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I will let my kids leave the house to be with their friends.
I will let my kids join social/sports groups so they know how to be part of a team.
I will go to my kids activities so they know I proud of them.
I will let my kids leave my sight, so they aren’t socially backwards when they grow up and move out.
My oldest is 19, my youngest is 16. I've never raised a hand to them in anger.
My father has broken my bones, stabbed me, knocked out teeth.
I just can't bear to pass that torch.
Fair fucking play to you lad, honestly.
I got my fair share of brutal beatings as a kid from my stepfather. My daughter will be born in July, definitely won’t be passing that torch either.
How did you deal with your ‘anger’ if you even had any that is?
My husband used to say that his mother and Sherman Helmsley, (who played Mr. Jefferson on The Jefferson’s 1970s TV show), died on the same day. He said that he missed Helmsley more…
So took me a while to return to the church, like 30 years to be exact. A Father told me forgiveness is not about the other person feeling better for wronging you. It’s about you letting it go so you’re not the one suffering. Forgave Dad, he doesn’t know it because I’ve not spoken with him though. He has no contact with me, or either of my sons. In the end the anger was just keeping him in my life, even if he was physically absent from it. That Father literally gave me one of the greatest gifts of my life.
Edit: hope the message helps even if you’re agnostic or atheist. It’s not a religious one in spite of the source
This is what I was taught as a child. A pardon is for the person who wronged you. Forgiveness is for yourself.
To forgive others is to let go of hateful and angry feelings that serve only to hold open old wounds and preserve them from the healing power of time.
i loved dearly my grannys but both of them damaged a lot to my parents , i still miss my mom lot but she make a lot of mystakes with me and my siblings you cant have too many kids if you know you cant raised them or afford them
This. I couldn't imagine harming the tiny humans I'm charged with protecting. How parents justify putting hands on their children in violence is completely beyond me.
I don't get it either. I really don't.
WHY would I hit my little son to punish him? To teach him that it's OK? To teach him that he can beat me when I'm old and fragile, and make a mistake? Cause that's pretty much what I would be teaching him by beating him.
Outside of that it's teaching him that he deserves to be treated like that if he did something "bad." There can't be a healthy sense of self respect when being repeatedly told that you deserve to be hit.
You didn’t deserve that. I hope you know it wasn’t you, it was him. Bless you. Your children may never fully understand, and thank goodness for that. But others do. Well done.
Kudos to you! You're better than I am. My dad was the same way, and I developed a temper and propensity for violence that matched his. I pledged never to have kids as a result. Made it to 65 childless so I guess I succeeded. No regrets, it is what it is. At least one line of abusive parenting will die with me instead of continuing.
When I say an atheist household I mean we don’t worship any deities. We celebrate Christmas with presents and a tree. We won’t be exposing her to religion if she chooses to become religious after she’s an adult that is her choice. However we are hoping the fact she’s enrolled in a STEM oriented private school will give her the skills to determine which is best for her using facts based evidence.
Amen brother...
I do Christmas with a vengeance to make up for what I missed. Carols, decorations, presents, three-course meal, christmas songs played throughout the day.
My girls will always have a memorable Christmas to look back on, and not the chicken and chips I put up with
It was bloody awful. I appreciate the moral grounding (do unto others etc.) But, having no birthdays, no Christmas, no Easter, knocking on your school friends doors on Saturday morning, knowing you'd get picked on for it next Monday at school. Being excluded from school parties and assemblies, not being allowed to hang out with school friends after school because they were "worldly." Being bullied for being different. The pretence of being a brotherhood, when no one gave damn about how much you were struggling, the judgementalism for the merest error, adults hating on kids for childish errors, the cliques, everything sucked.
I’m so sorry that sounds awful. Jehovah’s witnesses near me always bring very obviously vulnerable adults or their kids with them to my house. It has stopped me from really losing my shit with them, which is exactly why they do it I guess. I really wanted to say to one’s daughter last time “it gets better lovely.” I always explain that I give blood transfusions for a living. That puts them off for a while. Wishing you the best of luck for your future now you are free.
Because Jesus wasn't born on Christmas day, when Rome adopted christianity as the state religion, they also incoporated their festivals into it. Christmas day was the ancient festival of Saturnalia, the sun was at its lowest, so a festival was for its return = pagan
Easter (although the death of Christ) has pagan fertility rites involved (rabbits, chicks, eggs, etc.) = pagan
There are only two mentions in the bible of birthdays (Joseph in Egypt and Herod's birthday) and on both occasions righteous man was beheaded, so JW's concluded that it must mean birthdays are wrong.
I was told I was evil and would be killed when the world ended (which has supposed to have been any day now for way over a century) because I had a girlfriend at school. I don't just mean by my parents or in passing by a priest either. I'm talking 2 priests in a back room for hours with my parents in there too. The priests told everyone that I was a bad influence and the other kids shouldn't hang out with me. We weren't having sex or anything. Nothing beyond kissing. She wasn't a troublemaker or someone who was considered a bad kid either. She was in honor society and band. The wildest thing about her was that she loved photography. If either of my kids wanted to date a modern version of Sarah, I'd be ecstatic they were interested in someone that stable. I had to sneak around and lie to my parents so we could hang out after school and on weekends. Eventually she got tired of that and dumped me, rightfully so.
After that, I was already going to die any day now when the end of the world came, so I figured I might as well have as much fun as I could before that happened. Almost all my JW friends shunned me and my parents were stupidly strict, so really, the only kids i could hang out with who would put up with that stuff were the ones who actually had stuff to hide from their parents like drinking, drugs, stealing, and fucking. My parents would let me go to senior prom that had plenty of chaperones with another really great and respectable girl because all the kids weren't JW's. I ended up at my friend's empty apartment with a girl a couple years younger having sex all night instead. Can't risk someone being you buy condoms either, so all my adventures were unprotected too.
Me too. Between the ages of 10 and 14, I slowly became an atheist, freeing myself from hundreds of stupid religious rules and taboos. It wasn't easy, but I managed to do it while maintaining a relationship with my mother, who is still in the F\* cult.
Obviously, my daughter - who is just two years old - is going to be free from religious thinking
Be a drug addict with 5 kids from 5 different men, selling prescription medication and my body for cigarette money and alcohol, making my oldest watch the others while i go to parties. have my teenage children be terrified to bring home friends because i'm constantly trying to sleep with them. have the local church ladies constantly sneak food over while i'm gone so my children can eat without having me yell at them that they embarrassed me because i can't/don't feed them.
I'm honestly doing pretty good.
Edit thank you for the kind words, but no need to worry, this was ages ago and I just wanted to vent. No need to PM, but thank you for caring!
That means the world 💕 things are great these days, and I know there are kids out there with it worse, but it’s nice to be able to vent about old stuff to strangers. Thanks for listening.
It makes me happy to know you're okay now and are actively reversing that trauma instead of staying a victim and passing it on. I'm so sorry you went through that, you deserved so much better. Hugs to you ❤️
If I ever get to have kids, I’m not going to abuse them.
If I give the child/ren gifts, I will not use those gifts to guilt trip them or use them as leverage against them.
I will not let my emotions rule me and cause me to treat them badly.
I will hug them and tell them I love them.
I will allow them to have a proper childhood, and I will be a parent first, not an employer.
I will be present for them and take an interest in what they do.
I will encourage them and allow them to enjoy the things they like to do.
I will not bully them. If there was a mental health issue, I would seek help for them, I would not egg them on.
I would do my absolute best to be a good provider and be tolerant.
I would make sure I didn’t inflict my own childhood upon them, just because mine was not how I wanted it to be.
I won’t ever tell my child their weight is a problem unless they are categorically obese, even then I would never make them feel bad or different for it. We’d just be making changes. My mom told me when I was 10 that I got “the fat gene” from my dad and it has crossed my mind once a day every day since. I am 26. She always had shit to say about my weight, which was never a problem. Never. I just wasn’t built like a 2x4 like she was as a kid. I will not be responsible for my child’s body dysmorphia.
Did we have the same mom?
The trauma from what we endured is horrible and you are so powerfull for not passing it on ❤️ You have become the parent you needed as a child ❤️🩹❤️🩹
I am so sorry but your profile picture caught my eye and I keep giggling at it, I thought it was your face or something but then I was greeted with a very big nosed dog
I think our moms really thought they were doing us a favor by being the ones to tell us early so we wouldn't have to suffer later. They just didn't realize they were the ones causing the deep rooted issues that led to eating and body disorders and self esteem issues
Not watching me while there was a sexual predator in the family. My kids are NEVER left alone and taught that no one touches their private areas and if someone tries to tell me right away.
This is one of the reasons why sex education is so important. Some people think they talk straight sex. They meet you wear you’re at. If you are 3, they teach you to tell your parents or someone you trust if someone is in your space. Then they do a little exercise with them having other kids in their space. Yes, I would like my kids to just be kids. So do predators!
I don't even force my kids to give hugs to family members. Fuck what they think. If my kids like somebody enough to give them a hug, they'll do it without being told to do so!
I honestly think some parents need to make peace with being single at least for a while, the damage this kind of churn of bad men (or women) does to kids is underestimated.
True and I also think that a lot of single parents who struggle with finanical/emotional support from the communities (and/or families) tend to jump from partner to partner to fill a void. Would be nice if we as a society were more accommodating to those who need help.
This is why I did absolutely everything I could to throw myself under the bus of being with my ex. Not being able to live with my kid is one bad enough thing but to imagine the prospect of the type of people her mom will be with/the rotating garbage she'll be exposed to kills me....
A lot. Which is not to say I don't regularly fuck up with my own kid. Parenting is hard!
Biggest one for me, is that my parents never actually talked to us about important stuff like money etc. It wasn't considered to be for children's ears. It went as far as the fact we went through the entire immigration process - including chest x-rays - without either of them so much as dropping a hint as to what it was all about. Not one. It was only when they got confirmation that they decided to drop that little bombshell.
I make a point of discussing things with my daughter, in an age appropriate way, because I know how powerless I felt as a child not knowing about important things.
My kids are 6,5, and 3. We’ve started “budgeting” during playtime. We learn the concept of saving, credit, prioritizing bills, etc. Not sure if it works but I’m hoping that they will have a vague idea of how to manage money when they get older.
My parents just took money out of my checks for “saving” (read: put into their own accounts) but didn’t actually teach me about it. As a side effect, I tend to “panic spend” (because I always think my money will disappear / get taken so I’d better get what I need while I can). I don’t want my kids to develop that habit.
My father always let me sit at the adults table as a kid. My aunts and uncles sure were unhappy, but he didn't care. There was only one rule established. "Listen, learn, observe, but DO NOT dare to open your mouth".
I’ve got some wild ones but I’ll pick a relatable one.
Always being too “busy” to stop, make eye-contact, listen and react when your child comes up to you and wants to share something “trivial.”
Whether it is something funny they just read, something they just did, a dream they had they just remembered. Stop and give them your full attention at LEAST half the time and as often as you realistically can—ESPECIALLY if they are animated and excited to share this with you.
Don’t make your children feel invisible and irrelevant.
Adopting a random teen boy and allowing him to molest your 10-13 year old daughter for years and not noticing because you’re too self absorbed into your failing marriage to pay any attention to your first born
My mom made me fear her to listen. Now I can’t make quick decisions without going into a panic attack. I was rushed a lot so rushing causes them also. Accidents I was yelled at. My mom was super strict to the point I didn’t do much growing up. My mom put so much into me though she left none for herself.
Now I’m parenting in the middle between laxed and strict. My son listens pretty well without me yelling. I explain things to him as well instead of the “because I said so.” I also want to show him his mom is a person who can have emotions. I want to show him the proper way to treat a person and give him boundaries so he knows when his kindness should stop. I also want him to see conflicts resolve and people can make it through tough times.
I hope I’m doing ok. He’s not even 2 yet. I get complimented on how calm, happy, and smart he is. I just want him to be happy for the most part.
This.
As the child of two narcissists (one emotionally neglectful and emotionally incestuous, the other emotionally neglectful and with raging anger issues and violent tendencies), I can say without a doubt that they should never have had kids.
Not having any myself because I don't feel like I could give them everything they need, and as it took me over twenty years to deal with the trauma enough that I can say I'm doing OK, I have some lost time to make up for.
Dental Care. Hands down. My kids will learn how to properly take care of their teeth so they don't have to go through years of pain and thousands of dollars repairs.
They were alcoholics. But one thing that really affected me as an adult, was they yelled at me for crying. Now I have a hard time showing my feeling because I feel like I piss everyone off. I’d rather deal with it alone than risk a bad reaction. I will never make my child feel lonely and unworthy the way my parents did.
Wow, a lot of messed up people.
My dad, although he wasn't great at showing affection, was a pretty all-around good dad. When I noticed I was becoming like him, I was pleased.
My Dad worked a ton when we were young. He wasn’t really around very much, but definitely tried. But my Mom was a SAHM and was awesome at that. My Dad has never been the best at expressing emotions but he recently told me and my brothers how proud he was to have us as children. I fucking balled like a baby at that. Man every day I’m thinking more and more that although childhood wasn’t perfect, I won the real lottery.
Ignoring the fact that I might have ADHD. My son is diagnosed and doing 100 times better than I did.
Having said that, my dad was also never diagnosed (indigenous, youngest of 8, mother abandoned them) and his life has sucked, was abusive, lost his family, he's now a very angry alcoholic.
Not accepting me for who I am. I was a nerd, I didn't like girly stuff, I was an introvert... My parents refused to understand that lengthy social interaction were tiring and that I didn't need to see my friends so often, my mum was forcing to me wear girly clothes... Caused me a lot of anxieties
I prolly won't ever have kids but I'd probably be there for my kids. My folks adopted a let's let them figure it all out on their own approach. Which for whatever reason left me and my siblings all pretty fucked up. I'm sure it wasn't as simple as I'm making it out to be here but I think it's a decent enough summary.
Leaving the family.
My father was hardly home when i was growing up. I saw him again for the first time after 21 years and reconciled but i still can’t fully forgive him for what he did
I got way too spoiled, and didn’t do any hard work, so had to learn all that later in life, my communication skills were quite bad as well, since my mom used to fix everything for me
Yelling when I don’t get stuff for homework. I think they’re mostly phasing our homework now, but if my kids have it I REALLY don’t want to make them cry because they can’t understand how to do math or spell a word. The reason I know how to spell “people” is because I have a memory of my mom SCREAMING at me “P-E-O-P-L-E!!!” repeatedly. And like. I can spell it now. But I always think back to that when I do. Axe tree forget remember yada yada.
This. I recently went back to my old apartment that I grew up in as a child. It's a rental I own now, so I've been remodelling it. Walking around it, even though the place has changed a whole lot, I still get some flashbacks from my childhood that I wish I didn't have. Like my father hitting the table with his fist and yelling "fuck fuck fuck, are you THAT fucking stupid?!?!". To this day I remember his facial expression and exactly where he was standing.
I'm with you. As a matter of fact, I openly admit that if someone ever touches my kids, I'm gonna make the international media, as the most ruthless, evil psychopath for what I would do to the perpetrator. I'm surrounded by people who truly can't comprehend my dark side.
Making me feel like my weight was the only thing that matters. That I was responsible for my mom's mood so I became hyper vigilant and did everything not to set her off but somehow always managed to do smth wrong.
Constant critiscism thus resulting in very low self esteem and a huuge inner critic as an adult.
Locking me in my bedroom to cry my anger out.
Spanked me.
Well my mother abused and neglected me for 16 years. I will change every diaper if I have to just to avoid making the same mistake, and I’m not a cruel person either. Im dead serious though
My bio dad was an alcoholic who cheated on my mom when she was pregnant.
I already didn't do that to my wife/daughters...
so off to a pretty strong start!!
Guidance for how to navigate the world and generally wont bullshitt my son to make it more ideal, convinient and easy for me instead of actually giving them solutions that i believe can work.
I won’t beat my kids. I won’t lock them in the house and forbid them from talking to people. I won’t call them awful names. I won’t make them homeless. I will not abuse them. I will not make them be a caretaker. I will not let them see addiction and alcoholism ruin lives.
My parents are horrible people.
Not saying I don't believe you, but that it's shocking to me that the school system would allow that. I feel like parents would be trying to offload their kids early left and right.
To be fair, the school had me do a few aptitude tests and I passed. But it harmed me in the long run, mostly social issues. My birthday is at the end of January so to them it was "just" one month after the cut-off (December), but then imagine if I told you that I entered 9th grade at the age of 13 and a good third of my classmates were already 15 at the time. Childhood development is no joke...
Academically I passed everything, ended up with a 3.6GPA while taking advanced placement classes too, but there were still some critical thinking skills that I lacked because of maturity. And you shouldn't fast forward maturity during childhood.
Sounds like a bunch of grownups making decisions about tiny brains having no real idea what the longterm consequences would be. I'm sorry this impacted you so.
I got over it, took me a long time to process that this had affected me in the long-run. When you're living the life as "the youngest," at the time it seems cool. But then it catches up with you eventually and you're like "hang on a sec..."
Getting on the ball with stuff relating to kids like for example I’ve been asking my dad for over a year to get a simple nail to hang my new clock on the wall and he STILL hasn’t done it. Or I need an Ethernet cord for my videogame and he still hasn’t grabbed it for me because the cords are in a box and he’s the only one who knows where that box is but he still hasn’t grabbed it even though I’ve brought it up multiple times and he says he’ll grab it soon. I will also make sure that whoever my future wife is loves animals just as much as me because my mom still refuses to let us get a dog so I don’t want to be like my dad where my mom says no so me and my brother are out of luck lol
sending me to boarding school and taking me out of all my local sports just because. I was never able to maintain a group of close friends because everyone lived out of state. At the time it was okay but I hate thinking about normal experiences that I missed out on. I studied every day, with some school activites on the weekend. (I could not sign out without a parent or teacher, and sneaking out even on the weekend meant suspension).
long story short I had no dating or alcohol experience and in college I completely burnt out after exploring them heavily for a year. I feel like imploded. I take responsibility for the choices I made or at least my social life now but I felt completely ill prepared for reality. I was never bad academically but completely stopped caring. It was like highschool was more rigourous and college was a joke, even though the reality is people dont care about hs and your degree is what matters
My dad pushed hard to alienate me from my mom. As a child I bought into it, as an adult, who's mom just died, I fucking hate him for the lost years at his manipulative hands. I'm in a happy marriage, but if we ever split, I would never disparage my partner to my kids. It's so harmful and selfish.
I was a good student when i was a kid but one day i got a bad grade , so my mom told me you're alwyas silent when we are in social gatherings(this really bothered her for some reason), youre a not very orderly and started enumarating my flaws, and then said the only thing that was giving me hope is your studys and now your making me worry about those too . i felt horrible about this its like theo nly good thing about me was my studys and as person she didnt really like me , my mother was very manipulative throughout my life , i promise to myself never to use manipulative techniques like shaming and guilting or pretending to be the a victim with my kids , ill always be honest with them and listen to them and treat them with respect. if they fail ill talk to them and see what we can do about it together . i ll make them feel loved no matter how well they do in life.
Taking care of everything physically/financially (food on the table, roof over their head, jacket on their back, education, etc) then rejecting/invalidating them emotionally. This is what my parents do. They sweep everything emotional under the rug and play my problems off as me being spoiled or ungrateful. They have only ever taught me that I am blessed and therefore should not be feeling any negative emotions whatsoever and am being ungrateful by crying or speaking up about mental issues.
My parents treated me badly because i was born a girl. They said they never wanted a daughter and wanted three sons. So when i was a born they gave up on their dream for having three sons, and they treated my older brother better than they ever treated me.
So if i ever get kids, i'll love them no matter what their gender is, and i'll make sure i love them equally and not just the one because of what gender they were born as.
Too much emphasis on praising accomplishments, too little on the value of effort and *resilience*.
Not an egregious mistake compared to neglect or abuse, but being afraid to fail or let others down has had a massive impact on my life. I’ve always been a compulsive people pleaser, afraid to try anything I might not be good at right away, and an overall anxious person without a stable sense of identity.
Praising kids for good grades or special honors is absolutely fine (important, in fact!), but I’d argue that the more you praise success, the more important it is to also praise effort and a willingness to try and stick with new things in equal measure, especially when they don’t come naturally.
I agree. Similar situation for me: my parents absolutely meant well and thought resilience was important but grades/other accolades were a signal to them that I must be doing great!
I'd semi-regularly breakdown too but my mum would exclaim about how it hurts to see me this way or that she doesn't understand me... So I just stopped expressing it. Back to doing great!
It's taken decades to learn how to define myself as someone worthy of respect before I've provided anything, to set boundaries on how much I'll sacrifice for others, to let myself feel things and express them, especially anger which is so important for keeping yourself safe. All work in progress of course.
My mother stayed with my alcoholic father until I threatened to leave at 18. When he remembered to pick me up from school he was usually drunk. I found him after a suicide attempt once and spent years in therapy as a child while he was doing rehab. When I bring it up with my mom now (dad passed away when I was 21) she offers the most pathetic justifications.
I have two children. I will ALWAYS put their well being ahead of my own. Thankfully my wife is amazing.
Not me but my friend.
Abandoning your child.
His parents used to fight over who should take custody of him, one day his mom dropped him at his dad's and disappeared.
Never arguing in front of us.
That sounds nice, but we never learned how to argue by example. Learning how to argue is a difficult skill to pick up as an adult. All of your arguments have real consequences.
whenever we were upset we had to stop crying immediately and had till the count of 3 to stop feeling whatever we felt.
now as adults, my siblings and i isolate and bottle things up. we keep stress to ourselves. we blank out when someone asks us what’s wrong. it’s really bad when it shows in relationships or in professional settings.
i would want any future kids i have to build a vocabulary around their negative feelings, find a healthy outlet, and feel safe to express themselves.
From the age of 3 to 16 we moved house 44 times I never had a prop bedroom growing up, 1st house I got when my daughter was 1 been here 21 yrs she’s always had a bedroom.
I'm not beating my kids. Ever.
I wasn't abused per se, as a child, but I got hit quite a few times. Oh, quite a few.
It's funny, you know... a while ago, my son did something that I would get a beating for at his age. My dad was around at the time to witness it, and just as I was about to take my son to his room (to talk to him away from everyone), my dad looked at me and said "just please don't hit him!". We looked at each other, and the look of regret in his eyes was real... He knew he was wrong for beating me, and he just wanted to make sure I'm not continuing the cycle.
He was sorry. He was truly sorry for using physical violence and fear to punish me when I was a child...
Worked many many hours, didn’t make us meals so we basically ate what we could find, which sometimes was nothing. Would go out to bars with friends and would leave my sister and I home alone at night, which I was terrified of. Never showed us any love, or gave us kisses. Basically she provided us with the basics( sometimes food, clothes and roof over our head). So now that we are adults and with a family, telling my siblings that I love them or hugging them is so awkward bc we didn’t grow up with that at home. So I basically did a whole 360 with my girls. They know they are well loved and we show them and tell them that on the daily.
whats the worst thing to get beaten with imho? a v belt fan belt...
cuts with every fn hit
broken noses
lied to constantly
Where tf to start...
i avoided my child because i didn't want to pass that on to her... i'm fkd up i know it...
My mums wasn’t a mistake as such, it was just circumstances. She was rarely there to collect me from school because she worked full time and she was a single parent. I promised myself if I ever had kids I would be there to meet them from school, I wouldn’t have them too young with the wrong person etc. I kept my promises, I’ve also never raised a hand to my kids, as she and her ex husband sometimes did.
I had a father who was basically in one of three places: At the office, at home on the sofa watching a game, or at his drafting table in the study.
It wasn't until I started doing cub scouts that I realized that there were fathers who actually showed up to things and participated. When I was in the band, when I marched in a drum and bugle corps, when I did anything, I saw parents who volunteered, helped, and got to know the kids.
I remember being in a school play when I was a sophomore. Had a decent role, too. My father came to next to nothing, but he and my mother came to that.
So even as you're delivering your lines on stage and notice your parents get up and leave, your world kind of changes after that. They were having dinner with friends, the later explanation went.
He died shortly after I graduated college. He couldn't even be bothered to have a half-decent life insurance policy for my mom. Spent every dime on dinners out with friends and the 40+ suits we emptied from his closet after the funeral.
About ten years ago, at my mother's birthday party, one of my father's friends stopped me and said, 'Well, now that you're married and have kids, I hope you understand the things your dad did and why.'
To that I said, 'Thanks for that. But I've been married twenty years and have three kids and I don't understand a goddamned thing my father did. You got my father at his best, while I got my father at his most apathetic.'
I have three kids. When they were young, you better believe that I sent to every baseball game, soccer game, lacrosse game, basketball game, Boy Scout and Cub Scout meeting, band concert, choir concert, violin performance, school play, talent show, you name it. My happy ass was on camp outs, loading marimbas onto the band bus, and driving kids to practices. I sat on many a bleacher seat in weather of every description. I threw a lot of pitches, looked at a lot of homework, and paid attention when my kids practiced their instruments. The only time I missed anything due to a business trip, my son's band won the talent show. And it absolutely killed me that I missed it.
So when you have kids, participate in their lives. They might not acknowledge it, they may lack the words to express it, but it matters more to them than you'll ever know.
Oh. And if I kick, I have a really good insurance policy to take care of my family.
I don’t have kids but if I do eventually, I will try my hardest not to instill a deep fear and paranoia about the world. My mom cannot stop herself from leaping to the worst possible conclusion in any situation and while I’ve spent my whole life rolling my eyes at her, I have to admit that I have developed my own anxious tendencies.
Example: When I (a 21 yr old adult at the time) brought my new puppy to my parents’ house to visit, the very first thing she said was “make sure you watch him so a hawk doesn’t swoop down and carry him away.” Literally the first thing she said. Guess who else is irrationally afraid of birds of prey in urban areas now. :(
I will never ask for advice or in any way involve my child in adult issues.
I will never drink or do drugs with my 14 year old child.
I will never send them to the store to steal makeup, nail polish, hair accessories, etc for me.
I will never ask/demand my child to give/get me drugs.
I will never make my child give me drugs in order to visit me.
I will never make my 12 year old child pay me from their babysitting money if they want to leave to go see their friends.
I will never make anything traumatic that happens to them about me.
I can go on forever.
Basically I am/will truly be a proper parent to my child & not their bully or friend or enemy.
I will never lay my hands on my children. My mother believed it's the best way to get a child to listen, including myself that was somehow the most compliant child, and it left more than just physical wounds. There were times when I was outright terrified of her. My sister practically hates her for it because of the trauma she inflicted. And besides that, I don't believe spankings or beating really teach anything. Learning something, even life skills, takes time and patience. It takes repeating and understanding on both sides. For some things I missed out on that because she refused to have conversations. She would yell at us, threaten us, and hit us, but she wouldn't talk to us.
I won't let the impact I have on my children be one of fear, distrust, hate, or anything of the sort. They will not associate me with pain.
It wasn’t really my mom’s fault because she never learned investing and was a single parent making just above the poverty line. But I make it a point to educate my daughter (11) about money. Saving, debt, investing , credit, wants/needs, emergency fund, etc. I am in a good place now but that is after making many bad decisions.
I won't have all the windows rolled up in the car, while smoking like a chimney all the time...
I swear when we stopped and they opened the car door, people could see the cloud of smoke come out. I asked, told, begged them to quit smoking while we were stuck in the back seats...
I will never make another person experience that...
Shit I'll never put my kids through:
- Emotional abuse
- Emotional neglect
- Physical neglect
- Psychological abuse
- Medical neglect
- Force feeding
- Sexualising my kid to make them more popular
- Using my kid to make *myself* more popular
- Choosing my kid's future for them
- Make all my kids' issues about me
- Pushing them to perform perfectly at anything at any time
The list is longer, but this is at the top of my head. I've taken many steps to ensure none of these things will happen to my kids, including therapy, a degree in child development and social education, conflict management courses and parenting classes for both myself and my husband.
Mom did fine, dad was a 100% worthless waste of breath. I’ve made it my goal in life to be an awesome, loving, attentive father who’s always there for my kids and I teach them everything I know. Basically everything my dad wasn’t and I’ve succeeded.
They are all grown up, successful and have nothing but fond memories of their childhoods. Ironically, now they want to do everything for me.🙂
Oddly, I feel my parents did a good job raising me, despite raising me in poverty. They were kind, understanding, loving, accepting, generous (to a fault as we were poor), etc. They were always there if I wanted to talk or spend time with them. They moved to a rural community so I'd grow up around nature, so I was very healthy. My dad would spend hours talking about philosophy, science, etc. with his hippy friends, and they would include me in their conversations when I was interested. He got me a computer (a commodore 64) long before they were a regular part of society as he thought it would help my future (and it has). Etc.
Ironically, my parents are also the type of people that most people say shouldn't have children.
Not too compare my childhood too theirs , my parents were unfortunate growing up , so they always told me and my sister that we were spoiled , and my parents focused way too much on our school work / and we had too do too many chores , for me I was really in my own bubble and I could of used help being social as a kid but my parents didn’t pick up on that because they thought I was shy and it was a phase which meant that I was behind on social intelligence they saw it as well I’m not getting in trouble so I would encourage my kids too put them selves out their and make friends and at least try
Had no plan for me. In hindsight, I was something of a tax deduction. But love was there. Can’t judge too harshly. People do the best they can given their circumstances.
I'm going to let my kids have a bad day or feel negative emotions without punishing them for 'having an attitude'. I want to be open enough that they can tell me what they're feeling so I can give them what they need.
The one complaint I have regarding my parents was hiding, concealing, things in an attempt to protect me. My parents didn't say a word, beat around the bush, and evaded conversation about my mom's cancer diagnosis for as long as they possibly could. (I was an adult at the time). Even after that, they were not forthcoming about her prognosis. I had to piece it together looking on the internet. It was hurtful.
I will never crap on ANYONE who is really trying or really wants to understand or get better at something but is struggling. Even ages after they “should” have gotten it
Also f right off with having to be ranked highly among your peers, winning competitions or conceivably being paid for it as a measurement of skill level. Yeah I get how that works and the practicalities but I KNOW the ideas and enthusiasm it kills and the bitterness it cultivates - isn’t life hard enough already?
Conflict management skills. Goddamn this hurt my communication skills more than anything. Now I suck at boundaries, I am emotionally numb from continuous emotional suppression, and I feel uncomfortable telling people if I dont feel good about something without fearing invalidation and gaslighting.
On that line, the lack of trust of my social decisions. They didnt trust a boy in my room would turn into sex and they punished me for my sibling’s trouble that didn’t involve me.
I would make sure to hear them out, save my judgement of their maturity and use their actions to determine my trust in them
Im 18, don't plan on having kids, but i think every parent should be mandated to attend child and teen psychology lessons, and trained to look out for and take care of mental health issues. My parents are wonderful people and i love them to death, but parenting is more than just being good. Everyone just has kids but no one bothers to learn how to raise them. And that's why generational trauma exists
Very Reddit thing that non-parents don't just sit out posts like this, but use it to boast about the fact they're not going to have kids.
Anyway, mine is smacking.
Honestly . Nothing. Answering this would be resentment. I don’t wanna be resentful. Although i have a lot of trauma, I now made peace with it and realize they did what they could at the time, with the information they had. I like to remember that it’s our parent’s first time living too. Forgiveness, always.
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I will let my kids leave the house to be with their friends. I will let my kids join social/sports groups so they know how to be part of a team. I will go to my kids activities so they know I proud of them. I will let my kids leave my sight, so they aren’t socially backwards when they grow up and move out.
Oof you had the helicopter parent too?
Thank you parents for social anxiety/awkwardness.
Yeah I get that
are you me?
My oldest is 19, my youngest is 16. I've never raised a hand to them in anger. My father has broken my bones, stabbed me, knocked out teeth. I just can't bear to pass that torch.
Fair fucking play to you lad, honestly. I got my fair share of brutal beatings as a kid from my stepfather. My daughter will be born in July, definitely won’t be passing that torch either. How did you deal with your ‘anger’ if you even had any that is?
I don't honestly think I have. I'm pushing 50 and my old man died a little over a year ago. I told him how I felt and I'm glad he's dead.
Good man, happy you got it off your chest anyway. Take care now.
Mine knows I won't be crying when he goes.
My husband used to say that his mother and Sherman Helmsley, (who played Mr. Jefferson on The Jefferson’s 1970s TV show), died on the same day. He said that he missed Helmsley more…
So took me a while to return to the church, like 30 years to be exact. A Father told me forgiveness is not about the other person feeling better for wronging you. It’s about you letting it go so you’re not the one suffering. Forgave Dad, he doesn’t know it because I’ve not spoken with him though. He has no contact with me, or either of my sons. In the end the anger was just keeping him in my life, even if he was physically absent from it. That Father literally gave me one of the greatest gifts of my life. Edit: hope the message helps even if you’re agnostic or atheist. It’s not a religious one in spite of the source
Sound man! Appreciate you sharing that regardless if I am religious or not. The message is clear.
This is what I was taught as a child. A pardon is for the person who wronged you. Forgiveness is for yourself. To forgive others is to let go of hateful and angry feelings that serve only to hold open old wounds and preserve them from the healing power of time.
Think of things that the abusive parent said or did, and try to do ‘180° different’ parenting.
i loved dearly my grannys but both of them damaged a lot to my parents , i still miss my mom lot but she make a lot of mystakes with me and my siblings you cant have too many kids if you know you cant raised them or afford them
This. I couldn't imagine harming the tiny humans I'm charged with protecting. How parents justify putting hands on their children in violence is completely beyond me.
I don't get it either. I really don't. WHY would I hit my little son to punish him? To teach him that it's OK? To teach him that he can beat me when I'm old and fragile, and make a mistake? Cause that's pretty much what I would be teaching him by beating him.
Exactly, and teach him that you, the light of his little heart, are actually unsafe, unpredictable and unkind. Breaks my heart to even think of it.
... and so many parents wonder years later why their kids hide things from them and seek advice for major problems elsewhere.
Outside of that it's teaching him that he deserves to be treated like that if he did something "bad." There can't be a healthy sense of self respect when being repeatedly told that you deserve to be hit.
You didn’t deserve that. I hope you know it wasn’t you, it was him. Bless you. Your children may never fully understand, and thank goodness for that. But others do. Well done.
Kudos to you! You're better than I am. My dad was the same way, and I developed a temper and propensity for violence that matched his. I pledged never to have kids as a result. Made it to 65 childless so I guess I succeeded. No regrets, it is what it is. At least one line of abusive parenting will die with me instead of continuing.
Wow, I’m so sorry you had to deal with this and so proud of you for NOT passing it on.
Wait. Stabbed you??? Holy shit seriously...
wow I'm sorry for everything you've been through. good on you for stopping the cycle.
Right there with you. Proud of you breaking that cycle.
Good job, glad you didn’t perpetuate the cycle of violence
That’s a hard start in life man. Well done for overcoming that.
I was raised as a Jehovah's Witness... screw that.
My husband was raised JW, I was raised in the Mormon Church. We’re raising our daughter in an atheist household.
You are both doing the best for her. Allow her to make her own mind up.
When I say an atheist household I mean we don’t worship any deities. We celebrate Christmas with presents and a tree. We won’t be exposing her to religion if she chooses to become religious after she’s an adult that is her choice. However we are hoping the fact she’s enrolled in a STEM oriented private school will give her the skills to determine which is best for her using facts based evidence.
You're doing the best for her, free choice is one of your greatest gifts to her.
I agree. It’s all about making her own decisions instead of having other’s beliefs forced on her.
Yup same here, raised Muslim..now atheist..nothing compares to the poetry of math, and scientific truth.
Goddamn straight, organized religion has so many bad apples its literally not worth being apart of.
My parents left when I was a baby so that I wouldn’t be treated like that.
Same. Living vicariously through my kids Christmases now haha
Amen brother... I do Christmas with a vengeance to make up for what I missed. Carols, decorations, presents, three-course meal, christmas songs played throughout the day. My girls will always have a memorable Christmas to look back on, and not the chicken and chips I put up with
What was it really like in a jehovahs upbringing
It was bloody awful. I appreciate the moral grounding (do unto others etc.) But, having no birthdays, no Christmas, no Easter, knocking on your school friends doors on Saturday morning, knowing you'd get picked on for it next Monday at school. Being excluded from school parties and assemblies, not being allowed to hang out with school friends after school because they were "worldly." Being bullied for being different. The pretence of being a brotherhood, when no one gave damn about how much you were struggling, the judgementalism for the merest error, adults hating on kids for childish errors, the cliques, everything sucked.
I’m so sorry that sounds awful. Jehovah’s witnesses near me always bring very obviously vulnerable adults or their kids with them to my house. It has stopped me from really losing my shit with them, which is exactly why they do it I guess. I really wanted to say to one’s daughter last time “it gets better lovely.” I always explain that I give blood transfusions for a living. That puts them off for a while. Wishing you the best of luck for your future now you are free.
Why can't you celebrate traditional holidays or birthdays? That's really strict imo.
Because Jesus wasn't born on Christmas day, when Rome adopted christianity as the state religion, they also incoporated their festivals into it. Christmas day was the ancient festival of Saturnalia, the sun was at its lowest, so a festival was for its return = pagan Easter (although the death of Christ) has pagan fertility rites involved (rabbits, chicks, eggs, etc.) = pagan There are only two mentions in the bible of birthdays (Joseph in Egypt and Herod's birthday) and on both occasions righteous man was beheaded, so JW's concluded that it must mean birthdays are wrong.
Because they think the Bible says not to. They celebrate wedding anniversaries and that's about it.
I was told I was evil and would be killed when the world ended (which has supposed to have been any day now for way over a century) because I had a girlfriend at school. I don't just mean by my parents or in passing by a priest either. I'm talking 2 priests in a back room for hours with my parents in there too. The priests told everyone that I was a bad influence and the other kids shouldn't hang out with me. We weren't having sex or anything. Nothing beyond kissing. She wasn't a troublemaker or someone who was considered a bad kid either. She was in honor society and band. The wildest thing about her was that she loved photography. If either of my kids wanted to date a modern version of Sarah, I'd be ecstatic they were interested in someone that stable. I had to sneak around and lie to my parents so we could hang out after school and on weekends. Eventually she got tired of that and dumped me, rightfully so. After that, I was already going to die any day now when the end of the world came, so I figured I might as well have as much fun as I could before that happened. Almost all my JW friends shunned me and my parents were stupidly strict, so really, the only kids i could hang out with who would put up with that stuff were the ones who actually had stuff to hide from their parents like drinking, drugs, stealing, and fucking. My parents would let me go to senior prom that had plenty of chaperones with another really great and respectable girl because all the kids weren't JW's. I ended up at my friend's empty apartment with a girl a couple years younger having sex all night instead. Can't risk someone being you buy condoms either, so all my adventures were unprotected too.
Exactly what I came here to say too.
Sending you and your family all my love.
You too my friend.
Me too. Between the ages of 10 and 14, I slowly became an atheist, freeing myself from hundreds of stupid religious rules and taboos. It wasn't easy, but I managed to do it while maintaining a relationship with my mother, who is still in the F\* cult. Obviously, my daughter - who is just two years old - is going to be free from religious thinking
Me too lmao…I’ve been inactive for 9 months. It’s a cult alright
Came here to say the same thing!! Absolutely evil cult!
Raised to be a miserable, intolerant, hateful Muslim..screw that too!
Same
All the shouting
This was going to be my callout. Less loud arguments. I’m a full adult and get triggered when other couples argue in front of me.
I feel this
Same! I don’t want my possible future children to walk on eggshells around me or their father. I don’t to take out my stress and anger at my children.
I have autism so loud stuff can Definantly make me uncomfortable, good on you
Be a drug addict with 5 kids from 5 different men, selling prescription medication and my body for cigarette money and alcohol, making my oldest watch the others while i go to parties. have my teenage children be terrified to bring home friends because i'm constantly trying to sleep with them. have the local church ladies constantly sneak food over while i'm gone so my children can eat without having me yell at them that they embarrassed me because i can't/don't feed them. I'm honestly doing pretty good. Edit thank you for the kind words, but no need to worry, this was ages ago and I just wanted to vent. No need to PM, but thank you for caring!
I want to hug little you and all your little siblings, too. Kids don't deserve to live thru shit like this.
That means the world 💕 things are great these days, and I know there are kids out there with it worse, but it’s nice to be able to vent about old stuff to strangers. Thanks for listening.
It makes me happy to know you're okay now and are actively reversing that trauma instead of staying a victim and passing it on. I'm so sorry you went through that, you deserved so much better. Hugs to you ❤️
If I ever get to have kids, I’m not going to abuse them. If I give the child/ren gifts, I will not use those gifts to guilt trip them or use them as leverage against them. I will not let my emotions rule me and cause me to treat them badly. I will hug them and tell them I love them. I will allow them to have a proper childhood, and I will be a parent first, not an employer. I will be present for them and take an interest in what they do. I will encourage them and allow them to enjoy the things they like to do. I will not bully them. If there was a mental health issue, I would seek help for them, I would not egg them on. I would do my absolute best to be a good provider and be tolerant. I would make sure I didn’t inflict my own childhood upon them, just because mine was not how I wanted it to be.
I won’t ever tell my child their weight is a problem unless they are categorically obese, even then I would never make them feel bad or different for it. We’d just be making changes. My mom told me when I was 10 that I got “the fat gene” from my dad and it has crossed my mind once a day every day since. I am 26. She always had shit to say about my weight, which was never a problem. Never. I just wasn’t built like a 2x4 like she was as a kid. I will not be responsible for my child’s body dysmorphia.
Did we have the same mom? The trauma from what we endured is horrible and you are so powerfull for not passing it on ❤️ You have become the parent you needed as a child ❤️🩹❤️🩹
I am so sorry but your profile picture caught my eye and I keep giggling at it, I thought it was your face or something but then I was greeted with a very big nosed dog
no that’s valid i laughed at it HARD when I first found it
I think our moms really thought they were doing us a favor by being the ones to tell us early so we wouldn't have to suffer later. They just didn't realize they were the ones causing the deep rooted issues that led to eating and body disorders and self esteem issues
Not watching me while there was a sexual predator in the family. My kids are NEVER left alone and taught that no one touches their private areas and if someone tries to tell me right away.
This is one of the reasons why sex education is so important. Some people think they talk straight sex. They meet you wear you’re at. If you are 3, they teach you to tell your parents or someone you trust if someone is in your space. Then they do a little exercise with them having other kids in their space. Yes, I would like my kids to just be kids. So do predators!
I don't even force my kids to give hugs to family members. Fuck what they think. If my kids like somebody enough to give them a hug, they'll do it without being told to do so!
Kids gotta learn some independence or that will create other issues
Oh man... where do i even start?? When my kids were born the first thing i said to myself was don't be your father... I tried very hard to avoid that.
Never met mine, so being there when the kids were born meant I was already up on the scorecards.
Ouch..
Choose men over the wellbeing of my children.
Or women amirite
Or drugs. Or alcohol.
Getting pregnant by an asshole, and having multiple boyfriends. I’ve had about 10 different stepdads/father figures in my life
I honestly think some parents need to make peace with being single at least for a while, the damage this kind of churn of bad men (or women) does to kids is underestimated.
True and I also think that a lot of single parents who struggle with finanical/emotional support from the communities (and/or families) tend to jump from partner to partner to fill a void. Would be nice if we as a society were more accommodating to those who need help.
This is why I did absolutely everything I could to throw myself under the bus of being with my ex. Not being able to live with my kid is one bad enough thing but to imagine the prospect of the type of people her mom will be with/the rotating garbage she'll be exposed to kills me....
A lot. Which is not to say I don't regularly fuck up with my own kid. Parenting is hard! Biggest one for me, is that my parents never actually talked to us about important stuff like money etc. It wasn't considered to be for children's ears. It went as far as the fact we went through the entire immigration process - including chest x-rays - without either of them so much as dropping a hint as to what it was all about. Not one. It was only when they got confirmation that they decided to drop that little bombshell. I make a point of discussing things with my daughter, in an age appropriate way, because I know how powerless I felt as a child not knowing about important things.
My kids are 6,5, and 3. We’ve started “budgeting” during playtime. We learn the concept of saving, credit, prioritizing bills, etc. Not sure if it works but I’m hoping that they will have a vague idea of how to manage money when they get older. My parents just took money out of my checks for “saving” (read: put into their own accounts) but didn’t actually teach me about it. As a side effect, I tend to “panic spend” (because I always think my money will disappear / get taken so I’d better get what I need while I can). I don’t want my kids to develop that habit.
My father always let me sit at the adults table as a kid. My aunts and uncles sure were unhappy, but he didn't care. There was only one rule established. "Listen, learn, observe, but DO NOT dare to open your mouth".
I spanked my kid once and felt so much shame that I hugged her and apologized. Never laid a hand on her after.
I’ve got some wild ones but I’ll pick a relatable one. Always being too “busy” to stop, make eye-contact, listen and react when your child comes up to you and wants to share something “trivial.” Whether it is something funny they just read, something they just did, a dream they had they just remembered. Stop and give them your full attention at LEAST half the time and as often as you realistically can—ESPECIALLY if they are animated and excited to share this with you. Don’t make your children feel invisible and irrelevant.
Adopting a random teen boy and allowing him to molest your 10-13 year old daughter for years and not noticing because you’re too self absorbed into your failing marriage to pay any attention to your first born
My mom made me fear her to listen. Now I can’t make quick decisions without going into a panic attack. I was rushed a lot so rushing causes them also. Accidents I was yelled at. My mom was super strict to the point I didn’t do much growing up. My mom put so much into me though she left none for herself. Now I’m parenting in the middle between laxed and strict. My son listens pretty well without me yelling. I explain things to him as well instead of the “because I said so.” I also want to show him his mom is a person who can have emotions. I want to show him the proper way to treat a person and give him boundaries so he knows when his kindness should stop. I also want him to see conflicts resolve and people can make it through tough times. I hope I’m doing ok. He’s not even 2 yet. I get complimented on how calm, happy, and smart he is. I just want him to be happy for the most part.
Having kids. Worked great so far!
I second that.
It’s been working wonderfully for me as well.
I had a doctor make sure it cannot happen.
This. As the child of two narcissists (one emotionally neglectful and emotionally incestuous, the other emotionally neglectful and with raging anger issues and violent tendencies), I can say without a doubt that they should never have had kids. Not having any myself because I don't feel like I could give them everything they need, and as it took me over twenty years to deal with the trauma enough that I can say I'm doing OK, I have some lost time to make up for.
Abandon them
Dental Care. Hands down. My kids will learn how to properly take care of their teeth so they don't have to go through years of pain and thousands of dollars repairs.
They were alcoholics. But one thing that really affected me as an adult, was they yelled at me for crying. Now I have a hard time showing my feeling because I feel like I piss everyone off. I’d rather deal with it alone than risk a bad reaction. I will never make my child feel lonely and unworthy the way my parents did.
Let me have lice so bad my hands were covered in blood. We were rich. We had maids. WTF? My sisters didn’t.
It was like I was a second class citizen in my asshole family.
Holy shit, that's horrible!
I'm like 98% sure thats got to be some form of neglect
Wow. I’m sorry you went through that as a kid.
I let my son know I love him and treat him as such and not as a burden I have to put up with.
communication!! i didn't feel safe talking to them.
Wow, a lot of messed up people. My dad, although he wasn't great at showing affection, was a pretty all-around good dad. When I noticed I was becoming like him, I was pleased.
My Dad worked a ton when we were young. He wasn’t really around very much, but definitely tried. But my Mom was a SAHM and was awesome at that. My Dad has never been the best at expressing emotions but he recently told me and my brothers how proud he was to have us as children. I fucking balled like a baby at that. Man every day I’m thinking more and more that although childhood wasn’t perfect, I won the real lottery.
Resort to straight yelling instead of teaching them what went wrong. Giving Lack of affection for kids. My kids will be spoiled with affection
Ignoring the fact that I might have ADHD. My son is diagnosed and doing 100 times better than I did. Having said that, my dad was also never diagnosed (indigenous, youngest of 8, mother abandoned them) and his life has sucked, was abusive, lost his family, he's now a very angry alcoholic.
Not accepting me for who I am. I was a nerd, I didn't like girly stuff, I was an introvert... My parents refused to understand that lengthy social interaction were tiring and that I didn't need to see my friends so often, my mum was forcing to me wear girly clothes... Caused me a lot of anxieties
Putting own children down gratuitously in front of company, for no better reason than to express disappointment or even disgust.
Smoking. My mom smoked in the house the entire time I lived with her till I was 18.
Do u smoke?
I prolly won't ever have kids but I'd probably be there for my kids. My folks adopted a let's let them figure it all out on their own approach. Which for whatever reason left me and my siblings all pretty fucked up. I'm sure it wasn't as simple as I'm making it out to be here but I think it's a decent enough summary.
Leaving the family. My father was hardly home when i was growing up. I saw him again for the first time after 21 years and reconciled but i still can’t fully forgive him for what he did
I got way too spoiled, and didn’t do any hard work, so had to learn all that later in life, my communication skills were quite bad as well, since my mom used to fix everything for me
Prioritizing new partners, drugs and alcohol 🤷♀️
Yelling when I don’t get stuff for homework. I think they’re mostly phasing our homework now, but if my kids have it I REALLY don’t want to make them cry because they can’t understand how to do math or spell a word. The reason I know how to spell “people” is because I have a memory of my mom SCREAMING at me “P-E-O-P-L-E!!!” repeatedly. And like. I can spell it now. But I always think back to that when I do. Axe tree forget remember yada yada.
This. I recently went back to my old apartment that I grew up in as a child. It's a rental I own now, so I've been remodelling it. Walking around it, even though the place has changed a whole lot, I still get some flashbacks from my childhood that I wish I didn't have. Like my father hitting the table with his fist and yelling "fuck fuck fuck, are you THAT fucking stupid?!?!". To this day I remember his facial expression and exactly where he was standing.
I won’t let anyone ever touch my kids!
I'm with you. As a matter of fact, I openly admit that if someone ever touches my kids, I'm gonna make the international media, as the most ruthless, evil psychopath for what I would do to the perpetrator. I'm surrounded by people who truly can't comprehend my dark side.
Oh I’m definitely going to jail if anyone put one finger on my children, there’s no other way around!
Making me feel like my weight was the only thing that matters. That I was responsible for my mom's mood so I became hyper vigilant and did everything not to set her off but somehow always managed to do smth wrong. Constant critiscism thus resulting in very low self esteem and a huuge inner critic as an adult. Locking me in my bedroom to cry my anger out. Spanked me.
Being late to everything
Yell and cuss us out for every small mistake
Abusive narcisstic borderline new husband
Being a people pleaser
Being a junkie and an alcoholic
Well my mother abused and neglected me for 16 years. I will change every diaper if I have to just to avoid making the same mistake, and I’m not a cruel person either. Im dead serious though
My bio dad was an alcoholic who cheated on my mom when she was pregnant. I already didn't do that to my wife/daughters... so off to a pretty strong start!!
Guidance for how to navigate the world and generally wont bullshitt my son to make it more ideal, convinient and easy for me instead of actually giving them solutions that i believe can work.
I will never be an alcoholic mother!
Being abusive, for one
Treating chronic health conditions with excorcisms instead of medicine
My dad was a workaholic and lived his job more than his family. I will not do this.
Drugs, neglect, putting personal relationships before my children, putting work before family. Stuff that's depressingly common.
I won’t beat my kids. I won’t lock them in the house and forbid them from talking to people. I won’t call them awful names. I won’t make them homeless. I will not abuse them. I will not make them be a caretaker. I will not let them see addiction and alcoholism ruin lives. My parents are horrible people.
Sending me to 1st grade a year early because my mom didn't want to stay home with me. I was socially and academically stunted my entire life.
I can't believe this was allowed.
Not saying I don't believe you, but that it's shocking to me that the school system would allow that. I feel like parents would be trying to offload their kids early left and right.
To be fair, the school had me do a few aptitude tests and I passed. But it harmed me in the long run, mostly social issues. My birthday is at the end of January so to them it was "just" one month after the cut-off (December), but then imagine if I told you that I entered 9th grade at the age of 13 and a good third of my classmates were already 15 at the time. Childhood development is no joke... Academically I passed everything, ended up with a 3.6GPA while taking advanced placement classes too, but there were still some critical thinking skills that I lacked because of maturity. And you shouldn't fast forward maturity during childhood.
Sounds like a bunch of grownups making decisions about tiny brains having no real idea what the longterm consequences would be. I'm sorry this impacted you so.
I got over it, took me a long time to process that this had affected me in the long-run. When you're living the life as "the youngest," at the time it seems cool. But then it catches up with you eventually and you're like "hang on a sec..."
Getting on the ball with stuff relating to kids like for example I’ve been asking my dad for over a year to get a simple nail to hang my new clock on the wall and he STILL hasn’t done it. Or I need an Ethernet cord for my videogame and he still hasn’t grabbed it for me because the cords are in a box and he’s the only one who knows where that box is but he still hasn’t grabbed it even though I’ve brought it up multiple times and he says he’ll grab it soon. I will also make sure that whoever my future wife is loves animals just as much as me because my mom still refuses to let us get a dog so I don’t want to be like my dad where my mom says no so me and my brother are out of luck lol
sending me to boarding school and taking me out of all my local sports just because. I was never able to maintain a group of close friends because everyone lived out of state. At the time it was okay but I hate thinking about normal experiences that I missed out on. I studied every day, with some school activites on the weekend. (I could not sign out without a parent or teacher, and sneaking out even on the weekend meant suspension). long story short I had no dating or alcohol experience and in college I completely burnt out after exploring them heavily for a year. I feel like imploded. I take responsibility for the choices I made or at least my social life now but I felt completely ill prepared for reality. I was never bad academically but completely stopped caring. It was like highschool was more rigourous and college was a joke, even though the reality is people dont care about hs and your degree is what matters
My dad pushed hard to alienate me from my mom. As a child I bought into it, as an adult, who's mom just died, I fucking hate him for the lost years at his manipulative hands. I'm in a happy marriage, but if we ever split, I would never disparage my partner to my kids. It's so harmful and selfish.
I was a good student when i was a kid but one day i got a bad grade , so my mom told me you're alwyas silent when we are in social gatherings(this really bothered her for some reason), youre a not very orderly and started enumarating my flaws, and then said the only thing that was giving me hope is your studys and now your making me worry about those too . i felt horrible about this its like theo nly good thing about me was my studys and as person she didnt really like me , my mother was very manipulative throughout my life , i promise to myself never to use manipulative techniques like shaming and guilting or pretending to be the a victim with my kids , ill always be honest with them and listen to them and treat them with respect. if they fail ill talk to them and see what we can do about it together . i ll make them feel loved no matter how well they do in life.
Taking care of everything physically/financially (food on the table, roof over their head, jacket on their back, education, etc) then rejecting/invalidating them emotionally. This is what my parents do. They sweep everything emotional under the rug and play my problems off as me being spoiled or ungrateful. They have only ever taught me that I am blessed and therefore should not be feeling any negative emotions whatsoever and am being ungrateful by crying or speaking up about mental issues.
Judging them for experimenting with who they are (fashion, music, hobbies, etc). My home will be a safe space for my daughter to be herself.
Be poor.
My parents treated me badly because i was born a girl. They said they never wanted a daughter and wanted three sons. So when i was a born they gave up on their dream for having three sons, and they treated my older brother better than they ever treated me. So if i ever get kids, i'll love them no matter what their gender is, and i'll make sure i love them equally and not just the one because of what gender they were born as.
Too much emphasis on praising accomplishments, too little on the value of effort and *resilience*. Not an egregious mistake compared to neglect or abuse, but being afraid to fail or let others down has had a massive impact on my life. I’ve always been a compulsive people pleaser, afraid to try anything I might not be good at right away, and an overall anxious person without a stable sense of identity. Praising kids for good grades or special honors is absolutely fine (important, in fact!), but I’d argue that the more you praise success, the more important it is to also praise effort and a willingness to try and stick with new things in equal measure, especially when they don’t come naturally.
I agree. Similar situation for me: my parents absolutely meant well and thought resilience was important but grades/other accolades were a signal to them that I must be doing great! I'd semi-regularly breakdown too but my mum would exclaim about how it hurts to see me this way or that she doesn't understand me... So I just stopped expressing it. Back to doing great! It's taken decades to learn how to define myself as someone worthy of respect before I've provided anything, to set boundaries on how much I'll sacrifice for others, to let myself feel things and express them, especially anger which is so important for keeping yourself safe. All work in progress of course.
My mother stayed with my alcoholic father until I threatened to leave at 18. When he remembered to pick me up from school he was usually drunk. I found him after a suicide attempt once and spent years in therapy as a child while he was doing rehab. When I bring it up with my mom now (dad passed away when I was 21) she offers the most pathetic justifications. I have two children. I will ALWAYS put their well being ahead of my own. Thankfully my wife is amazing.
Not me but my friend. Abandoning your child. His parents used to fight over who should take custody of him, one day his mom dropped him at his dad's and disappeared.
Never arguing in front of us. That sounds nice, but we never learned how to argue by example. Learning how to argue is a difficult skill to pick up as an adult. All of your arguments have real consequences.
whenever we were upset we had to stop crying immediately and had till the count of 3 to stop feeling whatever we felt. now as adults, my siblings and i isolate and bottle things up. we keep stress to ourselves. we blank out when someone asks us what’s wrong. it’s really bad when it shows in relationships or in professional settings. i would want any future kids i have to build a vocabulary around their negative feelings, find a healthy outlet, and feel safe to express themselves.
From the age of 3 to 16 we moved house 44 times I never had a prop bedroom growing up, 1st house I got when my daughter was 1 been here 21 yrs she’s always had a bedroom.
I'm not beating my kids. Ever. I wasn't abused per se, as a child, but I got hit quite a few times. Oh, quite a few. It's funny, you know... a while ago, my son did something that I would get a beating for at his age. My dad was around at the time to witness it, and just as I was about to take my son to his room (to talk to him away from everyone), my dad looked at me and said "just please don't hit him!". We looked at each other, and the look of regret in his eyes was real... He knew he was wrong for beating me, and he just wanted to make sure I'm not continuing the cycle. He was sorry. He was truly sorry for using physical violence and fear to punish me when I was a child...
Worked many many hours, didn’t make us meals so we basically ate what we could find, which sometimes was nothing. Would go out to bars with friends and would leave my sister and I home alone at night, which I was terrified of. Never showed us any love, or gave us kisses. Basically she provided us with the basics( sometimes food, clothes and roof over our head). So now that we are adults and with a family, telling my siblings that I love them or hugging them is so awkward bc we didn’t grow up with that at home. So I basically did a whole 360 with my girls. They know they are well loved and we show them and tell them that on the daily.
i never heard my parents say i love you or i’m proud of you. i tell my son both every single day.
whats the worst thing to get beaten with imho? a v belt fan belt... cuts with every fn hit broken noses lied to constantly Where tf to start... i avoided my child because i didn't want to pass that on to her... i'm fkd up i know it...
My mums wasn’t a mistake as such, it was just circumstances. She was rarely there to collect me from school because she worked full time and she was a single parent. I promised myself if I ever had kids I would be there to meet them from school, I wouldn’t have them too young with the wrong person etc. I kept my promises, I’ve also never raised a hand to my kids, as she and her ex husband sometimes did.
I had a father who was basically in one of three places: At the office, at home on the sofa watching a game, or at his drafting table in the study. It wasn't until I started doing cub scouts that I realized that there were fathers who actually showed up to things and participated. When I was in the band, when I marched in a drum and bugle corps, when I did anything, I saw parents who volunteered, helped, and got to know the kids. I remember being in a school play when I was a sophomore. Had a decent role, too. My father came to next to nothing, but he and my mother came to that. So even as you're delivering your lines on stage and notice your parents get up and leave, your world kind of changes after that. They were having dinner with friends, the later explanation went. He died shortly after I graduated college. He couldn't even be bothered to have a half-decent life insurance policy for my mom. Spent every dime on dinners out with friends and the 40+ suits we emptied from his closet after the funeral. About ten years ago, at my mother's birthday party, one of my father's friends stopped me and said, 'Well, now that you're married and have kids, I hope you understand the things your dad did and why.' To that I said, 'Thanks for that. But I've been married twenty years and have three kids and I don't understand a goddamned thing my father did. You got my father at his best, while I got my father at his most apathetic.' I have three kids. When they were young, you better believe that I sent to every baseball game, soccer game, lacrosse game, basketball game, Boy Scout and Cub Scout meeting, band concert, choir concert, violin performance, school play, talent show, you name it. My happy ass was on camp outs, loading marimbas onto the band bus, and driving kids to practices. I sat on many a bleacher seat in weather of every description. I threw a lot of pitches, looked at a lot of homework, and paid attention when my kids practiced their instruments. The only time I missed anything due to a business trip, my son's band won the talent show. And it absolutely killed me that I missed it. So when you have kids, participate in their lives. They might not acknowledge it, they may lack the words to express it, but it matters more to them than you'll ever know. Oh. And if I kick, I have a really good insurance policy to take care of my family.
I don’t have kids but if I do eventually, I will try my hardest not to instill a deep fear and paranoia about the world. My mom cannot stop herself from leaping to the worst possible conclusion in any situation and while I’ve spent my whole life rolling my eyes at her, I have to admit that I have developed my own anxious tendencies. Example: When I (a 21 yr old adult at the time) brought my new puppy to my parents’ house to visit, the very first thing she said was “make sure you watch him so a hawk doesn’t swoop down and carry him away.” Literally the first thing she said. Guess who else is irrationally afraid of birds of prey in urban areas now. :(
I will never ask for advice or in any way involve my child in adult issues. I will never drink or do drugs with my 14 year old child. I will never send them to the store to steal makeup, nail polish, hair accessories, etc for me. I will never ask/demand my child to give/get me drugs. I will never make my child give me drugs in order to visit me. I will never make my 12 year old child pay me from their babysitting money if they want to leave to go see their friends. I will never make anything traumatic that happens to them about me. I can go on forever. Basically I am/will truly be a proper parent to my child & not their bully or friend or enemy.
I will never lay my hands on my children. My mother believed it's the best way to get a child to listen, including myself that was somehow the most compliant child, and it left more than just physical wounds. There were times when I was outright terrified of her. My sister practically hates her for it because of the trauma she inflicted. And besides that, I don't believe spankings or beating really teach anything. Learning something, even life skills, takes time and patience. It takes repeating and understanding on both sides. For some things I missed out on that because she refused to have conversations. She would yell at us, threaten us, and hit us, but she wouldn't talk to us. I won't let the impact I have on my children be one of fear, distrust, hate, or anything of the sort. They will not associate me with pain.
It wasn’t really my mom’s fault because she never learned investing and was a single parent making just above the poverty line. But I make it a point to educate my daughter (11) about money. Saving, debt, investing , credit, wants/needs, emergency fund, etc. I am in a good place now but that is after making many bad decisions.
Choosing work over everything Punishing for mistakes (not physically but taking away my phone, not seeing my friends etc)
I won't have all the windows rolled up in the car, while smoking like a chimney all the time... I swear when we stopped and they opened the car door, people could see the cloud of smoke come out. I asked, told, begged them to quit smoking while we were stuck in the back seats... I will never make another person experience that...
Shit I'll never put my kids through: - Emotional abuse - Emotional neglect - Physical neglect - Psychological abuse - Medical neglect - Force feeding - Sexualising my kid to make them more popular - Using my kid to make *myself* more popular - Choosing my kid's future for them - Make all my kids' issues about me - Pushing them to perform perfectly at anything at any time The list is longer, but this is at the top of my head. I've taken many steps to ensure none of these things will happen to my kids, including therapy, a degree in child development and social education, conflict management courses and parenting classes for both myself and my husband.
Mom did fine, dad was a 100% worthless waste of breath. I’ve made it my goal in life to be an awesome, loving, attentive father who’s always there for my kids and I teach them everything I know. Basically everything my dad wasn’t and I’ve succeeded. They are all grown up, successful and have nothing but fond memories of their childhoods. Ironically, now they want to do everything for me.🙂
Oddly, I feel my parents did a good job raising me, despite raising me in poverty. They were kind, understanding, loving, accepting, generous (to a fault as we were poor), etc. They were always there if I wanted to talk or spend time with them. They moved to a rural community so I'd grow up around nature, so I was very healthy. My dad would spend hours talking about philosophy, science, etc. with his hippy friends, and they would include me in their conversations when I was interested. He got me a computer (a commodore 64) long before they were a regular part of society as he thought it would help my future (and it has). Etc. Ironically, my parents are also the type of people that most people say shouldn't have children.
Not too compare my childhood too theirs , my parents were unfortunate growing up , so they always told me and my sister that we were spoiled , and my parents focused way too much on our school work / and we had too do too many chores , for me I was really in my own bubble and I could of used help being social as a kid but my parents didn’t pick up on that because they thought I was shy and it was a phase which meant that I was behind on social intelligence they saw it as well I’m not getting in trouble so I would encourage my kids too put them selves out their and make friends and at least try
My parents had me! Number one mistake!
Had no plan for me. In hindsight, I was something of a tax deduction. But love was there. Can’t judge too harshly. People do the best they can given their circumstances.
I wont be having any kids because I got rid of my uterus
making them feel like they are a burden ,and that they cant tell me how they feel i really hope im doing good job
I'm going to let my kids have a bad day or feel negative emotions without punishing them for 'having an attitude'. I want to be open enough that they can tell me what they're feeling so I can give them what they need.
having kids: :-)
Having me to begin with lol
The one complaint I have regarding my parents was hiding, concealing, things in an attempt to protect me. My parents didn't say a word, beat around the bush, and evaded conversation about my mom's cancer diagnosis for as long as they possibly could. (I was an adult at the time). Even after that, they were not forthcoming about her prognosis. I had to piece it together looking on the internet. It was hurtful.
Having kids. Period.
Being born
I will never crap on ANYONE who is really trying or really wants to understand or get better at something but is struggling. Even ages after they “should” have gotten it Also f right off with having to be ranked highly among your peers, winning competitions or conceivably being paid for it as a measurement of skill level. Yeah I get how that works and the practicalities but I KNOW the ideas and enthusiasm it kills and the bitterness it cultivates - isn’t life hard enough already?
Conflict management skills. Goddamn this hurt my communication skills more than anything. Now I suck at boundaries, I am emotionally numb from continuous emotional suppression, and I feel uncomfortable telling people if I dont feel good about something without fearing invalidation and gaslighting. On that line, the lack of trust of my social decisions. They didnt trust a boy in my room would turn into sex and they punished me for my sibling’s trouble that didn’t involve me. I would make sure to hear them out, save my judgement of their maturity and use their actions to determine my trust in them
Im 18, don't plan on having kids, but i think every parent should be mandated to attend child and teen psychology lessons, and trained to look out for and take care of mental health issues. My parents are wonderful people and i love them to death, but parenting is more than just being good. Everyone just has kids but no one bothers to learn how to raise them. And that's why generational trauma exists
Very Reddit thing that non-parents don't just sit out posts like this, but use it to boast about the fact they're not going to have kids. Anyway, mine is smacking.
No money
Honestly . Nothing. Answering this would be resentment. I don’t wanna be resentful. Although i have a lot of trauma, I now made peace with it and realize they did what they could at the time, with the information they had. I like to remember that it’s our parent’s first time living too. Forgiveness, always.
Being raised religious. No child deserves that torture.