How was your childhood and how has it affected your adult life?

dseag2

dseag2

Dallas, TX
Location
Dallas, TX
If anyone wants to share or you feel that it may be cathartic, please do so.

I was an only child and grew up in a house where my father lived for his career and was very pragmatic. I still knew that he loved me, and as he got older I used to run errands with him on weekends. My mother came from a very dysfunctional family and had very low self-esteem but did everything she could to be the best mother she could. She was very OCD when it came to cleanliness and used to make me and my friends play on the front porch so we didn't get the inside of the house dirty.

I still lived at home in college, and she always had lunch or dinner ready for me when I got home. I only got in trouble a few times and it was always "wait until your father gets home".

There are advantages and disadvantages to being an only child. Yes, you don't have siblings to fight with, and when my father passed away 21 years ago I became the executor of his estate with no challenges. The downside is, you are the only offspring so all of the pressure is on you to be successful. I never wanted to be a disappointment to my parents, so I always worked extra hard to make them proud. Ultimately, I did.

Both of my parent have passed now, but I do look back at how my childhood has shaped me as an adult. It was not really "dysfunctional", but it was not easy either. Feel free to share.
 

My childhood was like a rollercoaster parts of it were idyllic and parts of it were chaotic.

My grandmother was my rock. She taught me empathy, thrift, and joy in the small things in life.

It’s interesting to me that my sister and I who are only three years a part have very different views on our childhood as well as life in general.

I believe that there must be a brief window of time in every child’s development that shapes them for life.
 
Same here. My parents were "strict", what would be called "abusive" these days. I put this down to a number of things, especially their total inability to logically explain their position, and a good dose of insecurity. I know, that as Shakespeare put it :
"The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones", but I never forgave them for some things and carry that bitterness to this day.
 
From ages 10-16 was the worst of my childhood.I was sent to 2 boarding schools,then for 2 yrs lived with my aunt&uncle in Baltimore,MD. I had trouble with schoolwork,put back in the 4th grade, 9th grade.My older sister,younger brother didn't have that problem,they got to stay home interact with our parents 24/7.It took me years to forgive them
The experience of being at 2 boarding schools,Deerfield, Mass,&Toronto,Canada did something emotionally to me.Its why I like to be by myself. I've heard from others who went to boarding school,they felt the same way,, I accepted what happened to me a long time ago
As I grew older,made a life for myself by staying here because of my job,have a group of close friends who are my 'buffalo family'.My sister lives across'the pond' in England,we've never been close,my brother is in CT,we're very close,talk every Sun
 
had a great childhood,great parents not wealthy but we had every thing we needed.taught me i did not need a lot of material things,just try to be a good person.and treat other people like you would want to be treated.my parents were not perfect.nobody is,we were taught to do the best we can .learn from your mistakes.
 
Last edited:
I had very strict parents. My brother and I had little freedom outside of the house, but total freedom inside the house. No set bedtime and we could do as we pleased. I believe that that lack of outside freedom was because we moved around a lot because of my father's work. A few months here. a year there, then somewhere else or back to a place we had already been.

As I look back on it, I went to school with children of all races and nationalities. Native Americans, Asian, Black, White, Arab, and more I didn't even realize. It taught me that there are good and bad in every one. And moving so much taught me how to make friends quickly and easily.

I hated the strictness at the time, but as I look back on it, I believe that my parents were afraid for us because we seemed to always be someplace new and strange. It taught me to be independent and strict in the rules I set for myself.
 
I have several friends who are still dealing with childhood trauma and have been in therapy all of their lives. I must confess, that my childhood was idyllic. We had parents who loved, cared, nurtured and encouraged all of us. My two sisters and I are very close, as adults, even though we live far apart. I feel bad for so many others.
 
I had a wonderful childhood with 2 wonderful parents and an older brother and sister. My brother who was 13 yrs old when I was born, wasn't home much. So it was mainly my sister who was 2 yrs older than me who spent a lot of time together. I became my sister's defender if anyone bothered with her I took care of it. We still laugh about things we did growing up. She would call me her little guardian.
 
I was a "wild and free" country boy who did whatever he darn wanted to do and I did plenty. I did things that I would never tell anyone now what I did. I had a lot of fun and that is maybe why I never faced male manapause. Nope, never bought a red convertible nor a Harley Motorcycle. I'm glad I did those things and have no regrets. Youth is fleeting and life is short. That is the time to kiss the girls, drink the booze, party all night, drive around and look for "chicks" and just have a wild time. Like I said, NO REGRETS!
 
I had a good childhood with loving parents and grandparents. We weren't wealthy by any means, but we got what we needed and quite a bit of what we wanted, thanks to my mother who could squeeze a nickel until the buffalo's nose bled.

We were "free range children". Everybody thinks that's a new concept, but back then a lot of parents didn't "hover" all the time. Stay within the allowable boundaries, come home for meals and only come home crying if you're losing blood at an alarming rate....LOL. My mother had a dinner bell outside the back door, which could be heard for a long ways. We knew the range in which it could be heard and knew to come running when it was rung. Other than that, stay off the railroad tracks (which we played on, just not in sight of the house) and keep our ears peeled for the bell. All was well.

Mom and Dad were very involved in our schools (altogether too much, for my taste back then) and were very active in our church.
 
We lived on USAF bases the majority of the time. They were very safe places to live, and we were what they call "free range" children. We had to be home for meals, or to do homework after school. We were not wealthy, but we did not know that. We had everything we needed and wanted. Except the huge stuffed St. Bernard that cost $25 (a lot of $$ back then). We kids loved living on base - lots of kids to play with, lots of things to do.

My mother was a child in the former East Germany during WWII. She was very traumatized by that experience. As result, she was very over-protective. I think she felt safe on AF bases. We kids never left the base, except when we lived in Germany -- always to a bakery or for me to go to the Army hospital in Landstuhl. (I was born with my ureters having no valves and attached to the wrong place on my bladder. Had surgery for that when I was ten. Before that I spent a lot of time in hospitals.)

She was really scared when she made plans for us to go to Leipzig so we could meet her relatives. My brother was baby, and he stayed home with our father. The American Red Cross stationed people at the border in case she was arrested. She was always reminding us to never talk about anything American in public. She took us to her twin aunts' house, so they could meet us. They were very old (I was 8), and had a huge collection of dolls. Her stepfather (her father and her first stepfather had been killed in the war) was a baker who made delicious cakes for breakfast - several kinds. Cake was always served in our home for holiday breakfasts.

When I was 11, some kids were murdered in Auburn, AL. My mom told me the day before I was to go on my first girl scout camping trip that I could not go because she didn't want me to be murdered. I was so upset! https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.co...ngs-plains-recalled-50-years-later/831024001/

My mom changed when my dad got out of the service. She became extra protective. She not only warned us about the bad things that could happen if we weren't careful (like using the monkey bars and the jungle gym), she forbade us to go places because people would get us. I assume she met kidnap us. This stymied our activities. People with whom we socialized were invited to our house several times before we could do anything outside our house with them. One of them was a boy who used to play "My Ding--a-Ling", a song he and my mom thought was very funny, and I couldn't figure out why. Chuck Berry song, I think. (Do not enlighten me; I know what the song means.)

I could not wait to move out of the house so I could have my freedom. I was very eager to see what the real world was like. I had read about it in the news and in books, and felt woefully unprepared to join that world. By the time I was 23, I still had seen some of things I'd read about, so my best friend took me to where I wanted to go. I wanted to see for myself that prostitutes peddled their wares on the streets. Boy, was that interesting, but she would let me get out of the car and talk to them. (In retrospect, a good thing.) We also saw drug dealers, too!

When I was 20, I went to Six Flags to ride all the roller coasters all day. My mother had impressed upon us how dangerous they were. They were scary, but I wanted to get over my fear of them. I discovered I don't like roller coasters. One was some sort of water ride, and I loved that, so every time I went to an amusement park after that, I had great fun on all the water-related stuff.

When I was 29, my brother was the bartender and bouncer at a strip club. I had never been to one, so two of my friends accompanied me there. My brother was nice about it, even though he made us sit at the bar right in front of him. I wanted to talk to a stripper, and he arranged that, and I got to more or less interview her, to find out all sorts of things. The customers there were gross.

Anyway, the upshot is that it was always anxiety-inducing to do something new because my mother's voice was always in the back of my head, cautioning me not to do it due to worst case scenarios that could happen. I didn't do anything that I thought would be unsafe. I am a very curious person, is all, even though the worst that can happen is always in the back of my mind. To her last breath, my mother was always worried when I went to a mall or to Walmart. Too many people over the decades had been shot in parking lots of those places. Of course not in her Walmart or the malls near her house, but anywhere in the USA would do for her to be petrified.
 
Middle class, parent's collage educated. Dad became legally blind when I was around two; mother had to get a job to support the family. With their roles reversed, my dad raised me while my mother worked. She was "emotionally unavailable", like a lot of working fathers of the fifties were. That affected the way I related to women, to a large degree. Once I became aware of that, I sought to correct my dysfunction.
I'm still working on reconciling the bumpy parts of my life, with mixed results.
 
My family life was the absolute pits. No need to elaborate.
I had to amuse myself and found pleasure in venturing up into the hills by myself.
Nature is beautiful and serene. Any angst dissipates when amongst the flora and fauna.
How has it shaped my adult?
I am who I am now because of my home life experiences.
Introverted, I would very easily adapt to the life of a hermit.
I am empathetic and compassionate to those having a hard time in life and do what I can to ease the way for them.
 
Bretrick said:
My family life was the absolute pits. No need to elaborate.
I had to amuse myself and found pleasure in venturing up into the hills by myself.
Nature is beautiful and serene. Any angst dissipates when amongst the flora and fauna.
How has it shaped my adult?
I am who I am now because of my home life experiences.
Introverted, I would very easily adapt to the life of a hermit.
I am empathetic and compassionate to those having a hard time in life and do what I can to ease the way for them.
Click to expand...
I wish there were hills or any kind place to venture when I was a kid rather than the tract houses and parking lots as far as the eye could see I grew up in . I instead retreated into books and television; maybe if there had been anything resembling nature I would've become a regular environmentalist instead of one whose favorite outdoor activity is going back inside. :LOL:
 
never got yelled at for having bad grades.they helped me with my school work and was very patient with me.i got a lot better.had normal average grades,that was the best i could do and that was good enough for them.graduated high school and then got my degree from technical college.i have learned to be patient with my kids.sometimes it was very hard but they all turned out just fine.
 
I just saw a snippet of the Adele interview with Oprah. She mentions having a feeling of abandonment her entire life that has affected her relationships. Her therapist made her revert back to her life as a child, which seems to have helped her tremendously. 16 years ago, my therapist made me do the same... to connect with my 9 year-old self... and there was lots of crying but it helped me move on.
 
My mom had little time or love for kids and this was sad and troubling. Dad was very loving we were little, but withdrew when we became teens. I was ambivalent as a child and just wanted to fit in. As a teen I was popular and impossible. Growing up we were latch key kids which meant responsibility. My maternal grandmother was absolutely wonderful to me and loved me more than anyone else in the family did. She had an unshakable belief in my abilities for some reason and to this day, I still hear her voice guiding me through times of confusion or trouble. She's the reason I'm such an autonomous individualist and this is probably more than anyone wants to know. 😊
 
childhood:
I spent my childhood always alone and adventuring. ( always barefoot) I did such dangerous things that I dared not tell anyone! (killing rattle snakes, crawling in caves, walking on condemned bridges, playing around quicksand; etc. I always wanted to go places no one had gone before, and I did!
Adulthood:
After i divorced my 1st husband, I spent a year traveling solo and exploring Alaska , so I guess it carried over. (Had some dangerous & harrowing experiences)
childhood:
I always wanted to do artwork but was told I had no talent, CONSTANTLY! (even by friends, teachers and relatives)
adulthood:
Now I do artwork and don't care if anyone likes it or not!
childhood:
Read a lot, had a deep interest in the paranormal because I knew people's thoughts and could see spirits and see and hear Holy Angels.
Adulthood:
Still do.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top