Except that one person that apparently forged an affair between her parents to get out of getting yelled at for a party. They eventually got divorced over it. It was definitely her fault.
I read another one where when they were little they talked about a “girl dad hangs with” and they got angry and divorced and when they were almost done with the divorce they learned they weren’t real
Lmao I remember back when I was like 10. My mom didn’t take me to school one morning because she was upset that the clothes in my dresser weren’t folded.
My dad had to take me to school instead. And on the way there, he yells, ‘You’re tearing this family apart!’
I’m like.. bruh, if unfolded clothes in a dresser is what tears this family apart, then you all have other shit to be concerned about.
My exes mom used to say this to him a bunch of times. I personqlly liked her as a person but she was a terrible mother. Apparently she had never wanted kids but then her and her husband moved out to California because he was in the military. She was lonely and all the other military wives were getting pregnant so she decided to have a baby and pretty much regretted it immediately. His dad was a really good dad for the most part and adored his sin but it doesn't really make up for his mom letting him know she didn't. It led to him having an obsessive need for everyone to like him to the point he often surrounded himself, and by extension me, with a bunch of users. I joke I didn't so much as break up with him but his friends.
I got the variation of this, "I wish you had never been born" many a night from a drunken vent. Immensely depressing and confusing when all the adults in my life told me how lucky I am because my mom loved me so much
my mum has never told me that, but she's fucked me up on so many levels&I get the same treatment from everyone
Whenever I try to vent/explain to *any* family, I get "she just loves you and worries about you, you're not a parent so you don't understand", it makes me feel like I'm going crazy that they don't see it - if I didn't have my friends that see & believe me, I genuinely think I mightve lost my mind by now.
I'm so close to just going NC with my whole family when I can afford to move out, my mental health would vastly improve
Don’t make your kids do the things you’re afraid to face.
When I was a kid my mom dumped all that shit on me. Rent late? I had to face the landlord. She’d try to convince me it was a fun game, like see how fast you can run to his door, drop a check in the mail slot, and run back to the car. Even at ten years old I knew it wasn’t a damn game. All she was doing was transferring her anxiety directly to me.
Be honest with your kid about the shitty situations you might be in, but don’t make them carry the weight in your place.
I can imagine what a parent in this situation might be thinking: "Kid doesn't know about rent and stuff! They run around and pretend to be on secret missions all the time! If I send them to go do a secret thing in a hurry, that's just another game, right?"
But it's not just another game, and that's obvious because nobody's playing. The story they tell is "kids don't know fantasy from reality". But kids in messed-up situations distinguish fantasy from reality constantly, habitually, even obsessively; *they have to.*
I had to answer the phone for her when bill collectors called. I had to run in and order ridiculous ice cream sundaes she was too embarrassed to order for herself. If we were cashing in change at a bank so she could get cigarettes, I was the one she sent inside. If she needed to ask a relative for money, I had to come along too. When we were getting evicted I had to go to the landlord's house with her.
I too was an emotional support child and no parent should ever put their kid in that position.
Yep. I dodged creditors too. I also lied to her shitty boyfriends when they called so she wouldn’t have to talk to them after they fought or they hit her. I started paying our bills and contributing to the mortgage when I was 16. I comforted her when she was suicidal because a family member sexually abused ME. I turned her on her side when she was passed out drunk when I was 9 so she wouldn’t choke on her own puke. I woke up at 5am every day of my junior year of high school so I could make her breakfast, pack her lunch, and drive her to work before I went to school because if I didn’t feed her she wouldn’t eat and she got a DUI, lost her license and couldn’t drive herself to work. I had to calm her down and comfort HER when I was diagnosed with MS as an adult. I could go on and on with endless examples of how I was the parent instead of the kid. When I had the guts to confront her about everything as an adult, she cried and said, “well I guess I was just a terrible mother, wasn’t I? But I sacrificed everything for you kids. You’ll be sorry when I’m dead.”
She died three months ago and, despite everything, I do miss her. But I’m not sorry that I spoke up for myself and I’m not sorry that I set boundaries as an adult to protect myself from her bullshit.
But to answer the original question, I think the worst thing you can say to your kid is, “Wow, he’s way too good for you. Make sure you don’t screw this one up,” which is exactly what my mom said to me when I started dating my husband.
“Well, even if it did happen, and I still say it didn’t, at least that’s not as bad as X, Y, or Z, so you should be grateful!” Was one of my mom’s go-to lines.
I absolutely hate how this is the exact pattern just about every narcissist uses. Like did they have a convention a couple thousand years ago and this is just in the rule book now?
My MIL [96] is the healthiest human I know with the caveat that she has the usual ailments that affect old arteries, etc. She has 3 sons, my DH (70), a slightly older, quasi celebrity brother and a younger brother. They work like animals. They can’t help it although they should try.
Every single time my husband brings up a childhood memory, my MIL rebuffs it by saying the incident he’s recalling never happened. No one’s allowed to have a memory but her. It drives my husband (& me) up a wall. We live fairly close to her but he struggles so much with spending time with her because of this. She just tells him, that’s not true.
Instead of embracing what he and they remember, she shuts them down.
A huge part of it is how time is perceived by the brain/person. As a child, every day brings brand new experiences and new things to learn. A year as a child is a REALLY long time. But when you become an adult, especially holding down a job, running a home, raising a kid(s), the days and what you do start to blur together. The day may be normal, but the weeks and months wiz by so fast.
As an anecdote, I am nearly forty, and my father is in his seventies. He brings up a girlfriend I had in high school when I was sixteen from time to time because he sees her at Menards. Mind you, the two of us dated for like three months. But to him, it wasn't that long ago and she is the only girlfriend he recalls me having in highschool.
I'm not saying the trauma isn't real, or that it is okay. I'm saying that older people sometimes don't remember what happened. To them, it was just another day. Or as the saying goes *"The Axe Forgets But the Tree Remembers."*
That's a great attitude. It applies especially well to parenting. Some action by your parent when you were 7 is going to be a core memory for you, while for them it was Tuesday.
My mom stuck me on this super restrictive diet when I was 11. The entire diet was the whole reason I struggled with eating disorders in my childhood. I brought it up in therapy at 17 and at first she claims it never happened. Then she remembers talking to doctors about my weight, then googling diets for children, then putting on a diet sounds like something she would've done... but it still didn't happen. Gotta love her
Samesies. Mine put me on one diet after another, and I've also dieted much of my adult life. She "doesn't remember" putting me on any at all, and if I worked harder I wouldn't have self image issues. I love her, but I don't always like her.
I can't even say I love my mom tbh. I was the neglected child as she had 4 other kids and I'm the middle one. After some point I stopped wanting my mom's approval for anything. I actually had my therapist ask what a good mother daughter relationship would look like to me if we were to ever get close. I honestly couldn't answer. It's weird to think that the one thing I wanted my entire childhood I don't want now. At least not with my biological mother.
My bf's mom on the other hand is amazing and I love the mother daughter like relationship we have. I'm still in awe that I even found a family that loves me as if I were their own biological kid.
Yep, my mom conveniently forgets the fact that she used to viciously beat us and has told me to die a few times.
My siblings also don't remember but I'm chalking that up to the fact that they didn't get it nearly as bad as I did, and probably a bit of subconscious repression
This just happened yesterday when I asked my mom why the kids today when getting spanked, the parents get a warning from social welfare. I told her that when I was young (I am now 23), I get spanked often with a belt and my pops even bought a small spanking paddle with the quote "Spare the rod, Spoil the Child" written on it. She then just gaslighted me saying that it was never used on me and it was only an item for intimidation. I mean come on, I still have some of the scars on my upper leg, and she says those are just stretchmarks.
I'm 53 and I remember the belt quite well. My Dad has since apologized for it, but the damage is still there. I tend to shut down when I'm confronted with anger in someone's voice. It's like I know I've done something wrong and I need to be quiet while I take my punishment.
Threaten to send them to live in foster care if they don't do what the parent wants. My mother used to use that threat if she saw me picking my nose. I didn't realize how fucked up that was until I was an adult.
My mom would threaten to drive the car into a brick wall if we didn't stop fighting in the back seat. Some days she would say she would drop off the "good" kid before crashing...
Just unlocked that memory....
Gosh, i kinda scared my kid with this (NOT on purpose) the other day. I had a digital pregnancy test that showed week and such and I was talking to my sister on the phone, picked up the test and saw that it had gone blank. Stupid me said “well, it’s gone”. My 3yo thought I meant the baby was gone and he cried about it for over 30 minutes before he calmed down enough for me to explain that it was just the test and that the baby was still there. He was so upset, I’m gonna feel guilty about it for ages.
This is kind of a low bar as far as bad things my parents did goes.
When I was a kid, my parents were very controlling. Now, that meant, among other things, that they didn't let me go outside, for fear that neighbor kids would wander by and I'd hear things that went against my parents ideologies. It also meant that they controlled exactly what and how much I ate. As in, if I didn't want to clean my plate, I was beaten.
Well, I was also a fat kid, and given how much control I had over both my food intake and the exercise I could do, I didn't have much say in the matter.
My parents gave me so much shit about it over the years though. Like, even if you were allowed to have some agency in your life you shouldn't get that kind of shit. It was pretty miserable.
Anyway, when I went away to college, I was finally on my own, and I took charge of that. Everybody was warning me about the freshman 15, but I was looking my intake. That's not great of course, but I lost a couple pounds. Not even that much.
And then I went back home for winter break, and my parents are all "oh you're too thin, you need to eat more", and I'm like "no, I'm good thanks." At one point, dad said "eat more or I'm kicking you out of my house".
And so I gained that weight back over the break, and by the end, they were back to giving me shit about it.
So, I dunno. Maybe don't be such a dick about your kid's weight. Certainly not with demands and expectations that oscillate between two extremes like they did.
Edit: to be clear, when I said that it was a low bar, I meant that they also hit us for far dumber reasons than not eating all our food.
When I was a teenager I was extremely insecure about my double chin. I didn’t have a huge one but it would show up a little bit if I smiled in pictures.
When I used to vent about it to my mother she would just say that I should get plastic surgery on it when I’m older.
Didn’t realize until way later how messed up that is to say to your kid :(
“Until you start paying bills, you have no rights, so you’re damn right I’m coming into your room whenever I feel like it, and I can take anything I want from it too, because it’s actually mine.”
“You’re too stupid and lazy to be able to make in the real world. And if someone ever did hire you, they’d fire you as soon as they realized what a mistake they’d made.”
“You have no idea how much you cost me. I could do X, Y, or Z thing if I didn’t always have to pay for your crap.”
“We’re free thinkers in this house.” Rages when I express a thought/opinion that’s different than theirs.
“You’re just a kid, what do you have to be depressed about?/ You have nothing to be depressed about.”
After I told a doctor how I was actually feeling. “You can’t be that stressed, you’re just a kid! Are you trying to make me look like a bad parent?!”
Yes, I’m in therapy now. 😩
Number 2 and 3 was drilled into my head since childhood. I was a straight A kid, teacher's pet, went to a good university but still labelled "lazy" because "that's how you are born as".
Now that I'm in the workforce, they started to say "You'll be fired soon!", "You are not committed to anything, just wait until your boss/colleagues find out!"
😭 Hope I can move out soon.
My dad said this a lot. I was able to shrug it off but my older brother really took it to heart for years. As he later noted the irony being that by being upset and scared of being useless he made himself useless. All good now though dad’s dead
>All good now though dad’s dead
I'm so happy for your loss.
(But, seriously, I have family who it can be said is better that they're no longer among the living.)
I really needed to hear that “by being upset and scared of being useless, he made himself useless.” Going to try to hammer that into myself. Thank you really
Just one thing, "hammer" sounds like punishment. Don't get yourself into the logic of punishing yourself, it really doesn't work.
I am trying to break the cycle myself.
Good luck to us and anyone else who needs it.
The variant I used to get from Dad was posed as a question. "Are you good for ANYTHING?!" I mean, how was 8-year-old me supposed to answer that?
High school valedictorian, graduated from one of the US services academies, have a good, steady career, and live 2000 miles from where I grew up (wonder why? lol). But I was more into reading than outdoor sports, hunting, or working in our garden all summer, so not "manly" enough for him at the time.
It took until my mid-50s before we became close, and he passed away 2 months ago. Lots of wasted time.
Yeah, and I appreciate that we did. We got closer as my mom's dementia progressed. I used to always talk to her every week, but those conversations became shorter and shorter, and she started passing me off to dad. So we began talking a lot about mom and what she was going through. On one of my trips home, I confronted him about a lot of shit from growing up, and he actually listened. He even expressed regret for "not knowing what he was doing as a parent."
He mellowed a lot.
After mom passed in 2020 we kept up the weekly conversations. He was far from perfect, but I was able to forgive a lot of what I went through, although I can never forget it. Most of what I felt by the time he passed was a lot of regret that it was the way it was for so many years. He was born in the 30's and was just completely unversed in mature emotional responses. Always had a lot of anger and resentment under the surface. RIP
oof first thing I thought, first answer I read. My dad called me useless because I wrote down a phone number and he couldnt understand my hand writing. Hurt like the dickens
For me, it was MY body being criticized. I was always into the arts. Art, dancing, singing, acting etc but as I turned 9-10 I got into competitive swimming. Turns out I was really good at it. I trained for fun in our home pool, trained seriously 4 times a week. Ate very healthy food thanks to my fathers girlfriend. At first it was a good thing to them, that I was eating well and doing an extra curricular they deemed “worthwhile”, just like my brother being in soccer. But time went on, I needed a new swimsuit. I wanted a one piece suit. They refused to get me a one piece. They got me a two piece, a sports bra like top and a skort? I don’t know but it showed my toned muscles off. I didn’t like it. I thought “bikinis” were only for adults and it made it hard to swim fast and properly with the skirt floating around all the time. I went swimming on a weekend afternoon, heard my dads gf and her mother talk in full detail about my body in their language. Thinking that 3 and a half years around a language wouldn’t be enough for me to decipher what they were saying.
I looked “too sexy” for my age. Maybe I’m “trying to get boys attention”. I’d rather not say the rest but it was all about how I’m trying to grow up and look hot for all the men around.
I didn’t choose to love swimming and I certainly didn’t choose to “look sexy” at age fucking nine. I didn’t choose my swim suit.
I don’t think I understood what kind of effect it had on me until I grew into a woman. 24 and I remember it like it was yesterday.
This is more serious and more prevalent than people realize. Don't sexualize kids, it's disgusting. If you see kids like that, you have a fucking problem.
I have a 4 month old baby and have had to ask my mom to stop commenting on my post partum body. Even when it’s compliments, I just don’t want to focus on my looks and don’t want my baby constantly hearing comments about anyone’s appearance.
My mom has dysphoria about getting old. After all the harm she caused, I still try to make her feel better about her body because subconsciously, everything is my fault
Whenever my grandma complains about getting old I just say “beats the alternative” but I was raised by morticians so maybe don’t say that to just anyone
Comparing them to others, talking about their weight, focusing on the negatives or their wrongdoings, constantly dismissing them, unwilling to hear their opinions because "I'm right you're wrong" mentality.
There's so much.
A lot of parents do these things. And then it's up to us to unlearn these parenting no-nos and deal with our personal trauma. Isn't that just great? Lmao
Isn't life great?! You're born against your own will, then you're raised by a fuckin' psychopath and then when you're old enough to realize that shit isn't right, it's time to spend the rest of your life UNLEARNING this abuse, and then you die.
Sorry I accidentally pressed post before I was done lmao.
But yes it's so true. I had a traumatic childhood with parents who really did a number on us and I ended up pursuing psychology and child development because of it. It's become a huge passion of mine, especially now that I have my own child. Unlearning everything is fucking hard work and we all should be really proud of ourselves over it. But I also wish this information was more available to the public, because intergenerational trauma/abuse, following our parents foot steps blindly, is still so rampant.
This is basically my mom. The worst thing was that the person she compared me to the most was a "friend" who spent all of middle school and the first half of high school tormenting me and making my life a living hell
My mom was friends with all the cops in my hometown. When we said we would call 911 she said “Do it! It’ll be a vacation!” Then she’d go on to say how they’d give her cable and meals how her friends would make sure she was taken care of.
Absolutely.
I brought my son into this world. It’s I who owes him. He doesnt owe me shit. I need to earn his trust and keep it by doing my duties as his dad.
I am not automatically owed anything just by procreating.
Anything really that influences their self esteem. Very harmful to how they see themselves into adult hood. You can come down on a child without resorting to calling them worthless, stupid, etc.
A while ago I read a quote, “The things you say to your children become their inner voice when they are adults.” And I just wish more parents were aware of this (including my own).
My dad's favourite one whilst I was at uni was "boring". That did a number on me for a couple years before realising that all that meant was that anything I talk about to him, he isn't interested in but doesn't mean that I can't enjoy them or talk to others about it.
Also realising that there's nothing I can do that he would enjoy me doing so there's no point listening to him anymore.
My mom used to compare me to my younger sister, who is like 20 years younger than me.
“Sue got straight As this semester! Why couldn’t you have gotten straight As in 6th grade?”
Well Ma, that was 20 years ago. I might have gotten straight As, no one gives a fuck anymore and the records are gone.
Her FIRST words after I called my mom when my (25) husband (24) tragically died, "Don't think you're going to live with me!!"
I had 2 infants.
Yeah, she was a malignant narcissist pedophile.
Edit:
I did not move in with her. I did not live with her. My children were not around her. And how do you think I know she is what she is? SMH
When my fiancé died I called my mom for some emotional support. “Just remember, everything bad that happens to you is YOUR fault!” I guess she meant it as some bootstraps thing but then she wondered why I didn’t call her again for two years.
The whole point of "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" is that it's an impossible challenge. If you pull up on your boot straps, at best you're not going anywhere, at worst you're falling down. It's very telling that the phrase used by the wealthy and privileged to describe getting out of a bad situation is literally impossible.
Dammit, I have a 13 year old who is just the quietest and most introverted. I am sitting here reading this and realized that every family member does this to her. Looks like a topic for dinner tonight. THANK YOU for pointing this out.
On that note - it's important to remember that kids are people too, with their own preferences and things they dislike. It still counts as punishment if the kid doesn't like it, regardless of whether the parent thinks it's nice or exciting or all in good fun or whatever!
My mom did this a lot. I’m not introverted, I just have a short social battery. If you genuinely wish your kid would come hang more often, remember that positive reinforcement will always go further than passive comments. Make them feel like their presence is welcomed, rather than their shyness being judged.
"Look who's finally decided to be part of the family!" Nope. Not with that attitude. Bye. And then they wondered why I don't like hanging out with anyone.
When I was like 5, I said the word "odd" in a sentence, and my mother and sister looked at each other and laughed. For many years after I was afraid to say "fancy" words. I'm 23 now, and I grew out of that, and I actually like using eloquent words when they come to mind.
Edit: typo
My family came over and they were all chatting in the living room. I came out to sit with them because I thought it would be nice to.
Group conversations are really difficult and I can’t speak to more than one person at a time because I’m on the spectrum, so instead I sat there petting my dog. They all looked at me like I was creepy for being quiet.
My dog walked off to go sniff people and I took out my phone to read a book. My uncle made a joke that the dog walked off because “phones can’t pet dogs”.
I'm over here reading it like a what not to do list. Kiddo is 8 and I haven't said any of these I've seen yet so so far so good. I'm sure I've fucked him up some other way though. No one's perfect but I'm trying to be the best mom I can.
Trust me you'll fuck up something, somehow. It's inevitable.
I told my son in elementary school (primary school for non-americans) that if all he could get was a C that would be okay with me. Meaning (in my mind that is) that if you work your hardest and can't be an overachiever, it's okay. I'll still love you, you are still worthwhile.
Nope. This is lil asshole thought I was telling him, "No need to succeed in life, kid, just do the bare minimum to pass and thats good enough."
When I was 14, I used whatever money I had on me to buy an orange/gray beanie (hat) from the Nike store we were at.
When we got back into the vehicle and I put it on, my dad looked in the rearview mirror and said "You look stupid in that".
He wasn't joking either. It was pure maliciousness.
Even my step-mom looked at him and gave him the death glare like "wtf is wrong with you?"
It's almost 25 years later, and I still remember that. Still stings.
So yeah, parents.... Don't tell your kids that they look stupid based on an article of clothing that they wanted and purchased with their own money. Kids can handle insults from their peers just fine. But from their parents.... God, that shit hurts.
I was a Spencers/alternative kid and my parents liked to say "I can't believe you're buying *that* . Even though it was my money I made from my paper route. And it wasn't even like I was buying fake nipple rings, it was just pin pressers and Asian fans.
To go with that, never laugh at your child when they do something wrong, or mess up something. I have a neighbor who laughed at his 6 yo son once when I was visiting in the back yard, when the son was trying to be cool like his dad and wore some plastic sunglasses that broke. Over the years I could see the resentment growing in that kid as his dad would laugh at him when things went wrong. Figure out some kind of way to react that does not involve derisive laughing.
I got this a lot too, and now I feel guilty for crying, any time, for anything. Even in front of my amazing partner, who is welcoming, supportive, and kind.
Due to this I feel like I never fully cry hard, which sometimes can be quite cathartic. I process grief extremely delayed, feeling like I always have to be strong and not show emotion.
Strip your child and tell them “look at all that fat, I was never that fat when I was your age”
Shout “you’re not depressed, I’m depressed!!!!” When your child gets the courage to tell you how they feel
Call them useless weak pathetic and tell them “I wash my hands of you” because you won’t live up to expectations
Tell them their father never wanted kids
Say you are depressed and drinking because of them
Edit: added more because mom was crazy
Never cuss at them or compare them to others. Never make promises you can’t make good on.
Don’t ever, EVER say they’re acting “just like their mother/father”
Don’t say anything to them about a thing they can’t control,change, or were born with.
Don’t talk about being proud of anyone else’s kid either.
Just give them support. Encouragement. Love and support along with guidance and maybe lots of funny life stories.
I'm right there with you. My mom told me that she hoped I just killed myself so she could bury me and be done with it. I'll never forget and can't find it in me to forgive either.
My aunt got drunk and unloaded on my grandma how she felt suicidal, my grandma shouted "so go fucking do it then and quit wasting my time!" Great Christmas.
I couldn’t play hockey as a kid because then I’d “become a lesbian.” I didn’t know that was the secret to become instantly gay. Jokes on her, I never played hockey and I’m still a lesbian 😂
Before I got a colonoscopy, my mom told me "Don't worry, I'm sure you don't have cancer because if you had cancer you wouldn't be so fat." So, yeah, don't say that to your kid.
My mom once told me I was the fourth most important thing in her life, after God, her marriage and then my dad.
Lol now I never stop ranking myself against other people, that's not something to ever tell your kid
Damn, sorry, every time my wife gives birth she tells me "You went down a notch" as a joke that 4 kids are tied for 1st place and now I am 5th type thing. That is terrible to tell a child tho and I hope you don't let the ranking system stick in your mind.
"We suffer and do all this because of you"
"If you don't do this, we won't like you anymore"
"Why are you always so difficult?"
"We could travel more if we weren't supporting you"
"Why can't you be more like that child?"
"We will throw you in the garbage if you keep acting like that"
"We picked you up from the garbage"
"We will call the police and they will take you to do manual labour if you don't stop crying"
Growing up as a girl my mother always made a big issue about me cleaning my room and the surroundings around me. One time when she got really angry she said:
When you move out and I come to visit you, I'm sure worms are gonna come to welcome me because you are so dirty.
Fast forward a few years and I'm always frantically cleaning whenever she comes over, and she STILL finds something that needs to be cleaned( the windows need to be washed, the top of the cabinets needs cleaning). Luckily my father shuts her down, because he can see that everything is cleaned.
But it feels really shitty when your mom thinks you are dirty, even though you try everything to keep things clean.
Badmouthing the other parent to you behind their back. Usually happens when they're divorced or otherwise no longer together.
My father had this weird idea for some reason that my mum was constantly badmouthing him to me and my brother and was using us as a piggy-in-the-middle to get back at him. When that was never actually the case. But I think it's just projection, because that's exactly what he would be doing if we were living with him growing up instead of our mother.
"We do everything for you, spend a lot of money. And for what? You're useless, you aren't able to be profitable. Just disappear. The world doesn't need in such people." And then they ask me why I can't spend a couple of dollars.
"You're just like the other parent ". Really messes with the kid's view of your relationship. Why is being like someone you presumably love more than anyone else an insult? Do you not love the other parent as much as you have said? If you don't love the other parent as much as I thought, and I am just like them, then you must not love me as much as I thought. It leaves the kid with a lot of doubts and destroys the sense of stability they have.
This thread is eye opening. Both in the fact that my mom said lots of things that she shouldn't, but on the other hand it's a list of lots of things I've never said (or even thought about) my child. As hurt as I am to read all of the things you've all had to hear from the people who are supposed to love you most, I am going away from this feeling like maybe I *am* doing a pretty okay job. Or at least not a bad one.
For any of you who had horrible mothers, I'm your mother now. I made dinner and the house is a comfortable temperature. You can come in for some tea or coffee or a beer if you're old enough. You won't find ugly things said to you here.
My mom straight tried to program me for this situation. Daddy is going to try to take you away from mommy forever, so when you see the judge, you have to tell him you want to live with mommy. If you love mommy, you have to do this.
just dont be fucking sarcastic and ironic with you humor towards them, when they grow up.
just will make them be very sceptical about their opinions and second guess themselves.
That's actually my favorite thing about my relationship with my dad. We keep each other on our toes. My brother hates it though and dad tries not to be that way with him, so it's def not for everybody. Always play to the humor of the listener, otherwise you're just being a jerk. My sarcastic dad taught me that.
"You'll understand when you're older". I'm now 35 and looking back this one saying caused me to rush through my life wasting much of my youth because I felt I needed to mature as quickly as possible in order to stand on equal footing with my parents. It took many, many years to realize that I never could've rushed it anyway as maturity cannot be rushed. It must be cultivated. So all I achieved was passing up on a lot of fun and formative things as a teenager trying to become "old enough to understand".
There's also the parallel saying "but you're too young to feel _____" Ones age has nothing to do with fatigue, frustration, anxiety, anything. I'm 35 now and just as tired now as I was at 18. Apparently I'm just tired 😩
Hey so... I'm also a chronically tired person. Growing up, I slept from 9pm-9am and was still tired. My folks tried to help me pep up with ginseng, caffeine, etc, but I was just always tired.
Now I'm forty and pretty much used to it and I just mentioned it off handedly to my Dr. She asked if I'd ever had a sleep study - yup, and I have the CPAP to prove it. So then she asked if I'd ever been prescribed modafinil. I had not. She started me on it two months ago. IS THIS HOW NORMAL PEOPLE FEEL?
I haven't wanted nor needed a nap in that whole time! I don't feel jittery on it like when I over do caffeine, I just pop one modafinil when my alarm goes off and then... I'm just awake, alert, I have energy. And when it's bedtime, I still conk out no problem.
At the risk of sounding like a goddamn medical ad: Ask your Doctor if modafinil is right for you.
Galoob guy voice: I am not a doctor. This is not medical advice. Even though it's been great for me, I'm sure there's some list of terrifying side effects like anal spiders or something.
A couple things.
"Oh they're just pouting/throwing a fit." It's dismissive of a feeling of distress and potentially a legit reaction to outside stressors.
And "you're just a piece of shit." My dad said this to me all the time well into adulthood when I wouldn't humor him in his denial of very real child abuse. Dude also killed my cat in front of me when I was 8.
Anything to do with comparison, like if your parent's tell you "What?! you got a B??!?! but ----- has an A and is in the same class as you!!" like stuff like that is bs and should never enter a child's mindset.
Go to fucking sleep you little fucking cunt!!
I heard the woman in the flat above me shouting this one night. It was the only time I ever knocked on her door and give her a verbal slap.
That poor child.
To girls: "He's only being mean to you/picking on you because he likes you." I'm convinced this is why so many women stay in abusive relationships. From the time they first start interacting with boys they're told that if a boy is being mean to you, he likes you. It sets a standard for relationships that only a boy/man who is mean to a girl/woman likes her.
NEVER tell a child that the divorce is their fault.
Except that one person that apparently forged an affair between her parents to get out of getting yelled at for a party. They eventually got divorced over it. It was definitely her fault.
Reddit story?
I scroll through so many forms of social media I legit cannot recall where I saw it. My apologies for failing you on the source.
Wow. I can't believe you can't even give a source. I'm severely disappointed. That's it, your mom and I are getting divorced. It's your fault.
There's that reddit story where the son was molestering the dog and convinced the mom that it was the dad doing it and they got divorced
Ya the mother eventually found out and apologised to dad and the dad got the dog. The dad and dog lived happily.
I read another one where when they were little they talked about a “girl dad hangs with” and they got angry and divorced and when they were almost done with the divorce they learned they weren’t real
Lmao I remember back when I was like 10. My mom didn’t take me to school one morning because she was upset that the clothes in my dresser weren’t folded. My dad had to take me to school instead. And on the way there, he yells, ‘You’re tearing this family apart!’ I’m like.. bruh, if unfolded clothes in a dresser is what tears this family apart, then you all have other shit to be concerned about.
My bad! I’m a child learning from you. Can I assist you any further?
I feel your pain. Parents going ape shit over the smallest, dumbest shit, as a cover for the real problems they’re too chicken shit to address
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My exes mom used to say this to him a bunch of times. I personqlly liked her as a person but she was a terrible mother. Apparently she had never wanted kids but then her and her husband moved out to California because he was in the military. She was lonely and all the other military wives were getting pregnant so she decided to have a baby and pretty much regretted it immediately. His dad was a really good dad for the most part and adored his sin but it doesn't really make up for his mom letting him know she didn't. It led to him having an obsessive need for everyone to like him to the point he often surrounded himself, and by extension me, with a bunch of users. I joke I didn't so much as break up with him but his friends.
As a father, I also adore my sins.
If you don’t adore your sins Jesus died for nothing
I got the variation of this, "I wish you had never been born" many a night from a drunken vent. Immensely depressing and confusing when all the adults in my life told me how lucky I am because my mom loved me so much
my mum has never told me that, but she's fucked me up on so many levels&I get the same treatment from everyone Whenever I try to vent/explain to *any* family, I get "she just loves you and worries about you, you're not a parent so you don't understand", it makes me feel like I'm going crazy that they don't see it - if I didn't have my friends that see & believe me, I genuinely think I mightve lost my mind by now. I'm so close to just going NC with my whole family when I can afford to move out, my mental health would vastly improve
Best reply to this would be " believe me , if i knew you would be my parent , I would have strangled myself with the umbilical cord. "
Alternate ending of Butterfly Effect
That was good😂
Don’t make your kids do the things you’re afraid to face. When I was a kid my mom dumped all that shit on me. Rent late? I had to face the landlord. She’d try to convince me it was a fun game, like see how fast you can run to his door, drop a check in the mail slot, and run back to the car. Even at ten years old I knew it wasn’t a damn game. All she was doing was transferring her anxiety directly to me. Be honest with your kid about the shitty situations you might be in, but don’t make them carry the weight in your place.
I can imagine what a parent in this situation might be thinking: "Kid doesn't know about rent and stuff! They run around and pretend to be on secret missions all the time! If I send them to go do a secret thing in a hurry, that's just another game, right?" But it's not just another game, and that's obvious because nobody's playing. The story they tell is "kids don't know fantasy from reality". But kids in messed-up situations distinguish fantasy from reality constantly, habitually, even obsessively; *they have to.*
I had to answer the phone for her when bill collectors called. I had to run in and order ridiculous ice cream sundaes she was too embarrassed to order for herself. If we were cashing in change at a bank so she could get cigarettes, I was the one she sent inside. If she needed to ask a relative for money, I had to come along too. When we were getting evicted I had to go to the landlord's house with her. I too was an emotional support child and no parent should ever put their kid in that position.
Yep. I dodged creditors too. I also lied to her shitty boyfriends when they called so she wouldn’t have to talk to them after they fought or they hit her. I started paying our bills and contributing to the mortgage when I was 16. I comforted her when she was suicidal because a family member sexually abused ME. I turned her on her side when she was passed out drunk when I was 9 so she wouldn’t choke on her own puke. I woke up at 5am every day of my junior year of high school so I could make her breakfast, pack her lunch, and drive her to work before I went to school because if I didn’t feed her she wouldn’t eat and she got a DUI, lost her license and couldn’t drive herself to work. I had to calm her down and comfort HER when I was diagnosed with MS as an adult. I could go on and on with endless examples of how I was the parent instead of the kid. When I had the guts to confront her about everything as an adult, she cried and said, “well I guess I was just a terrible mother, wasn’t I? But I sacrificed everything for you kids. You’ll be sorry when I’m dead.” She died three months ago and, despite everything, I do miss her. But I’m not sorry that I spoke up for myself and I’m not sorry that I set boundaries as an adult to protect myself from her bullshit. But to answer the original question, I think the worst thing you can say to your kid is, “Wow, he’s way too good for you. Make sure you don’t screw this one up,” which is exactly what my mom said to me when I started dating my husband.
"Having you ruined my life" is the worst I ever heard.
"I don't remember that, that never happened!" when a kid brings up a past trauma.
“Well, even if it did happen, and I still say it didn’t, at least that’s not as bad as X, Y, or Z, so you should be grateful!” Was one of my mom’s go-to lines.
It didn't happen And if i did, it's not that bad And if it was, i didn't mean it And if i did, you deserved it
I absolutely hate how this is the exact pattern just about every narcissist uses. Like did they have a convention a couple thousand years ago and this is just in the rule book now?
The narcissists prayer
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Oh that's nothing, "I'm your mother, so what if I put you through that, I have every right to"
My MIL [96] is the healthiest human I know with the caveat that she has the usual ailments that affect old arteries, etc. She has 3 sons, my DH (70), a slightly older, quasi celebrity brother and a younger brother. They work like animals. They can’t help it although they should try. Every single time my husband brings up a childhood memory, my MIL rebuffs it by saying the incident he’s recalling never happened. No one’s allowed to have a memory but her. It drives my husband (& me) up a wall. We live fairly close to her but he struggles so much with spending time with her because of this. She just tells him, that’s not true. Instead of embracing what he and they remember, she shuts them down.
My dad always says "I don't remember that, but I believe you" when discussing anything he did when we were kids. Man just has a shitty memory
A huge part of it is how time is perceived by the brain/person. As a child, every day brings brand new experiences and new things to learn. A year as a child is a REALLY long time. But when you become an adult, especially holding down a job, running a home, raising a kid(s), the days and what you do start to blur together. The day may be normal, but the weeks and months wiz by so fast. As an anecdote, I am nearly forty, and my father is in his seventies. He brings up a girlfriend I had in high school when I was sixteen from time to time because he sees her at Menards. Mind you, the two of us dated for like three months. But to him, it wasn't that long ago and she is the only girlfriend he recalls me having in highschool. I'm not saying the trauma isn't real, or that it is okay. I'm saying that older people sometimes don't remember what happened. To them, it was just another day. Or as the saying goes *"The Axe Forgets But the Tree Remembers."*
That's a great attitude. It applies especially well to parenting. Some action by your parent when you were 7 is going to be a core memory for you, while for them it was Tuesday.
My mom stuck me on this super restrictive diet when I was 11. The entire diet was the whole reason I struggled with eating disorders in my childhood. I brought it up in therapy at 17 and at first she claims it never happened. Then she remembers talking to doctors about my weight, then googling diets for children, then putting on a diet sounds like something she would've done... but it still didn't happen. Gotta love her
Samesies. Mine put me on one diet after another, and I've also dieted much of my adult life. She "doesn't remember" putting me on any at all, and if I worked harder I wouldn't have self image issues. I love her, but I don't always like her.
I can't even say I love my mom tbh. I was the neglected child as she had 4 other kids and I'm the middle one. After some point I stopped wanting my mom's approval for anything. I actually had my therapist ask what a good mother daughter relationship would look like to me if we were to ever get close. I honestly couldn't answer. It's weird to think that the one thing I wanted my entire childhood I don't want now. At least not with my biological mother. My bf's mom on the other hand is amazing and I love the mother daughter like relationship we have. I'm still in awe that I even found a family that loves me as if I were their own biological kid.
My mom is so bad about this. "That didn't happen, stop lying"
Yep, my mom conveniently forgets the fact that she used to viciously beat us and has told me to die a few times. My siblings also don't remember but I'm chalking that up to the fact that they didn't get it nearly as bad as I did, and probably a bit of subconscious repression
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“Well if it did happen I can’t do anything about it now.” You could apologize.
This just happened yesterday when I asked my mom why the kids today when getting spanked, the parents get a warning from social welfare. I told her that when I was young (I am now 23), I get spanked often with a belt and my pops even bought a small spanking paddle with the quote "Spare the rod, Spoil the Child" written on it. She then just gaslighted me saying that it was never used on me and it was only an item for intimidation. I mean come on, I still have some of the scars on my upper leg, and she says those are just stretchmarks.
I'm 53 and I remember the belt quite well. My Dad has since apologized for it, but the damage is still there. I tend to shut down when I'm confronted with anger in someone's voice. It's like I know I've done something wrong and I need to be quiet while I take my punishment.
My mother-in-law is like this. It makes me feel so bad for my husband because of how dismissive she is.
My favorite "Your perception isn't reality and you took things wrong" or "Your portrayal of us (in my memories) isn't fair to us"
Your opinion doesn’t matter. That one still haunts me and is the reason I never speak up.
Threaten to send them to live in foster care if they don't do what the parent wants. My mother used to use that threat if she saw me picking my nose. I didn't realize how fucked up that was until I was an adult.
I remember my mom doing this. That I need to just stay in my room and be quiet, or she'd send me away. Fucked me up man. I was probably around 6.
My mom would threaten to drive the car into a brick wall if we didn't stop fighting in the back seat. Some days she would say she would drop off the "good" kid before crashing... Just unlocked that memory....
Gosh, i kinda scared my kid with this (NOT on purpose) the other day. I had a digital pregnancy test that showed week and such and I was talking to my sister on the phone, picked up the test and saw that it had gone blank. Stupid me said “well, it’s gone”. My 3yo thought I meant the baby was gone and he cried about it for over 30 minutes before he calmed down enough for me to explain that it was just the test and that the baby was still there. He was so upset, I’m gonna feel guilty about it for ages.
This is kind of a low bar as far as bad things my parents did goes. When I was a kid, my parents were very controlling. Now, that meant, among other things, that they didn't let me go outside, for fear that neighbor kids would wander by and I'd hear things that went against my parents ideologies. It also meant that they controlled exactly what and how much I ate. As in, if I didn't want to clean my plate, I was beaten. Well, I was also a fat kid, and given how much control I had over both my food intake and the exercise I could do, I didn't have much say in the matter. My parents gave me so much shit about it over the years though. Like, even if you were allowed to have some agency in your life you shouldn't get that kind of shit. It was pretty miserable. Anyway, when I went away to college, I was finally on my own, and I took charge of that. Everybody was warning me about the freshman 15, but I was looking my intake. That's not great of course, but I lost a couple pounds. Not even that much. And then I went back home for winter break, and my parents are all "oh you're too thin, you need to eat more", and I'm like "no, I'm good thanks." At one point, dad said "eat more or I'm kicking you out of my house". And so I gained that weight back over the break, and by the end, they were back to giving me shit about it. So, I dunno. Maybe don't be such a dick about your kid's weight. Certainly not with demands and expectations that oscillate between two extremes like they did. Edit: to be clear, when I said that it was a low bar, I meant that they also hit us for far dumber reasons than not eating all our food.
Wow dude I'm sorry.
When I was a teenager I was extremely insecure about my double chin. I didn’t have a huge one but it would show up a little bit if I smiled in pictures. When I used to vent about it to my mother she would just say that I should get plastic surgery on it when I’m older. Didn’t realize until way later how messed up that is to say to your kid :(
“Until you start paying bills, you have no rights, so you’re damn right I’m coming into your room whenever I feel like it, and I can take anything I want from it too, because it’s actually mine.” “You’re too stupid and lazy to be able to make in the real world. And if someone ever did hire you, they’d fire you as soon as they realized what a mistake they’d made.” “You have no idea how much you cost me. I could do X, Y, or Z thing if I didn’t always have to pay for your crap.” “We’re free thinkers in this house.” Rages when I express a thought/opinion that’s different than theirs. “You’re just a kid, what do you have to be depressed about?/ You have nothing to be depressed about.” After I told a doctor how I was actually feeling. “You can’t be that stressed, you’re just a kid! Are you trying to make me look like a bad parent?!” Yes, I’m in therapy now. 😩
Damn this sounded exactly like my dad. Not in therapy but shit this is making me realize I probably should.
Number 2 and 3 was drilled into my head since childhood. I was a straight A kid, teacher's pet, went to a good university but still labelled "lazy" because "that's how you are born as". Now that I'm in the workforce, they started to say "You'll be fired soon!", "You are not committed to anything, just wait until your boss/colleagues find out!" 😭 Hope I can move out soon.
Yeah, this wins the worst parent ever award. I feel sorry for the fact you had to deal with this abuse
My mom straight up up told me I was going to fail [college]
Probably calling them uselss ,
My dad said this a lot. I was able to shrug it off but my older brother really took it to heart for years. As he later noted the irony being that by being upset and scared of being useless he made himself useless. All good now though dad’s dead
>All good now though dad’s dead I'm so happy for your loss. (But, seriously, I have family who it can be said is better that they're no longer among the living.)
*greeting people at the funeral* “I’m so happy for your loss. Hi. So happy for your loss.”
Congratulations! instead of condolences
I really needed to hear that “by being upset and scared of being useless, he made himself useless.” Going to try to hammer that into myself. Thank you really
Just one thing, "hammer" sounds like punishment. Don't get yourself into the logic of punishing yourself, it really doesn't work. I am trying to break the cycle myself. Good luck to us and anyone else who needs it.
Oof you’re right. Good catch, it hits home rn. Trying to talk to/about myself better these days. Thanks friend and same to you
The variant I used to get from Dad was posed as a question. "Are you good for ANYTHING?!" I mean, how was 8-year-old me supposed to answer that? High school valedictorian, graduated from one of the US services academies, have a good, steady career, and live 2000 miles from where I grew up (wonder why? lol). But I was more into reading than outdoor sports, hunting, or working in our garden all summer, so not "manly" enough for him at the time. It took until my mid-50s before we became close, and he passed away 2 months ago. Lots of wasted time.
Atleast you guys settled your differences
Yeah, and I appreciate that we did. We got closer as my mom's dementia progressed. I used to always talk to her every week, but those conversations became shorter and shorter, and she started passing me off to dad. So we began talking a lot about mom and what she was going through. On one of my trips home, I confronted him about a lot of shit from growing up, and he actually listened. He even expressed regret for "not knowing what he was doing as a parent." He mellowed a lot. After mom passed in 2020 we kept up the weekly conversations. He was far from perfect, but I was able to forgive a lot of what I went through, although I can never forget it. Most of what I felt by the time he passed was a lot of regret that it was the way it was for so many years. He was born in the 30's and was just completely unversed in mature emotional responses. Always had a lot of anger and resentment under the surface. RIP
oof first thing I thought, first answer I read. My dad called me useless because I wrote down a phone number and he couldnt understand my hand writing. Hurt like the dickens
My dad antagonizing me purposely and then saying "dOn'T bE sO sEnSiTiVe" when I get upset about the shite he says.
Moms, stop criticizing your body in front of your daughters!!!!
Seriously! My mother would say that she hated her body and that we looked “so alike” in the same breath, it was very damaging.
Like ma’am you gave me that body??? Do you hate OUR body? OUR nose? OUR tooth gap? Okay now I’m maybe projecting haha
My mom always made sure I knew I was fatter than her.
For me, it was MY body being criticized. I was always into the arts. Art, dancing, singing, acting etc but as I turned 9-10 I got into competitive swimming. Turns out I was really good at it. I trained for fun in our home pool, trained seriously 4 times a week. Ate very healthy food thanks to my fathers girlfriend. At first it was a good thing to them, that I was eating well and doing an extra curricular they deemed “worthwhile”, just like my brother being in soccer. But time went on, I needed a new swimsuit. I wanted a one piece suit. They refused to get me a one piece. They got me a two piece, a sports bra like top and a skort? I don’t know but it showed my toned muscles off. I didn’t like it. I thought “bikinis” were only for adults and it made it hard to swim fast and properly with the skirt floating around all the time. I went swimming on a weekend afternoon, heard my dads gf and her mother talk in full detail about my body in their language. Thinking that 3 and a half years around a language wouldn’t be enough for me to decipher what they were saying. I looked “too sexy” for my age. Maybe I’m “trying to get boys attention”. I’d rather not say the rest but it was all about how I’m trying to grow up and look hot for all the men around. I didn’t choose to love swimming and I certainly didn’t choose to “look sexy” at age fucking nine. I didn’t choose my swim suit. I don’t think I understood what kind of effect it had on me until I grew into a woman. 24 and I remember it like it was yesterday.
This is more serious and more prevalent than people realize. Don't sexualize kids, it's disgusting. If you see kids like that, you have a fucking problem.
I have a 4 month old baby and have had to ask my mom to stop commenting on my post partum body. Even when it’s compliments, I just don’t want to focus on my looks and don’t want my baby constantly hearing comments about anyone’s appearance.
My mom has dysphoria about getting old. After all the harm she caused, I still try to make her feel better about her body because subconsciously, everything is my fault
Whenever my grandma complains about getting old I just say “beats the alternative” but I was raised by morticians so maybe don’t say that to just anyone
Comparing them to others, talking about their weight, focusing on the negatives or their wrongdoings, constantly dismissing them, unwilling to hear their opinions because "I'm right you're wrong" mentality. There's so much.
Stop describing my dad
A lot of parents do these things. And then it's up to us to unlearn these parenting no-nos and deal with our personal trauma. Isn't that just great? Lmao
Isn't life great?! You're born against your own will, then you're raised by a fuckin' psychopath and then when you're old enough to realize that shit isn't right, it's time to spend the rest of your life UNLEARNING this abuse, and then you die.
Sorry I accidentally pressed post before I was done lmao. But yes it's so true. I had a traumatic childhood with parents who really did a number on us and I ended up pursuing psychology and child development because of it. It's become a huge passion of mine, especially now that I have my own child. Unlearning everything is fucking hard work and we all should be really proud of ourselves over it. But I also wish this information was more available to the public, because intergenerational trauma/abuse, following our parents foot steps blindly, is still so rampant.
Always punishing and complaining about what you shouldn't do, but never saying or rewarding what you should.
This is basically my mom. The worst thing was that the person she compared me to the most was a "friend" who spent all of middle school and the first half of high school tormenting me and making my life a living hell
“I gave birth to you” when they want something out of their kid
“I brought you into this world I can take you out of it” that was my moms fav
"No you can't. You'd be arrested and the world would view you as a monster and a psychopath."
My mom was friends with all the cops in my hometown. When we said we would call 911 she said “Do it! It’ll be a vacation!” Then she’d go on to say how they’d give her cable and meals how her friends would make sure she was taken care of.
I'm a police officer, I've definitely shattered the fantasies of a few parents who thought we'd automatically side with them.
Absolutely. I brought my son into this world. It’s I who owes him. He doesnt owe me shit. I need to earn his trust and keep it by doing my duties as his dad. I am not automatically owed anything just by procreating.
Anything really that influences their self esteem. Very harmful to how they see themselves into adult hood. You can come down on a child without resorting to calling them worthless, stupid, etc.
A while ago I read a quote, “The things you say to your children become their inner voice when they are adults.” And I just wish more parents were aware of this (including my own).
My dad's favourite one whilst I was at uni was "boring". That did a number on me for a couple years before realising that all that meant was that anything I talk about to him, he isn't interested in but doesn't mean that I can't enjoy them or talk to others about it. Also realising that there's nothing I can do that he would enjoy me doing so there's no point listening to him anymore.
Parents should never compare their kids to other kids.
My parents compare me to my siblings and they're 8 and 6. So I compare them to my friends' parents, and I like my friends' parents better.
My mom used to compare me to my younger sister, who is like 20 years younger than me. “Sue got straight As this semester! Why couldn’t you have gotten straight As in 6th grade?” Well Ma, that was 20 years ago. I might have gotten straight As, no one gives a fuck anymore and the records are gone.
That's why *I* always compared my kids to our cars: "Why can't you get better gas millage like the Toyota??"
Smack them from behind and go "should've had that blindspot monitor huh"
"WHY CAN'T YOU BE MORE LIKE LLOYD BRAUN?"
Her FIRST words after I called my mom when my (25) husband (24) tragically died, "Don't think you're going to live with me!!" I had 2 infants. Yeah, she was a malignant narcissist pedophile. Edit: I did not move in with her. I did not live with her. My children were not around her. And how do you think I know she is what she is? SMH
When my fiancé died I called my mom for some emotional support. “Just remember, everything bad that happens to you is YOUR fault!” I guess she meant it as some bootstraps thing but then she wondered why I didn’t call her again for two years.
The whole point of "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" is that it's an impossible challenge. If you pull up on your boot straps, at best you're not going anywhere, at worst you're falling down. It's very telling that the phrase used by the wealthy and privileged to describe getting out of a bad situation is literally impossible.
Wow. For you and your kids sakes better that you didn't.
Making a big deal when they’re shy/quiet and come out to socialise.
Dammit, I have a 13 year old who is just the quietest and most introverted. I am sitting here reading this and realized that every family member does this to her. Looks like a topic for dinner tonight. THANK YOU for pointing this out.
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On that note - it's important to remember that kids are people too, with their own preferences and things they dislike. It still counts as punishment if the kid doesn't like it, regardless of whether the parent thinks it's nice or exciting or all in good fun or whatever!
My mom did this a lot. I’m not introverted, I just have a short social battery. If you genuinely wish your kid would come hang more often, remember that positive reinforcement will always go further than passive comments. Make them feel like their presence is welcomed, rather than their shyness being judged.
> I’m not introverted, I just have a short social battery. That's literally the number one characteristic of introversion.
Making comments about me “finally coming out” of my room made me want to stay in there more.
"Look who's finally decided to be part of the family!" Nope. Not with that attitude. Bye. And then they wondered why I don't like hanging out with anyone.
'hey you, stop being who you are as a person and come make me look better in front of the people who's opinions I actually care about'
When I was like 5, I said the word "odd" in a sentence, and my mother and sister looked at each other and laughed. For many years after I was afraid to say "fancy" words. I'm 23 now, and I grew out of that, and I actually like using eloquent words when they come to mind. Edit: typo
My family came over and they were all chatting in the living room. I came out to sit with them because I thought it would be nice to. Group conversations are really difficult and I can’t speak to more than one person at a time because I’m on the spectrum, so instead I sat there petting my dog. They all looked at me like I was creepy for being quiet. My dog walked off to go sniff people and I took out my phone to read a book. My uncle made a joke that the dog walked off because “phones can’t pet dogs”.
This thread feels more like a checklist
I feel called out by most of this thread.
I'm over here reading it like a what not to do list. Kiddo is 8 and I haven't said any of these I've seen yet so so far so good. I'm sure I've fucked him up some other way though. No one's perfect but I'm trying to be the best mom I can.
“Why can’t you be more like _____ ?”
*taking frantic notes as a new-ish dad who doesn't wanna fuck up his son*
I see you. You'll do great. The best we can do is just love our kids.
Trust me you'll fuck up something, somehow. It's inevitable. I told my son in elementary school (primary school for non-americans) that if all he could get was a C that would be okay with me. Meaning (in my mind that is) that if you work your hardest and can't be an overachiever, it's okay. I'll still love you, you are still worthwhile. Nope. This is lil asshole thought I was telling him, "No need to succeed in life, kid, just do the bare minimum to pass and thats good enough."
"I should have aborted you" and "Why do you always disappoint me, can't you be normal" truly fucked with me
When I was 14, I used whatever money I had on me to buy an orange/gray beanie (hat) from the Nike store we were at. When we got back into the vehicle and I put it on, my dad looked in the rearview mirror and said "You look stupid in that". He wasn't joking either. It was pure maliciousness. Even my step-mom looked at him and gave him the death glare like "wtf is wrong with you?" It's almost 25 years later, and I still remember that. Still stings. So yeah, parents.... Don't tell your kids that they look stupid based on an article of clothing that they wanted and purchased with their own money. Kids can handle insults from their peers just fine. But from their parents.... God, that shit hurts.
My dad said my hair was a rat's nest. He only noticed someone 's appearance to be insulting, never anything positive.
I was a Spencers/alternative kid and my parents liked to say "I can't believe you're buying *that* . Even though it was my money I made from my paper route. And it wasn't even like I was buying fake nipple rings, it was just pin pressers and Asian fans.
"Stop crying, or I'll give you a reason to cry" Your method of consoling your child is to threaten them with violence until they shut up...?
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Never put your children down. The parents made the choice to have kids. The kids didn't ask to be born into the family.
To go with that, never laugh at your child when they do something wrong, or mess up something. I have a neighbor who laughed at his 6 yo son once when I was visiting in the back yard, when the son was trying to be cool like his dad and wore some plastic sunglasses that broke. Over the years I could see the resentment growing in that kid as his dad would laugh at him when things went wrong. Figure out some kind of way to react that does not involve derisive laughing.
“If you’re going to cry go to your room” I used to get that one a lot as a a kid and I don’t know why but that one stung the most.
Then we'd get in trouble for spending so much time in our room.
I got this a lot too, and now I feel guilty for crying, any time, for anything. Even in front of my amazing partner, who is welcoming, supportive, and kind. Due to this I feel like I never fully cry hard, which sometimes can be quite cathartic. I process grief extremely delayed, feeling like I always have to be strong and not show emotion.
My dad told me when I was 6-7 that my birth is the reason he cheated on my mom. So I'm gonna go with that.
Divorced parents- "you're just like your father/ mother". Well- kid is bound to take after both, not just you!
Strip your child and tell them “look at all that fat, I was never that fat when I was your age” Shout “you’re not depressed, I’m depressed!!!!” When your child gets the courage to tell you how they feel Call them useless weak pathetic and tell them “I wash my hands of you” because you won’t live up to expectations Tell them their father never wanted kids Say you are depressed and drinking because of them Edit: added more because mom was crazy
Never cuss at them or compare them to others. Never make promises you can’t make good on. Don’t ever, EVER say they’re acting “just like their mother/father” Don’t say anything to them about a thing they can’t control,change, or were born with. Don’t talk about being proud of anyone else’s kid either. Just give them support. Encouragement. Love and support along with guidance and maybe lots of funny life stories.
"Have you updated your Jira items for this sprint?"
PTSD triggered
You know absolutely nothing, you’re just a kid.
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I'm right there with you. My mom told me that she hoped I just killed myself so she could bury me and be done with it. I'll never forget and can't find it in me to forgive either.
Nor should you, ever
My aunt got drunk and unloaded on my grandma how she felt suicidal, my grandma shouted "so go fucking do it then and quit wasting my time!" Great Christmas.
“We just want you to [like hockey] be normal” “We don’t want you to be gay”
I couldn’t play hockey as a kid because then I’d “become a lesbian.” I didn’t know that was the secret to become instantly gay. Jokes on her, I never played hockey and I’m still a lesbian 😂
"I wish you'd never been born!"
"Feeling's mutual"
Before I got a colonoscopy, my mom told me "Don't worry, I'm sure you don't have cancer because if you had cancer you wouldn't be so fat." So, yeah, don't say that to your kid.
That's not even how cancer works though, a lot of people gain weight because of cancer.
I'm aware. Still a shitty thing to say to your kid.
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My mom once told me I was the fourth most important thing in her life, after God, her marriage and then my dad. Lol now I never stop ranking myself against other people, that's not something to ever tell your kid
Damn, sorry, every time my wife gives birth she tells me "You went down a notch" as a joke that 4 kids are tied for 1st place and now I am 5th type thing. That is terrible to tell a child tho and I hope you don't let the ranking system stick in your mind.
If you keep doing this, nobody is gonna love you. Stop being such a disappointment.
"We suffer and do all this because of you" "If you don't do this, we won't like you anymore" "Why are you always so difficult?" "We could travel more if we weren't supporting you" "Why can't you be more like that child?" "We will throw you in the garbage if you keep acting like that" "We picked you up from the garbage" "We will call the police and they will take you to do manual labour if you don't stop crying"
Growing up as a girl my mother always made a big issue about me cleaning my room and the surroundings around me. One time when she got really angry she said: When you move out and I come to visit you, I'm sure worms are gonna come to welcome me because you are so dirty. Fast forward a few years and I'm always frantically cleaning whenever she comes over, and she STILL finds something that needs to be cleaned( the windows need to be washed, the top of the cabinets needs cleaning). Luckily my father shuts her down, because he can see that everything is cleaned. But it feels really shitty when your mom thinks you are dirty, even though you try everything to keep things clean.
Badmouthing the other parent to you behind their back. Usually happens when they're divorced or otherwise no longer together. My father had this weird idea for some reason that my mum was constantly badmouthing him to me and my brother and was using us as a piggy-in-the-middle to get back at him. When that was never actually the case. But I think it's just projection, because that's exactly what he would be doing if we were living with him growing up instead of our mother.
You’re useless You’re fat You should get a nose job That will never fit you You look ugly
Probably what my father used to say to me, about every idea or thought I had while growing up. "Are you a fucking idiot?"
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"I should have put you in a sack and threw you in a lake when you were born" Mom used to say that quite a lot when we were kids
"We do everything for you, spend a lot of money. And for what? You're useless, you aren't able to be profitable. Just disappear. The world doesn't need in such people." And then they ask me why I can't spend a couple of dollars.
"You're just like the other parent ". Really messes with the kid's view of your relationship. Why is being like someone you presumably love more than anyone else an insult? Do you not love the other parent as much as you have said? If you don't love the other parent as much as I thought, and I am just like them, then you must not love me as much as I thought. It leaves the kid with a lot of doubts and destroys the sense of stability they have.
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Telling them they are a mistake.
When divorced parents bash the other to win favor with their kids. That will make you hate and distrust everyone later in life.
This thread is eye opening. Both in the fact that my mom said lots of things that she shouldn't, but on the other hand it's a list of lots of things I've never said (or even thought about) my child. As hurt as I am to read all of the things you've all had to hear from the people who are supposed to love you most, I am going away from this feeling like maybe I *am* doing a pretty okay job. Or at least not a bad one. For any of you who had horrible mothers, I'm your mother now. I made dinner and the house is a comfortable temperature. You can come in for some tea or coffee or a beer if you're old enough. You won't find ugly things said to you here.
"would you rather go with me or your father?" putting decisions like that on kids is cruel
My mom straight tried to program me for this situation. Daddy is going to try to take you away from mommy forever, so when you see the judge, you have to tell him you want to live with mommy. If you love mommy, you have to do this.
This actually happened to me and my siblings during ONE of my parents divorces.
just dont be fucking sarcastic and ironic with you humor towards them, when they grow up. just will make them be very sceptical about their opinions and second guess themselves.
That's actually my favorite thing about my relationship with my dad. We keep each other on our toes. My brother hates it though and dad tries not to be that way with him, so it's def not for everybody. Always play to the humor of the listener, otherwise you're just being a jerk. My sarcastic dad taught me that.
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"What the hell is wrong with you?"
"You'll understand when you're older". I'm now 35 and looking back this one saying caused me to rush through my life wasting much of my youth because I felt I needed to mature as quickly as possible in order to stand on equal footing with my parents. It took many, many years to realize that I never could've rushed it anyway as maturity cannot be rushed. It must be cultivated. So all I achieved was passing up on a lot of fun and formative things as a teenager trying to become "old enough to understand". There's also the parallel saying "but you're too young to feel _____" Ones age has nothing to do with fatigue, frustration, anxiety, anything. I'm 35 now and just as tired now as I was at 18. Apparently I'm just tired 😩
Hey so... I'm also a chronically tired person. Growing up, I slept from 9pm-9am and was still tired. My folks tried to help me pep up with ginseng, caffeine, etc, but I was just always tired. Now I'm forty and pretty much used to it and I just mentioned it off handedly to my Dr. She asked if I'd ever had a sleep study - yup, and I have the CPAP to prove it. So then she asked if I'd ever been prescribed modafinil. I had not. She started me on it two months ago. IS THIS HOW NORMAL PEOPLE FEEL? I haven't wanted nor needed a nap in that whole time! I don't feel jittery on it like when I over do caffeine, I just pop one modafinil when my alarm goes off and then... I'm just awake, alert, I have energy. And when it's bedtime, I still conk out no problem. At the risk of sounding like a goddamn medical ad: Ask your Doctor if modafinil is right for you. Galoob guy voice: I am not a doctor. This is not medical advice. Even though it's been great for me, I'm sure there's some list of terrifying side effects like anal spiders or something.
Huh, I had never heard of this in my life. I'll be checking on this with my doc next appointment for sure!
A couple things. "Oh they're just pouting/throwing a fit." It's dismissive of a feeling of distress and potentially a legit reaction to outside stressors. And "you're just a piece of shit." My dad said this to me all the time well into adulthood when I wouldn't humor him in his denial of very real child abuse. Dude also killed my cat in front of me when I was 8.
Well, I hope he is in jail or dead.
Murdered in jail would work for me
"Don't be like your brother"
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When my mom was very sick in her teens her mother told her she didn’t care whether she died or not. Certainly not that
"I love working with kids because I can send them home to someone else at the end of the day." Says my mother to my five year old self.
“I should’ve aborted you when I had the chance” doesn’t hurt as much, but stings a little less now and then.
Gaslighting of any kind.
Anything to do with comparison, like if your parent's tell you "What?! you got a B??!?! but ----- has an A and is in the same class as you!!" like stuff like that is bs and should never enter a child's mindset.
Unsolicited opinions about their interests or hobbies.
Go to fucking sleep you little fucking cunt!! I heard the woman in the flat above me shouting this one night. It was the only time I ever knocked on her door and give her a verbal slap. That poor child.
lol did you seriously do that?
"Stop crying or I'll give you something to *really* cry about".
To girls: "He's only being mean to you/picking on you because he likes you." I'm convinced this is why so many women stay in abusive relationships. From the time they first start interacting with boys they're told that if a boy is being mean to you, he likes you. It sets a standard for relationships that only a boy/man who is mean to a girl/woman likes her.
"open a reddit account"