Did you have a happy childhood?

[Silver Fox]

Mostly yes. Youth is wasted on the young, as the saying goes.

 

[Turdus philomelos]

Sadly no, mum thought I would be happy with a dolls pram than my own bike.

As a consequence never managed to gain those bike handling skills you learn when you had no fear of falling off.

 

[biggs682]

Oh yes and still enjoying it at 55

 

[Venod]

the summer of 76 was great

Spent a lot of it on strike sat outside a factory, I can't recall why we were striking, probably for more pay, I left that job in 78 and stayed with the next company until retirement.

 

[steveindenmark]

I had a great childhood. I grew upon the East Coast of Yorkshire with mum and dad and 5 siblings. We had a 2 bedroomed house which was 100m from the sea and backed onto a large playing field. At the far end of the playing field was an open air swimming pool. Dad owned the house and it was spotless and always well maintained as he was a painter and decorator. We were all well fed, well looked after and well mannered. dad was an ex commando sergeant but mum ruled the house. She was tiny but she couldn't half wallop if you stepped out of line.

My summer holidays made Swallows and Amazons look boring. The friends I made at that time are still my friends, although I have lived out of England half of my life.

Mum and dad are both gone now, which is a shame, as the older I get the more my respect and admiration grows for them. How they managed to do with one income and 6 children in a tiny house, just beggars belief. We didn't have much, but we didn't need much. We had great friends, the sea, beach, cliffs and countryside and were loved.

 

[Bonus]

spent my youth in the early 70's in Crawley. Could have been worse.

 

[Aravis]

I know my parents tried very hard not to replicate the things that went wrong in their childhoods, and then made plenty of new mistakes themselves. A cycle which I have no doubt perpetuated.

Long after both my parents are dead, I'm still resentful of a few things, which is a bit tragic really. But everything they did was well-intentioned, of that I'm quite certain.

 

[keithmac]

Mine was pretty shoot, probably why I'm a miserable so and so now.

Saying that I dropped all my baggage as best as you can when my son was born and now have a daughter as well, making bloody sure they have a better time of than I did.

Nice to see them both growing up good well centred individuals.

Son's top achiever in his school year so we're keeping an eye on that as they maybe pushing him a bit to hard to get there SATS test score up next year, we've always said if he tries his best that's more than good enough for us.

 

[Roadhump]

Mixed feelings, mainly not good. It was okay in terms of a nice house, physical comfort, food and clothing, but I lived so much of my childhood and youth in a constant state of fear; partly because I was a grammar school kid who became a convenient target for gangs of kids from other schools, but mainly because of my dramatic, overbearing, controlling dad who was probably the worst bully I ever had to suffer.

Whilst I am sure my dad wanted to mean well, he really did epitomise the phrase, "action speaks louder than words"; he would bawl me out if I expressed an opinion he didn't agree with, regularly slap me around - and on 2 or 3 occasions he kicked the living daylights out of me, and stifle my initiative. There were occasional glimpses of warmth and encouragement from him, but on the whole he talked the talk of a good dad but didn't walk the walk; he never came to watch me play football, or rugby despite his own prowess in that sport and his stated pride that I would play it too (I hated the egg chasing game, but enjoy watching it now), and despite his own alcoholism which eventually killed him, he never found the time to take me for a pint when I came of age (small things can mean so much) or afterwards despite having 32 years, until I was 50, to think about doing so, before he died. My mum was lovely but she was cowed by my dad and her blind loyalty to him, and was scared to intervene. I know he affected my 2 sisters in similar and different ways as well.

I know I have made mistakes with my own children, but I have deliberately used my experience to try to make things better for them, I hope I have succeeded to some extent.

 

[keithmac]

I tried digging around to find out what happened in my early years (5 to 10 mainly) as I have very limited memory of that time, probably my brain suppressing it..

I know I spent time in a childrens home for no fault of my own but because it's shut down I can't get any records of it.

You would think there would be a file on me somewhere but obviously not!.

I have great respect to my now passed Grandma and Grandad as they did the best they could but the rest of my family I still view with disdain.

It's funny, my best friend from school went through nearly the same as me (divorced parents early on, alcohol affected father, etc) I just had the joys of a sectioned Mother on top of all that. Nearly 30 years on we are still best mates.

Happy days!

 

[keithmac]

Lets brighten the mood a bit, hopefully if my two posted they would say deffinitely yes!.

Took them away to Bridlington last week and plenty more trips to come this year. They thoroughly enjoyed it.

Not a cheap hobby but deffinitely money well spent imho.

 

[furball]

I've always thought I had an idyllic childhood but reading a lot of the posts on this thread I can appreciate how privileged it was.
That said I think I was lucky to survive. I went out with my friend in the morning and went home when it got dark. We played in chicken houses, went across the fields to a quarry where we climbed down and roasted potatoes in fires we lit (the fires started better with the assistance of a spot of petrol from a can kept in my father's garage). We learned to swim in the river but the best fun of all was jumping over the swinging arm of the sewage filter bed that was across the field behind our house.

 

[Mrs M]

Lets brighten the mood a bit, hopefully if my two posted they would say deffinitely yes!.

Took them away to Bridlington last week and plenty more trips to come this year. They thoroughly enjoyed it.

Not a cheap hobby but deffinitely money well spent imho.

View attachment 347852

Good on you!
They do look happy
I don't have any kids but I'm not embarrassed to say how proud I am of my sister and her hubby.
They have 2 lovely, polite, well behaved kids who are a credit to them.
Have everything we didn't
Sister didn't want to inflict any of the c**p we had as kids and they've done a brilliant job.

 

[Roadhump]

I've always thought I had an idyllic childhood but reading a lot of the posts on this thread I can appreciate how privileged it was.
That said I think I was lucky to survive. I went out with my friend in the morning and went home when it got dark. We played in chicken houses, went across the fields to a quarry where we climbed down and roasted potatoes in fires we lit (the fires started better with the assistance of a spot of petrol from a can kept in my father's garage). We learned to swim in the river but the best fun of all was jumping over the swinging arm of the sewage filter bed that was across the field behind our house.

When our kids came along, I always worried about them when I thought of some of the things I got up to in my youth. I was lucky not to be electrocuted on a few occasions. I had an electric train set and one day when unplugging it, instead of pulling the plug out, I pulled the flex sharply, the plug came out of the socket, but one of the pins snapped. Being scared of what my dad would do I pushed the pin back into the socket and then put the plug back in. When my dad found out he was fine about it, and actually told me I shouldn't be scared to tell him things, as what I had done was very dangerous.

Another time, my curiosity led me to shove my thumb into a light bulb socket, I quickly pulled it out when I felt a sharp, intense tingling, but then I did it again to make sure it wasn't a one-off, when it hurt just as much, I realised the danger and never did it again. The third time, I was getting the train home from my mate's one wet winter day and, to show off, instead of using the bridge to get to the opposite platform I crossed the track; the bottom of my jeans were wet and as I was between the tracks a few inches from the electrified third rail, I felt a warm, tingling increasing in intensity, going up my leg. I jumped over the track and was okay, but some time later when I learned more about electricity, I realised this was probably the electricity from the 3rd rail arcing to my wet clothing, and I was probably a few more inches away from being turned into a cinder.

Most of us come through such tomfoolery okay, but there are occasional tragedies, a couple of years later, a lad I knew was running away from a fight and was electrocuted at that station. There but for the grace of God, go I.

 

[keithmac]

Good on you!
They do look happy
I don't have any kids but I'm not embarrassed to say how proud I am of my sister and her hubby.
They have 2 lovely, polite, well behaved kids who are a credit to them.
Have everything we didn't
Sister didn't want to inflict any of the c**p we had as kids and they've done a brilliant job.

I wouldn't say it makes everyone a good/ better parent going through an interesting childhood but when me and my wife decided to have children I knew I'd be doing the absolute best I could for ours.

Deffinitely life changing (all for the better!).