did not take in packed Lunch ?

Also think the household chores allocated to you and siblings was excessive too much Aswell !

It sounds like your parents were Lazy too.!

I am all for children helping out with a few household chores, but only light household chores !
not doing everything/or most of the chores !

that's wrong !

I think they obviously got their balance of family life (some what wrong out of Kilter) in certain aspects !

I can relate, certainly. I grew up in pretty straitened circumstances (I have five siblings, dad worked mum didn't, they overstretched to buy a big enough house in the 80s and were then hit by recession/rising interest and mortgage rates) and a lot of this sounds familiar. Especially the shampoo stuff and making my own packed lunch. I was allowed one school dinner a term as a treat!

The packed lunch thing is not the issue in itself, if I was capable of doing it properly but the fact that I often went to school without lunch suggests to me that I wasn't capable and I personally wouldn't want a child going without meals to teach them a lesson about responsibility.

@LemonRoses

As for jobs, if we wanted our bed changing we stripped it ourselves, did the laundry and made it again. It didn't happen very often. We survived. We learned to cook at a young age and could do a roast meal from about aged nine. We were expected to have the place clean and tidy when she came back from work. That involved going to the garden centre and buying coal to lay the fire, lighting the fridge if it went out (it was gas), and doing the washing. You did not have it hard and your mother does not sound unkind.

I think your upbringing is the unusual one here though

What does surprise me is what you’ve said about packed lunches, as someone in your early twenties. My DDs have been on packed lunches a couple of times I’ve had calls telling me that they were hungry and hadn’t had enough. Whereas what usually happened was that they didn’t eat much of the lunches we’d given them!

So I’m surprised the school didn’t question it when you went into school with a packed lunch? Your mum expecting you to prepare your packed lunch at 8 doesn’t surprise me. Her not checking that you had enough does.

Not checking that you were taking care of your teeth is the thing that also stands out.

Your description wouldn’t have surprised me if you were around my age (51), but it does for someone who would have been in primary school 15-20 years ago.

I also think the basics such as Bras are essential not a Luxury item

That was Neglect in my view as well !

And Only a few items of clothes to wear too.
Clothes need to changed regularly
otherwise basic hygiene issues arise !

I think that was also another example of Neglect there too

I see where you are Coming !

I know you had good family hols to look on !
But still !

"You sound incredibly unforgiving and judgmental."

Incredibly unforgiving? Despite the fact op has said several times how much she loves her mum?

I think you're looking to take a contrary opinion.

The shampoo & face wash stuff is tight and mean. Doesn't sound like personal hygiene was top of the list for them with consideration to their child.

Making ur own Packard lunch at 8 or you wouldn't have anything is neglect.

I think the making your own packed lunches from 8 is particularly mean but maybe they thought it was just instilling a sense of self-reliance/responsibility. A bit Misguided though IMO and possibly just a bit of laziness from your parents.

As for some of the other stuff - I’ve just been sorting ds’s laundry and noticed most of his socks, undies have holes in! He’s not mentioned it and I’ve only just noticed - I think boys especially don’t bother much about stuff like this. Il obvs order him some new things now I’ve noticed but my point is that these things can just go under the radar sometimes if you’re busy with other things, it’s not necessarily neglectful!

Your post has made me think though that I should reiterate to my dc’s to always mention to me if they ever need any new personal items/toiletries - I’m not a mind reader!
(Imagining now my own dc’s complaining in the future about having holey undies when they were kids even though we lived in a big house and were financially well-off!)

I had many experiences like this as a child and until my 20’a (35 now) I would have told people that I had a great childhood. Five kids, three bed semi, dad earnt just enough for us to have the latest consoles but not clothes or shoes. Mum was depressed and angry I just thought it was normal for mums to forget to get you from school or get out of bed to feed us sometimes 😅

It took being out in the wider world for me to realise how much emotional, physical and environmental neglect I had been subjected to.

I’d never been shown how to do a single chore and mum and dad definitely didn’t do them lol

I think it sounds like you might be tapping the top of an iceberg and wondering how deep it goes. Hopefully not too far! X 💐

Am I the only one reading this and wondering where on earth people are managing to there was neglect in play?

Sounds like trying to teach a bit of responsibility and consideration to finances to me (I would have probably had two bras though. A black one and a white one)

So I’m surprised the school didn’t question it when you went into school with a packed lunch?

That should have said without a packed lunch! Apologies.

Sorry, just seen the other stuff you mentioned, it does sound like your parents were pretty lazy!

I was a child in the 80s and had a similar experience, but it was 'teaching us the value of money'. Attitudes towards children seemed different back then (or that's what I tell myself to try to live with the past!).

Well yes, bras to me are items of clothing that need to be provided like any other.

I don't think my kids ever used conditioner though & face wash might also not have been a priority even if I could afford it tbh.

But it's more the overall picture than the details, isn't it?

All families are different and have their own idiosyncrasies. As children, we deem whatever happens in own families to be "normal" so it can come as quite a shock when we discover that there are other ways of living.

This is interesting and my upbringing sounds similar. My parents have always been well off but my mother in particular has always acted like they are a bill away from extreme poverty!

I was never taught that teeth needed brushing everyday. We only went to the dentist a handful of times.

I was never taught that you needed to wipe after a wee, or indeed that after a poo you need to wipe properly, it was all about saving toilet paper.

I had no idea that it was normal to wash your face and basic hygiene like showering was discouraged. This wasn't good as I was a very active child/teenager and played sport most days.

I had severe dandruff but I wasn't allowed to try anti dandruff shampoos.

When my period started it was very heavy and the pads my mother bought for herself were totally inadequate for me. I remember her getting so angry at me and made me feel ashamed for getting through so many. She didn't seem to care the pain I was in from these heavy periods at the age of 12.

I really needed a bra from age 11 but wasn't allowed one as they were too grown up.

I'm not sure what was going on with my parents. This all seems so cruel and neglectful looking back on it, it was almost as though having kids was an inconvenience and that we'd just pick stuff up as we went along.
The biggest problem I've had is that I'm autistic (had a late diagnosis last year at 29years old) and I don't tend to 'pick things up' I need to be taught.

@LemonRoses

As for jobs, if we wanted our bed changing we stripped it ourselves, did the laundry and made it again. It didn't happen very often. We survived. We learned to cook at a young age and could do a roast meal from about aged nine. We were expected to have the place clean and tidy when she came back from work. That involved going to the garden centre and buying coal to lay the fire, lighting the fridge if it went out (it was gas), and doing the washing. You did not have it hard and your mother does not sound unkind.

Was this in the 2000s though? It sounds very unusual to me.

Also in your previous post you’ve said the OP was quite well off and that conditioner is a luxury item. You know you can buy it for £1?

@dootdoot

Had a shit childhood in care in children's homes in the midlands uk

I was abandoned by my birth mother and birth father !

Thankfully I was adopted when I was 10yrs by a welsh good family !
(transracially adoption).

But sadly my mother who adopted me sadly died young from breast cancer when she was in her early fourties and I was 15 yrs.

I went off the rails then and became a single parent at 18 yrs age.

I think cause I had a shit early childhood experience in children's homes my adoptive parents over compensated by treating me like a princess !
which as a child I loved but looking back it would have been much better for my Cofindence.

When I was kicked out of my adoptive family home by my adoptive Christian father cause I was pregnant and not married.
I was clueless about cooking skills because I was cossetted too much when my mother adopted was alive.

I enjoyed the family hols abroad we had with my adoptive family .

Many happy memories of those and when my mother was alive times !

I grew up in the 70s and 80s too.

Maybe the era in which you were born.I grew up in the 1940 and 50's era. Every family where I lived, were all pretty much the same,as in being told to not be wasteful,don't use too much of this,don't use too much of that etc.

Nothing that was curtailed in the way we lived, because of shortages, was not ever neglectful, just a sign of the times..

To be honest,all these things have served me well over the years, as I am very frugal now,and when a child, I was taught, but not told,to do lots of things around the house,and garden from the age of three or four.

I know a lot of younger people who will give a big yawn, reading about the oldie days. but nothing was neglectful, unless you were unfortunate to have had nasty and ultra overbearing parents.

I think that many now well of people, perhaps had parents who were not well off, and the parsimonious habits that they learned as children have been difficult to shake off. This could be the case for the OPs parents.

Oh I was the eldest out of 8, with my birth family sisters and brothers ,
so I suspose quite a large family !

My sisters and brothers were split up in care too, in foster homes

They stayed in Birmingham and I moved to Wales away from Birth family !

It sounds like my childhood. I’m 30. (Other than the house and holidays)

I wouldn’t say I was neglected or abused as some PP have said it is. At all.
We were poor.

There are always posts from the Four Yorkshiremen on threads like this.

I would say what you described is unusual for the times (I have children close to your age) - especially parents not caring whether you had a school lunch or not. It seems fine to have an 8 year old make her own lunch but surely you'd check she had done it?

A lot depends on how it made you feel at the time? My mother did things differently to me - would go nuts if we washed our hair more than twice a week (It was bad for it apparently) but it never made me feel neglected even though I did different things with my own children. was it an idiosyncracy in an otherwise caring childhood or was it slight neglect maybe because of being overwhelmed/depressed that made you feel sad?

OP i would say considering your age the lack of toiletries and underwear was very uptight of your parents!
They sound very much like mine but I am late 30's. When I was at school there seemed to be two camps, those that were clean and freshly dressed (the majority) and those like me that were basically filthy with limited access to products and clothing.
I actually really feel for you, school/adolescence is tough enough without being short of the basics 😕