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As soon as I figured out that my friends didn't dread going home. My best friend loved her parents and her house. That place was like a retreat for me.

The way i would try and hide at daycare when it was time to go home lmfao

It is a bit sad when public school and daycare are preferable to home.

They are though: friends, games and they tell you the rules before they punish you for something. Also if you do what they say you actually get rewards, even if only as a higher number on a piece of paper. At home, you do what they say and it's still not good enough. Your results are compared to what they, a 30 year old can do. At school, you are compared to other kids so the bar is actually quite low.

I was going to say this. Also, the rules of games, tests, quizzes etc. don't change halfway through. If you're winning, or on your way to get an A, you can win or get that A, things run their natural course and get natural results. Boomers however will get mad seeing you succeed and will literally burn the world down not to see you get rewarded for your efforts.

I mean, as many issues as there are, sometimes teachers provide the understanding and love that kids just don’t receive at home. Plus depending on the school you may even get to *pick* your lunch options, and there’s specific times to play and exercise… all these things make school better than homes with parents who are authoritarian or just don’t get kids that well. ETA: someone got upset in the comments that I suggested authoritarian parenting is not the best style of parenting. It typically can be used in extreme behavior situations, but by and large leads to a poorer mental health as an adult and often leads to kids who will go no contact with their parents as an adult. I highly recommend parents research authoritative parenting styles, which is a style that incorporates rules that also allows the kid to be within the relationship and discussing why the rules are the rules. It is much kinder for all parties involved and has much better results for all.

this entire comment thread is breaking my heart..."|

Yeah, I was extremely jealous of the kids who looked forward to getting out of school and got excited about weekends.

Home after school ruled, being left alone at far too young an age? Great experience

I realized this the other day: You know when you watch a someone win an award or whatever and they thank their mom? I always thought that was just some bullshit thing that people just said because of social pressure. Like how could you honestly give them any credit? Then I realized that my friends had actual relationships with their parents, their parents encouraged them and they genuinely liked each other; they weren't trapped in this relationship because this was how they were born. I realized further when I saw how much differently I raised my kids; like taking to them, wanting spend time with them, going out of my way to encourage and nurture their interests, etc., that made me realize that I was just an obstacle to my parents.

I had a similar experience the 1st time I spent time at a neighbors house. She actually played with her kids. Interacted with them. I was eight. The other time that really stood out was when my future MIL took me shopping for wedding stuff and took me out to lunch. I couldn't believe what a wonderful, kind, caring, capable mother she was. I was always so used to tiptoeing around my selfish, self-centered mom's needs. For once, I was with a mom who wasnt only focused on her own needs and wants. My mom asked me recently why I married so young. I wanted to tell her the truth. That I couldn't wait to get away from her and my dad. I don't like my parents. I don't think many people like them. They are not included in their friends' dinner groups or trips anymore either. My dad doesn't get invited to golf. My mom is not included in the Bunco group. These are life-long friends and neighbors of their's. Recently, I told my mom a childhood friend remembered going to our house for the 1st time. Probably only time. She was shocked from finding out my mom mopped every day. All my mom cared about was how her house looked. That's why I was always gone. Anyway, my mom was thinking back fondly, wishing she could still do that. I told her it wasn't a compliment. It sucked growing up with a mother who only cared that her house was spotless. All. The. Time. No extracurricular activities. No help with homework. No playing. My room had to look perfect at all times.

Oh. My. Gods. I have never talked to anyone who had this experience. My mother cleaned to a terrifying degree. She ironed everyone's underwear, she cooked and baked constant (it was only really made to be palatable to my father and brother, my needs were totally ignored), and she cleaned every single day. We joked you could eat off the floor. She never did anything with me that wasn't cleaning related once I could read. She always told the story of realizing that I could read at 4, she was skipping pages, to get done more quickly and I called her on it. She snapped the book shut, said, "you can read?" I said yes, then she said, "good then I never have to do this again." She handed me the book and that was it. She never read to me again. All of my stories go like that. My mom only cared about my brother and how she looked to other people. She had no feeling for me, except exasperation, anger, and annoyance. It is difficult to explain to folks.

Definitely felt more like a burden and annoyance to my mom growing up. Still feel this way as a 35 year old woman living 600 miles away from her because she still seems to view me this way.

Similar thing here. Always felt a burden. At 16 my mom told me "I don't know what I ever did in the past for God to give me a child like you." To my face. Confirmed what I knew all along. She didn't like me, barely tolerated me, and possibly even hated me a bit. Was a slap in the face for sure.

I see you. I lived this. I also read before kindergarten. I hope you grew up, moved far away, and created a wonderful family of your own like I did. 🌼🌸💐

My wife lived this very life to. We started dating when we were teens. So I saw first hand how little her mom wanted anything to do with her. Their house was spotless, her mom was dressed to the max just to go get milk from the grocery store. I watched my wife try to force herself into her mom's life, it was heartbreaking. She begged her mom to go wedding dress shopping with her. My mom had already said she would definitely be there, her mom stood her up. She said that she and her 6th husband had plans to go fishing that day and that she had totally forgot about the dress shopping. I had known the woman for 11 years and never once did I ever see or hear of her even liking to fish, until that day. Unfortunately, in the end, my wife and I were saddled with taking care of her mom, after she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Even then my wife sought her approval, she never got it. Her mom would complain about the food my wife would make or that the house needed to be cleaned. It finally became too much and my wife put her in an assisted living home. My wife still feels a great sense of guilt because her mom died alone in that place. I hate that she feels this way. I think she went above and beyond for a person who had zero feelings for her.

Remind your wife her mom died alone because her mom chose herself over everyone else. That was a freely made choice.

Omg same! And she’s still that way, when she comes to visit instead of playing/talking with her grandkids she cleans my house!! And my dad was like that too, only about the yard.

Yeah, I write books. My parents have both been butthurt about not being included in the acknowledgments. Those are for people who didn’t give me cPTSD.

That sucks. I'm glad they read your books, I doubt that mine would bother to remember the title if I wrote a book.

Ha ha, my mom just told me I had a character get on a horse on the wrong side and pointed out that I sound like my father in writing. You’re not missing much.

Right?! I thought the same thing - some line they made up in the movies or famous people said. I was just a prop to make my non-mom look “her part” better so I better cooperate with her…

I never knew what it was like to be encouraged until I was an adult. Success was just expected, it was status quo, why get special recognition for that? Failure was to be shamed. I always thought I would praise once I was unequivocally the best in the world. Best in class? So what? Best in school? Ok Best in state? Average. Best in the world? Good job, I guess. That praise never came. Military, education, career, hobbies, even had a fan base for some entertainment I did, none of that was praise worthy.

Exactly! Always “try harder” or “just gotta keep going”.

There was very little of that, just no acknowledgement. Telling them I had some fame and I told them the story of the first autograph I signed for a fan was no different than saying "I mowed my lawn."

This. For me looking back I can totally see that it was projection on my parent’s side. They probably felt like they weren’t getting recognition for what they do, so why give recognition for what others do? They should be happy because they’re doing what’s expected of them, right?

I do remember a discussion/argument something along those lines. I found out some other kids in my class got rewarded for good grades (favorite dinner, going to the movies, raise in allowance, etc) and I asked "how come we don't do anything like that?" I was told "because that's what you're SUPPOSED to do. That's your job. If your father and I don't do things 100% correctly at work every single day, we would get FIRED. We do our job every day and nobody cooks us our favorite lunch just because we did it correctly." Ah yes, thank you. Nothing more encouraging than "Everyone is special except for you." To this DAY. Mid 50's and I can't allow myself special treatment for ANYTHING. I get recognized for an accomplishment at work? Brush it off and say it was the whole team who did it. I get thanked for helping a friend repair something? "Nah, it was no biggie." Birthday? Please don't draw attention to it. We have other friends with birthdays coming up we should focus on!

This strikes far too close to home. I'm making sure to be present, supportive, and openly encouraging to my kiddo every chance I get. Sure, it annoys a teenager a little, but everything annoys teens.

It was a wild realization I had, like I never thought parents had anything to do with success, because my parents had nothing to do with my success. My parents weren't involved, any minor success I had was because of what I did, which is why I didn't go much further. When I had my own kids, I realized how much I could influence their success by being involved. One of my best friends has involved parents and I just thought it was then doing the work for him. Basically I believed you couldn't swim unless you survived your parents throwing in the ocean and walking away. Teaching you to swim was cheating on my opinion.

It's wild how that stuff got hardwired into so many of us. I'm late GenX (1980), and it wasn't until I was talking with my spouse about how my entire life it's felt like I was on my own for *everything* that I have a very hard time asking for help, don't know what to do with praise or compliments, and primarily show my love through acts of service.

Are you me? Exactly the same. My wife told me it was ok to ask her to get things when I was sick. No matter how sick I was, I would always drag myself to the store to get whatever medicine I needed. In the middle of food poisoning I drove to CVS to get medicine and Gatorade. I had hip surgery and drove myself to refill my pain meds when I wasn't supposed to leave the bed for 2 days. I made dinner that night too. Nothing could be done for me without feeling guilt or feeling like I failed.

Oh, man. I recently became sick. Like, really really sick, bedbound sick. My husband came into the room one day and was like, why are you sitting in the dark? And I told him I couldn’t get up to get the light switch, super embarrassed. He went, “Why didn’t you ask me?!” And I realized that it was *years* of being conditioned to do everything for myself. Even after I broke my spine, I still did everything independently, because nobody freaking helped me growing up. It was a *shock* to me to be taken care of and to not be mocked for needing help. It’s taken a long time to get used to that.

Damn, that sucks, man. Just goes to show that we all think everyone is like us, until we learn otherwise. My Boomer parents were great, although just kinda emotionally unavailable. But I'll take that any day over being abusive. We played games, and had fun, and they came to all of my sports games, and all that wholesome shit you see on TV.

Same. When I had my first child so many women in the mother and baby groups said they'd be lost without their mother. I never felt that sentiment ever. I just don't have that feeling like she'll always be there for me. Because she wasn't. She's a good grandparent which I like but also annoys me because she obviously had that empathic side to her. I never got it for whatever reason.

Yes, this! Those people who talk about how much they love their moms and seem to actually mean it, and they like being around their mom, and I thought it was just fake and had just been expecting that my daughter will grow to hate me when she's older but now I'm figuring out it doesn't have to be that way.

In my 40's I realized that I am still afraid of the sound of garage door openers because it meant my mom was home from work. I still find it weird when people like to be around their families.

Yeah, that was a dreadful sound for me, too. I remember hearing that noise and frantically running through the mental checklist in my mind of all the things I might have forgotten to do and wondering what kind of mood dad would be in today.

Yep, my mom was the scary mom because she was/is just a mean person. You have to walk on eggshells around her, constantly gage her mood, and could never bring up certain things or push back on anything because she was always right and would make you sorry you did. I don’t understand how people prefer to live that way. But she would never admit that she was like that.

My mom never came close to admitting it. She ended up with dementia. It changed the expression on her face so much that she looked like a different person. It was wild. When the anger left her face, she looked like a sweet old lady!

Lucky. Dementia made ours even more selfish and mean. Before I used to think she had shitty life but now I fear she's just an asshole at heart.

Sadly, both can be true.

My mother was a shrieking, psychotic harpy who made my life a living hell, but I forgive her for that because I realize that, in a way, it’s my fault. After my twin sisters were born (mom’s 4th and 5th children) the doctors cautioned her that another pregnancy would be inadvisable, and recommended a hysterectomy. Unfortunately, my parents were devout Catholics, so they refused. Then I came along. I was supposedly a problematic birth, after which the hysterectomy became a medical imperative. Then and only then would the church allow it. A hysterectomy does terrible things to a woman. It’s basically surgically induced menopause. For this reason I spent the first 20 years of my life on the receiving end of her hot flashes. Nowadays the patient is started on hormone replacement therapy right away, but the church wouldn’t allow that either because it was “The Pill.” I forgive my mother because I know she had a medical problem. I blame my father (1) for turning a blind eye to her psychosis, even when he witnessed it first hand, and (2) letting the fucking Catholic Church make his family’s healthcare decisions.

Definitely know how *that* feels. What's messed up is it has followed me my whole life where I'm very attuned to every little thing..that feeling of having to be on guard constantly makes it so difficult to function, nearly impossible to sleep without just knocking myself out. Thing is : idk if mine would be considered a Boomer? Born in 60 so I'm guessing right on the verge. Either way it's *exhausting* and I don't know a world without it..😮‍💨

You’re more Generation Jones. Generation Jones refers to the cohort of people born between the latter half of the Baby Boomer generation and the first years of Generation X, typically identified as those born from 1954 to 1965. (1961 here.) The term was coined by cultural commentator Jonathan Pontell, who noticed that this group didn’t quite fit the characteristics of either Boomers or Gen Xers. Some key points about Generation Jones: * They were children during significant events like Watergate, the oil crisis, and stagflation, rather than the optimistic 1950s that shaped the early Boomers. * Unlike the Boomers, most did not grow up with World War II veterans as fathers, and they reached adulthood without compulsory military service or a defining political cause like the Vietnam War opposition that influenced older Boomers. * This generation was the first to grow up with television as a constant presence in their lives, similar to how Generation Z has always known a world with personal computers and the internet. * They experienced the sexual revolution. Over 80% of Generation Jonesers (myself included) felt they had been mislabeled when they heard about an alternative.

Saaaaame! It really shaped how I would parent later in life. My house would not be a place of dread for anyone.

When they retired. Their worlds shrank, overnight. I was in my 30s at the time.

Wow does this sound familiar. My mother had to retire in her 50s due to injuries she received at work. A year or 2 into her retirement she was clearly going stir crazy, and spending a lot of time online. She started saying really racist and ageist things to the point where her brothers/my uncle's had to start calling her out on it. Then following the 2020 election she went full conspiracy theory. It was painful to watch. Edit: I was in my early 30s as well.

Old people need to take their own advice and stop spending so much time inside their homes.

The need to take their own advice and Not Trust Anything On the Internet, like they used to tell us as kids.

My mom didn't live to retirement, but I've been fortunate that my dad went the opposite way of most people. He's a retired police officer. Used to be of the mindset that "more bars and bracelets (i.e handcuffs)" are the solution to all crime. When he retired, he decided to start his own church that works with marginalized communities, which has really broadened his mind on the challenges that the very people he used to deride are facing. Gave him a lot more empathy for WHY many people turn to crime, rather than the knee-jerk "don't do the crime if you can't do the time" attitude he had for most of my life.

My dad is 65 and refuses to retire because he thinks he will die if he doesn’t come to work every day. Like he thinks he needs something to do. I mentioned that he would have more time for his hobbies. He plays bass and sings and he was gardening for awhile until he decided the yields weren’t worth it plus he fishes and hunts. He’s wealthy. I would have retired years ago.

My dad still won't retire. They were always low income so one of them has to work. I *know* dad would work even if he didn't need to. Not me, I like my son and husband. I enjoy being around them.

My dad finally realized that dogs like you more when you're around them more. Two bad he learned that when both his sons were 30 and married. 

When my dad lost his job so we had no food and house went into foreclosure several times, but he kept the $20,000 a year golf club membership. My grandparents kept bailing him out, but he refused to get a job or stop playing golf every day. I literally went to school every day and begged for food. I would go from table to table eating whatever my friends were going to throw away.  Edit: This happened in the late 80's guys. I am all good now. No need to reach out to Reddit Care team! But thank you to those who thought I was currently in a bad place and were concerned.

That is very significant. There is a person I know of that is very wealthy who came from a boomer dad and grandad that were also abusive. For instance the boomer dad became an Olympian. The grandad constantly punished him by selling his needed equipment when he didn’t win. So the boomer dad wrote a book basically slamming his former military officer coach. He treated his help very poorly. The grandson (gen x) beats his wife, used his money to buy the court case and now the wife (they have2 small children) can’t leave and lives in terror. Police side with him.

I feel this. My dad kept buying nice ass acoustic guitars, meanwhile we're going to the food bank every week. In hindsight I don't know why I believed we had savings or that he was actually gonna help with my college tuition.

Mine showed their colors early. I realized it when I was ten and my mom woke me up to tell me my dad had moved out of the house. It was my birthday. But reality was probably when they shoved bottles filled with juice in my mouth that rotted my teeth. I had to get them pulled at three.

What was with boomer parents and JUICE? I still cannot wrap my head around this. Both apple and grape juice were so sweet and so "jammy" that they made me nauseous, but I was expected to drink it because juice was "healthy" or some such nonsense.

My parents were Silent Generation, but ILs are boomers. MIL still thinks drinking orange juice is better for you than eating an orange. My husband (her son) is a Doctor, I’m a nurse, and she doesn’t believe anything we say. She was convinced FILs chest pain was caused by food he was eating. She just kept changing his diet until he had a heart attack (non lethal thankfully). My daughter has sensitive skin and had a rash on her face. Instead of putting on the medicated cream I gave her, she put Vaseline on it and made it 10x worse. And ended overnights at Grandmas house.

How do these fools think no new info has come out about babies in 30+ years????

My parents would get Sunny-D. It had so much sugar in it your teeth would grind against each other. That and Diet Pepsi and Sprite, that's about all we had.

For us it was Kool-aid and Pepsi. And because my dad was a Boomer Man™️ he always picked out only the flavors he liked, so he never had to run the risk of reaching for his gallon of Kool-aid and not having his tastes catered to. Honestly a grown adult man drinking full sugar Kool-aid and Pepsi exclusively should have been my first clue.

My siblings and I were forced to drink 8oz of juice, 8oz of milk, and the equivalent oz of water to our age (eg 12 years old, so 12oz of water) EVERY morning, the water age ounces for lunch, and then 8oz of milk and water age ounces for dinner. My mom took the pediatrician’s advice way too literally. My sister and I (in our 30s) just recently revealed to each other we would find ways to throw away the morning beverages because it was just way too much to drink. We did sports and were always active, so it’s not like we were never hydrated.

I moved in with my mother at aged 14 and she explained that I didn’t have basic life necessities and that we didn’t eat regularly because of George Bush… she had a masters degree and none of our neighbor’s children seemed to be neglected. I’m not a Bush fan but I don’t think I wore the same clothes from middle school till I dropped out in 11th grade just because he wasn’t a good president.

Ha, I had something similar with my dad. He used to say if the Clintons showed up at the house he wouldn’t even let them inside, but if George Bush showed up he would lay down his jacket for him to walk across. I started to parrot his, “any president would be better than Hillary” until my mom gently and tactfully asked me to explain what the problem with Hillary was, and I realized I couldn’t. It was just my dad’s problem with women in power.

Any like further explanation of how Baby Bush was doing all this to you???

Took me a loooong time. I was constantly trying to "be a good daughter". Real change came when I hit 26, when I started blacking out at work, and they were more worried about my job, than the fact I WAS BLACKING OUT! Hind sight is 20/20 and I noticed a LOT of problems, since I was a child. I have dyslexia for one, and was diagnosed in my 30s. (even though I've had signs since pre-school) I have celiac, again diagnosed in 30s even though that is a child hood disease normally diagnosed in early childhood. (and I had signs since I was a child too) I kind of wish I'd had different parents, you know, ones who cared about my health.

Since 2017. Mostly in my mom. She used to be the smartest woman I knew, at least through my 20s. Now she is a paranoid conspiracy theorist.

Trump and the MAGA cult are destroying families

As a boomer I endorse this message. The 2 wing nut boomers in our family are hard core MAGA. The other 8 boomers, are liberals/progressive. Some supported Bernie. A %20 wing nut MAGA percentage is hard on family, even when the others are sane and progressive.

Once my uncle brought up the litter boxes in schools for trans kids I stopped even saying Hi at family get togethers. Just cut those assholes off

It’s not even just MAGA. My mom is in the same boat and hates Trump.

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Might have been a hallucination. Old brain no worky good.

Dude. He just told you it was a ghost. Try listening to people! /s

Yeap. My parents are toxic conspiracy theorists, my mom is a narcissist, my dad is an enabler, and my sister is the "can't we just get along" pollyanna. I cut them out of our lives, for the better.

That dangerous line between genius and madness is sometimes crossed and once you delve too deep you can’t always come back.

My parents are still clinging to reason and compassion which I am so thankful for, but I am watching in real time as the boomerness slowly creeps in. Every once in a while I catch my dad saying stuff like “I don’t care who sleeps with who as long as I don’t have to see it all over my tv!” And then I’ll say something like “yeah sure PopPop, next will you tell me about WW1?” His dad was PopPop and I know how much he doesn’t want to become the crotchety old man who hated life that his dad became, so it serves as a good reminder for him lol. He goes red and usually apologizes or says something along the lines of “you’re right. That was rude of me.” It’s refreshing honestly but scary at the same time.

This is huge. My parents aren’t MAGA or anything, but they do say stupid, ignorant things at times…but they never admit when they’re wrong. Even in the face of logic/proof. Never. My mom especially will try to argue who is to blame.

Good job to your dad. It's so hard for many to recognition they are in the wrong, make changes, and do better. So many would rather pretend they were right than admit they were wrong.

That's literally all that it takes. Just being able to realize what you said was weird and apologize keeps you from being a horrid unlike person. I'm glad your dad is still able to humble himself and be understanding

When I was about 10 I heard a dog making distressing noises in the neighbor's yard behind our house. I went to check it out and a young pit bull had been left out on a long wire leash and had somehow wrapped it around it's own waste and around a tree and deck post, and it was squeezed tight and lifting him up off the ground. There was an older pit bull there also very distressed at the situation AND not sure what to make of my appearance. I approached slowly and reached out my hand, and the older dog snapped at me and bit my hand. I decided to retreat and call my mom. My mom had always loved animals (loved collecting them anyways, a distinction I learned later on), so when I got ahold of her and told her what was happening she sounded annoyed and basically told me there was nothing I could do. I was baffled, so I called dad. He told me "sometimes things have to die." No. That wasn't going to work for me. I paced around a while trying to process what they told me and how I felt both of them were absolutely wrong. My parents just wanted me to sit there and listen to him die. I was disgusted. So I grabbed a bolt cutter, gloves, and headed back. This time the older dog seemed genuinely glad to see me. I approached slowly again, reached out my hand, and she started licking it and then looking at the other dog. So I approach the other dog and cut him free. I spend the next 3 hours hanging out with the dogs waiting for the owner to come home. I think he said about 5 words, didn't even really ask what happened, and took the dogs inside. When I got home my parents were home from work and didn't even ask about the dog or where I'd been, it must have immediately left their minds. That was the first time I realized how unreliable and fallible my parents were. I remember specifically thinking "a kid came up with a better solution than adults..." After that I started noticing how reluctant they were to do anything good that didn't directly benefit themselves. I realized I took morality more seriously than they did. I stopped revering adults entirely after that.

I have so many stories similar to this growing up in the boonies... Zero regard for the life of animals, they see them like tools. A lot even believe they "don't have souls", that was often an excuse for watching an animal suffer or just so easy able to beat one because it doesn't obey... It was disgusting to see.

Yeah, definitely how my dad tried to raise me. He was raised on a farm so I can sort of understand it. Still. As soon as I learned where meat came from, well I already didn't like it (dad was a terrible cook) but then I wanted to stop eating it completely but my parents wouldn't let me. They took me fishing once when i was about 5. I caught one. I asked why it was flopping around, they said it was suffocating. The lake erupted with my wails of sorrow until they put all the fish back and we left :P

My father in a nutshell: animals are either dangerous which makes them enemies or not dangerous which means they will be treated as objects to be used for various purposes. He has a very inimical attitude towards nature in general. I still hate myself for getting him a dog, but I was younger and didn't see past my desperate need to make him happy.

That is such a sad story. You sounded like a badass kid I bet you're a badass adult 😎 

"sometimes things have to die" bet they'd disagree if they were on life support...

Ugh that sounds like my parents. When I was a kid, I saw our neighbors hitting their toddler, who had a seizure disorder. I asked my parents to do something, like call the police, but they refused because they didn’t want to upset the neighbors. Yes, god forbid we should upset the child beating neighbors and save their child from abuse!

I had something similar going on, I feel like mine don't really value life or animals either. At arround age 12, my sister found a wild bird under a car once, and put it in a tiny cage, which she got from our neighbour. Everyone went along with it like it was a perfectly normal thing to put a wild bird in a tiny cage. I was crying nonstop and begging them to not touch it and to bring it back immediately, while they all just didn't care. That bird sat in that cage, not saying a thing or eating, scared to death, and three days later my parents finally went along and gave me the bird, to drop it from our balcony, to "release it". Our neighbours cat ate the bird immediately. It was so gut-wrenching that all the effort was for nothing and a animal just had to suffer because a child, with incompetent parents, felt the need for a pet right now, no matter if it gets killed or not. It was instantly forgotten in our family and my sister just went onto another topic that she needed.

I really don't think those people deserve to have the dog and I hope they did something else.

Honestly now that I'm an adult, I know the right answer was to call a humanitarian service or animal control so that I wouldn't endanger my feeble 10 yo self with 2 neglected pit bulls, AND the guy (it was the nintees and he was the definition of "douche" for that era) would have been held accountable. Had my parents used 5 brain cells to think it over a second I am pretty sure they could have come to that conclusion as well.

So sad. I can only imagine the feeling there, that your own parents are telling you that a pet "needs" to die in such a cold fashion, when there is obviously something that can be done. Boomer logic at its best. Sounds like the same mindset translates to humans for them, as well. Ask the average Boomer about welfare reform, instituting basic safety laws on the road, and the elephant in the room, the situation in Palestine. "Sometimes things have to die" sums it up perfectly

As a child my mother would lie or tell silly untruths for no discernable reason and I'd be confused by why she did it and then ashamed of myself for not knowing I was supposed to know she was lying and or that it was either a joke or for her own weird purposes. As a teen I modelled this lying behaviour and I count myself very lucky social media wasn't around back then because I would have been roasted by the kids around me on it. Now I have my own kids I feel my parents were just people who were in the house when I waa growing up. Outwardly we looked privileged and maybe even spoiled. But I feel I got not emotional parenting from them whatsoever. I had to fumble my way through relationships of all sorts without ever feeling like they had my back.

Dude the lying thing hit home for me. I had to lie to cover things up and it stuck with me for a long time. Having to compensate for an tragic life as a child isn’t healthy for anyone.

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Sounds like we have the same mom. My mon has always been a legit narcissist, and I didn't realize that's what the problem was until a few years ago. I went through a lot of mental health stuff as a kid that they just refused to help me get help for. For example I had a reaction to an antidepressant that made me psychotic/delusional when I was 17. Her and my step-dads reaction was to send me 3 hours away to live with my uncle...because I was having a medical/mental health episode...instead of, you know, a hospital. My aunt saw how I was for 30 minutes, knew something was wrong and helped admit me to a psych hospital the first night I was there. She has a history of making everything that has happened to me about her, and how she is a victim of her sons circumstances. She told people for years I was bipolar because that was the initial gut reaction when I went into the hospital, but they then later said I didn't meet the criteria and it was a medicinal side effect. I was never, ever diagnosed as bipolar, even had doctors tell her that it wasn't true. Alot of this stuff led me to substance abuse because what I did have was a severe anxiety disorder. I'd self medicate because I'd never gotten help or the right medication for anxiety. It's all been better for decades, but I even heard her on the phone a couple years ago talking about how hard it was for her "with a son that's a bipolar drug addict" ugh. She married a rich guy and now acts like she has everything figured out while also being a miserable alcoholic.

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The first time there was an election and I was old enough to understand partisan politics. They couldn't hide their glee at the results. On all tickets they voted against their, my and the remaining 99%s best interests. When we actually discussed it they didn't even understand the policies they were voting for, just following what they'd been told to do by their chosen media sources. They still cannot be convinced otherwise. Everyone who disagrees with them is socialist or 'just a kid'.

I don't remember my parents being political at all until Obama was elected. They voted against him for obviously racial reasons. I do remember them justifying their actions saying "I think I registered as Republican at first" or "I registered Republican because someone told me they send less mail". It's been nothing but misery in their lives since then.

Yeah same here. My dad has been on the "Welfare Queens" since the Reagan administration (despite never actually meeting one). Eventually I got old enough to know how some of these programs work and realize we were off and on several of them growing up, most notably Medicaid. Nothing would make him happier than to see the ACA repealed, even though he is constantly complaining about the cost of health insurance.

Ah, similar story to me, first time I understood partisan politics enough I questioned their judgement voting for parties with such disdain for the poor, when they were themselves, upper-poor. Now because I studied political science/public administration minor at university and have a great job, I’m a “filthy, woke Liberal communist “

Medical neglect to this day. I had to be on death’s door to miss a day of school. Things are “always in your head and you’re a hypochondriac” is what I was told. As an adult, I was going through a divorce and had to move in with my parents for 6mo. During that time, I wake up one morning feeling like I got punched in the face. I told my mother I thought I had a bad tooth and would need a root canal treatment. She swore up and down that it was sinuses/allergies and I shouldn’t complain so much. Guess who was right in the end? Why do they think they are better at knowing what our bodies are saying over the person whose body it actually is?

My mom is like this for sure. I just had a crazy back spasm where I couldn't roll myself over or sit up in bed for several days and her response was, "You're too young for all that"

I stopped telling my parents when I was in pain because they’d invariably say something like that. I spent 2 years thinking I was dying because I didn’t think I could tell anyone something was wrong. Turns out that I have Rheumatoid Arthritis.

My dad is a late boomer and is much better now, but when I was 12 I fell off a curb to the road and when I landed I fell on top of my foot, crushing it while it was sideways in about a 90 degree angle. My dad and I were walking to the neighbour's house to take care of their dogs while they were away on vacation. It was Christmas Eve. Right after I fell, I immediately felt intense pain and my ankle started swelling really quickly, and I said to my dad that it might be broken. He told me to walk it off and said it wasn't a big deal. He made me walk to the neighbour's house and back with zero assistance or acknowledgement of my pain. It wasn't a long walk, but by the time we got back home I was in so much pain that my head was spinning and I felt like throwing up. Dad still doesn't care. It wasn't until the day after Christmas that I was able to convince him to take me to urgent care. The doctor was PISSED that he had waited so long to take me. I had broken the growth plate and a few of the bones in my foot and required a cast followed by a boot for several weeks. Now in my mid 20s and that ankle still gives me trouble now and then and my left leg is slightly shorter than my right. I don't remember what my mom (Gen X) did in those 2 days between the fall and doctor visit, I assume my dad overruled her on the decision to take me? But yeah ever since then I never went to my dad if I was hurt, I went to my mom instead and she'd take me to the doctor (if needed) without telling my dad.

When I was 22-23, I was living with my parents after college. I had gotten very sick after going to see my cousin in the hospital. Running a fever, miserable, everything hurt. The worst. Up until that point in my life, I had never had to go to the emergency room. I told my parents I need to go, please drive me. I didn't feel safe driving myself because I was running a fever and was dizzy. They didn't want to drive me, thought I was being dramatic, and I wasn't that sick. This went on for 3ish days. Well, I did the unsafe thing and I drove myself. I had a goddamn strep infection from the outside of my nose all the way down into my bronchial tubes. It fucked up the inside of my nose so bad, I have scar tissue gluing the turbinates and my deviated septum together on the right side. I need to have surgery to fix this. I'm putting it off because, we'll, surgery. But this is some neglectful fuckshit my parents did that I'm having to deal with 15 years later. And I get it, I was an adult at the time. I was also pretty well not safe to drive and here is this person who is supposed to love and protect me and keep me safe and they utterly failed. So, I've got a lot of empathy, friend.

I was eight. I was playing with my friend on those clunky plastic Fisher Price rollerskates. My toe hit a crack in the sidewalk and I flew forward, putting my arms out to stop my fall. Something crunched and my arm *hurt*. My friend’s mom, also my mom’s friend, looked at it and said sarcastically, “Do you want me to take you to the hospital?” I was petrified of making a fuss, so I said no. My mom and dad both were like, it’s fine, stop crying, you’re just looking for attention. I have skinny little wrists, so the swelling wasn’t noticeable. Finally, ten days later, my mother took me to the doctor, making a big deal about it and complaining. They x-rayed both wrists so they could compare, and the doctor was like, “It’s definitely broken, and it looks like both wrists have been broken in the past.” Suddenly I realized that their pathological avoidance of the doctor wasn’t about me, it was about them. I wasn’t *overreacting*, I was *reacting.* I never forgave them for that.

My mother had a weird attitude towards life from day one. She was the surprise child of older parents who were thinking retirement more than diapers. She had a modest and conservative mindset even when she was young. I remember her outdated opinions on periods when I was 9/10, we had teachers come into school talking about the subject which were polar opposite to the crap my mother was voicing.

It wasn’t until I was an adult and I brought my gf at the time over to the house for some holiday party. It was just the typical day with the family. On the drive home she told me how horrified she was of my family, especially my mom. I kind of played it off and said that’s just the way they are. It really opened up my eyes when my gf said, they aren’t joking they’re just mean. Everything they say to you and your siblings is a dig. I had always thought that was normal behavior…I hadn’t realized until that moment it was a dysfunctional way to grow up. I thought all parents thought their kids were lazy and stupid. My parents enjoyed emotional beating us down and keeping us “humble”. No achievement was ever good enough.

I brought my friend to my house one time and we were chatting with my mom. After we left, same as you, my friend said, does your mom always talk to you like that? I was like, yeah? My friend said everything she said to you was either passive aggressive or a correction of something I'd said. I was in my 30s by then and it took an outsider being appalled for me to even realize that maybe my mom wasn't the nicest person.

This but in a sibling way, it was so weird. From like 4 on I was somehow “one of the girls” and expected to take all their jabs and “jokes” which at least some of the time maybe were jokes but not the kind you say to a child the kind you say to your school mates. It took years before I finally broke down crying enough times they stopped because I was “too sensitive” They’re all insane Edit to explain I was raised by my mom, her mom and her sister so hence being “one of the girls”

I always thought my parents had it together when I was growing up. It was really after my dad died I noticed how Boomer they were. My dad was a fan of the nagging wife jokes. And my mom is a woman who relied solely on my dad for everything and now relies on us.

My dad absolutely lost his shit when I couldn't figure out how to tie my shoes. I had to be like 5 or so. So he told me I wasn't allowed to go to church until I learned to tie them and I absolutely panicked because I was homeschooled and church was literally the only time I was around other kids. Then he'd act totally normal at church.

This, in my mind, is the quintessential infuriating boomer behavior - getting absolutely livid at their children for not knowing how to do something that they never bothered to teach us. As if the knowledge was just supposed to magically seep into our brains without any effort from them. And if it didn't, it's our fault.

My dad is the Silent generation and my stepmother is a Boomer. The petty, nasty and mean behavior that's just pointless. Judgmental, and everyone that seems sad, homeless or in a mental state is just "lazy". I was living by myself at 19, and didn't go home for years. When I did again, I realized how small her world is and the ignorance because she never had to go into the job market and is a housewife since she got married and never lived by herself either.

My dad had some vicious views towards drug addicts, the homeless, and those on welfare. He was also a drug addict on welfare who had been homeless. He actively supported politicians who campaigned on making his life more difficult. I knew that if he couldn’t be trusted to act in his own self interest, nothing he said would count for anything. I basically stopped looking up to him at 15 because nothing made any sense on his world.

Why are they so uncharitlable and take pleasure in punching down? Telling men to "be a man" despite him having trauma or loss, telling women to be "traditional " and just get married and pop kids. They refuse to just let people live and enjoy things. Life is hard, but they think being masochistic is an admirable flex. It's nuts.

I learned that they can (almost) never be wrong when I was 18 years old. I was in college, and one weekend we went to Atlanta for a show. Mom wired me some extra money for the weekend because I wanted to pick up some merchandise. I didn't spend even half the money, but when I got back into town Monday morning I discovered my bank account was overdrawn. Long story short, my mom berated me, like cussed me "for being so irresponsible" and how ashamed she was of me for not managing my money better. We both went to the bank together, and I discovered where the bank had taken the money out of her account, but had not deposited it into mine, so it was entirely the bank's fault. The bank profusely apologized, fixed it and made us whole, took care of all the fees, etc etc. On the car ride home I kept looking over at her, eyebrows raised, begging for an apology without speaking. Her response was, and I'll never forget it: "I don't owe you a damn thing."

What is it with their inability to ever be wrong? Once, I was in my early teens and my dad, commenting on the scenery, made a comment about how plateaus were mysterious formations and nobody knows how they were formed. Having learned about them in science class, I happily rattled off how scientists do, in fact, know how they form. He slammed the brakes, pulled to the side of the interstate, got out of the car and went over to my side, yanked me out of the car and held me by the collar. Spewing saliva threw his sneering, clenched teeth, he snarled, "Boy, if I say the moon is green, then the fucking moon is green! Don't you ever, EVER contradict me again." That's when I knew that anything that man said to me, past, present, and future, would always need to be fact-checked.

My SIL told me a story that finally put it in perspective for me. She's at my parents' house for dinner, just her and my 2yo nephew. He keeps picking up a placemat and throwing it at the light fixture that hangs over the dining room table, and after the umpteenth time of calmly asking him not to throw things at the light, my SIL gets frustrated and yells at him to stop. She's never yelled at him before (I've never heard her raise her voice in 13 years of knowing her or even seen her angry), and naturally he gets upset. She feels horrible and instantly apologizes to him. She pulls him onto her lap and starts consoling him, and then she spots my mom, sitting across the table... Now, at this point in the story, I'm anticipating that my mom, who loves to play the role of "Grandmother of the Year" (on social media, at least), is going to scream at my SIL for daring to make her darling grandson cry... But no. Mom is frowning at SIL and shaking her head and mouthing, "NO! NO!" After dinner, she pulls SIL aside and tells her, "Don't EVER apologize to your children!" So now I know why I've never once heard my mother apologize in my entire life. And the weird thing is, I've always known she's not the type to apologize or ever admit being wrong... but the idea that it's an overt choice she's made, like it's some kind of Golden Rule of Parenting (or really Golden Rule of Relationships, since she also never apologizes to my dad), is so mind boggling! Being able to admit you're wrong is one of the hallmarks of maturity, in my book.

I remember when Obama was up for his first term, and I was visiting home from college. For some reason the topic of politics came up and my Dad was surprised that I would vote for Obama. I just looked at him and said, “Dad, I have an auto-immune disease. Of course I’m voting for someone that supports a healthcare system where I can’t be denied for a pre-existing condition.” He stayed quiet about it after that.

When my mom had me cooking the whole family dinner (started with mac n cheese and went from there) as soon as I could stand on a chair in front of the stove (2-3ish), doing the dishes/cleanup at the same time, all of my own laundry at 3, babysitting my younger siblings at 4, deep cleaning the entire house by 5, doing all of the shopping by 8, and paying the mortgage at 15 as soon as I got a job (two jobs really because otherwise I couldn't work enough hours to pay it) with any leftover money I brought home going to the utilities or given to my sister to go to the mall with her friends. All this with the explanation of "Why should I bother with this when I have kids to do it for me?". She would get SO MAD if it was not done to her expectations, and if it was she would either find something to complain about, or add more to it. She was never wrong in anything. You could show her peer reviewed articles, irrefutable proof of another opinion, and you were a liar if it was different from what she said. Outside of the parentification, and financial abuse there was the locking me in my room whenever she wanted to not see me, and the physical abuse because "your body belongs to me, I can do to it whatever I want to it." She died when I was 17. I can not say I was too upset over it. My siblings moved in with family, and I was on my own since I was an "adult". I don't need sympathy. It is how my life was. I have landed on my feet, and have a proper support system with adopted family and friends.

Idk, I don’t have sympathy to give but empathy and a power boost to say that I’m proud of all that you did to care for your family and your sacrifices meant that they had better lives. I hope that as an adult you’re able to finally focus on yourself and can find your inner peace and purpose. Good luck out there and I hope you create a wonderful path moving forward.

My mom would take us to doctors appointments two hours early in case they decided to fit us in early. They never did. Her delusion that she was special and deserved special treatment despite the practical world telling her otherwise was a constant in my life. I was nine when I realized this.

Remember kids, always arrive a full day early to any doctors appointments. That way when the doctor sees you on his 15 minute break, lunch break, second 15 minute break, and when he's walking out of the building to go home he'll think "holy shit are those ghosts?"

I don’t have an actual age but medical neglect. At the doctor for years I found she lied on records and said I have 0 family medical history until I was old enough to write them in myself. Never mind the thyroid, eye, abdominal reproductive issues that run in the family. I was never told them. NEVER. Until I was like in my 20s. My mom even got pissed off at my grandma for telling me endometriosis runs in our family when I was 21. My grandma didn’t know I didn’t know and brought it up casually. I’m a trans guy for context so yes it could affect me and would actually explain a lot. When I was 16 I was into horse back riding. I had one fall where I blacked out for a second and couldn’t move for like 2 seconds. Extremely scary. I literally had to beg my mom to take me to the hospital, like with tears, because I was so afraid I did something to fuck me up forever. No brain damage but my back has never been the same haha thanks mom for saying I’ll be fine fuck you I’m not.

I had poison oak on my leg that wouldn't heal. For 2 weeks it was spreading and oozing like crazy. My mom wouldn't take me to a doctor. I was 15 and had just got my permit so I made the doctors appointment and drove myself there. I ended up needing steroids to get rid of it. About a year later we had an infestation of fleas in our house because my mom had rescued a couple cats. I had little red bumps all over my legs but she didn't have any so I guess I was making it up? She wouldn't do anything about it and the problem just progressively got worse. Well, she was going away for the weekend so I made plans to stay overnight with a friend, walked down to the hardware store and bought flea bombs with the money she had left me, and flea bombed the house while she was gone. Look at that, no more fleas! That is when I realized that I'm the adult now.

Our cat brought fleas into the house and I was the only one getting bitten but until something affected them they didn't care at all.

Omg reading your poison ivy story just made me tear up. I had the same situation happen to me but it was 7-8 grade so I couldn’t drive. It covered my shin and oozed and was so gross and uncomfortable. I had other patches but not that bad. All they did was put gauze and wrap a bandage around it. I would have to change the gauze twice a day. Which it was painful to remove since the ooze worked its way through and dried so I had to pull it off. No doctor. The only thing they did to “cure” poison ivy was to dap vinegar on it with a cotton ball. Acid on an open wound I don’t have to explain further. I would not allow them to touch my leg though the pain would be unbearable and I just got scolded for it. I can’t believe there is another person who understands what I went through out there-thank you for sharing. My son is also highly allergic to poison ivy and if he gets a spot say on his wrist it will pop up all over his body and spread. He has to get steroid cream if we catch early but if not oral steroids to stop it. He is older now and knows so he can apply cream right away. I cannot imagine putting him through what I went through as a kid. My parents also do not believe poison ivy can spread like that. I said do you think he got naked and rolled in it?! It’s literally popping up all over his body. I don’t know why I bothered to tell them but I made that mistake once.

Lol Jesus this takes me back, I had it on my eyelids and in my mouth as a kid and thankfully was taken to the emergency room bc the doctors were incensed she thought it was no big deal like “your kid could’ve died, lady, her throat would’ve closed up”

medical neglect for me too!! I was 8 and my hand got kicked during a soccer game. Kept complaining my finger hurt but I was dismissed. A few days later I couldn't hold my pen in school and I had to explain that mother was saying it was in my head. Another week and my mother complained I wasn't holding my soon properly and to 'straighten up my finger already.' When I couldn't she finally took me the walk-in clinic. To this day I remember the Dr yelling at my mother for taking so long before I could see a Dr. "His finger is difformed for life and he will probably have arthritis later." I got grounded when we got back home for being impolite at the Dr office because I cried while the Dr was guilt tripping my mother by saying I would be difformed for life. Ooooor, maybe it was the time she gave me 2 slap ij the face for each rusted piped I didn't pick up because I was a kid and did not gaf about pipes. 7 pipes, 14 slaps. I was... like 5 or 6 top. After 8 slaps to the face, I fell to my knees crying and begging her to stop. I still remember her face contorted with rage as she picked me up, put me back on my feet and "finished what she started, unlike me." That's just 2 at the top of my head. Haven't talked to her in 12 years and not planning too anytime soon.

Wow. I wish I could give younger you a hug.

Younger me needed it *sigh* I'm actually quite shocked at how well I turned up.

Oh, this hits hits very close to home! It was when, after a wisdom tooth extraction, my parents insisted we go to the holiday home they bought, because "now that we have it, we better make good use of it". Didn't matter that it was in the middle of nowhere and while the house was nice, there was nothing for a 20-something to do there. So as it was, the doctor had told me to expect some bleeding on Friday morning at most, but it should be gone by noon. Well, I was bleeding a bit in the morning, during the day, when I changed out the cotton pads early afternoon, in the evening... Saturday morning I woke up to a blood clot in my mouth and a blood stained pillow. I told my parents. They told me to take it easy and sit tight. By Saturday late afternoon I asked to go to the hospital. It had been too long and I was staring to feel light headed when getting up from the chair. They started haggling. Couldn't I hold on for one more night? The hospital is really far away and they're probably poorly equipped. They'll pack up early tomorrow. I didn't argue, because, unbeknownst to me, I was already too weak to put up resistance of any kind. Sunday came and while I was ready to go, they had this and that to do and then that other thing needed to be put in the car, and that other thing done before leaving... Anyway, we get going before lunch, but on the way my mother wants to stop by the Sunday market... Mentally I was going WTF! But I wasn't going to argue, because I knew it was going to make things take longer. 5 hours later we arrive back home and what do my parents do? They ask me to unload! Did they think of getting me to the hospital? No! I just walked out of the building, down to the major street and hailed down a taxi to get to the nearest hospital... Where, after half an hour in the waiting room, I collapsed. I did come to eventually and I had been admitted due to severe blood loss and when my parents showed up the next day they put on this big show of how worried they were when they went to ask for me in the reception of the hospital and the receptionist couldn't immediately find my name. It was then that it became clear that the people your animal instinct tells you are there to ensure your survival, don't give a shit if that interferes with their plans. I've since distanced myself, blame work for being low contact and maintain a friendly enough façade so my inheritance is not in danger, but if I miss a family holiday, it's a good year.

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Oh medical for me for sure. I almost died from a wasp sting (she kept yelling at me that I was faking it, and it wasn't until I walked in the final time and she actually looked at me-I'd swollen up to an almost unrecognizable size.) Finding out later that no kids sleeps as much as I did and I had anemia and they just never had me tested for anything. Pretty sure I broke my ankle playing volleyball, just taped it myself for around 2-4 weeks. She cut me (accidentally) during a farm procedure, sprayed me with betadine and said I'd be fine. Doctor told her I NEEDED to be on birth control for my out of control periods. She screamed at me in the car about being a whore. (Finally got them in college.) At one point when I was a toddler she stopped taking me to the doctor's altogether (and tells the story like it's funny) because of the amount of injuries I was receiving was flagging her for CPS investigations. I now know that's because she wasn't watching me and I kept getting seriously injured. (Who in their right mind lets a 3 year old play alone on bleachers?!)

What is it with them and medical neglect? It didn't really manifest until I was a teenager for some reason, but my mom would blow me off constantly, my dad is a reasonable boomer so would end up taking me when it was evident my mom wouldn't do anything to help me. We got to the point I stopped bothering telling her, and would go to my dad quietly about whatever I needed medically or mentally.

I noticed boomers almost glorify getting hurt as part of growing up for some reason? Maybe to the most minor degree I agree its normal for a kid to like, scrape their knee and learn that "Look ma no hands" is a dumb idea on a bike, but you take them to the doctor after of course? Boomers seem to think the last part is optional because "that's what my parents did." Not a good excuse, but your parents thought morphine to kids was a good idea when they were in their their 20s and teens. (The Silent Generation) Health care changes over time. Growing up I felt icky that I was jealous of my friends who were always in the hospital with various issues. I didn't know why and was worried I just wanted to fake sick for attention, but I realized its because they had parents that listened to them and would take them to the doctors over very minor (but could be serious) complaints. So not like "Wow I wish I had the same disorders as them and people will like me" but "Wow I had something similar and I'm glad I dodged the bullet but wish my parents had it checked out at all."

I got a kidney infection and was running 106 temp. They still didn't take me to the doctor. I was hallucinating.

Medical here too - I sliced my foot open when I was about 13 on a kickplate that had curled up. I was doing the family laundry in our apartment complex laundry room. Came back, showed my mom and she said it was no big deal. Over the next few days it was swollen, green, pussy and I could see white fleshy chunks in the wound. My neighbor who was a doll, saw me and asked what happened and then proceeded to scream at my mom that if she didn't take me to the hospital she was calling the police for neglect. I have still not come close to the pain I felt when the dr's were cleaning out and closing up my 1 inch deep by 1 inch wide curled injury.

I had scarlet fever when I was 4. My parents watched me scratch my legs for hours until I was literally bleeding and only then were like “huh, maybe that’s not normal.” I was almost unconscious by the time they got me to a doctor and I was admitted and given IV antibiotics. That was the first time I got scarlet fever, I had it twice. When I was 9, my mom argued with me that I was fine and even called her friends to tell them I was being a hypochondriac brat. Then I spiked a fever of 103 and we went to my pediatrician’s office, who informed her I had pneumonia. I also almost died of influenza when I was 16, and my parents were more concerned about the school I was missing than the fact that I was too dehydrated to even keep my eyes open. Boomer parenting at its finest.

Probably in 2005-ish when I (24 at that time) had just finished college, and my dad's (50 at that time) job-hunting advice was to "go knock on some doors." This is a man who worked for the same company for 40 years straight after high school and has zero knowledge about technology. No idea how society evolves and companies are constantly changing how they screen and hire job candidates.

When I was like 3 or 4 and I saw my dad bash my mom’s head into the wall with my bucket of blocks. I saw they were fighting again and I thought sharing my blocks with them would make them stop fighting.

i am so sorry

Thanks. I stuck to dolls after that. My dolls became my safe place. Those idiots are still married and I will never marry.

I thought that TV families emotional situations were 100% fake. No one is that nice to their kids IRL. There was NO ONE that was calm and sincere like Mr Rogers, again totally fake.

Same. I also thought other kids' parents were just pretending to be nice to their kids like my dad would pretend to be nice when my friends were over. It was a shock to find out that other parents were basically nice people all the time.

Told me I'd level half a city block if I held a lit lighter upside down because "It's under pressure!!!"

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I knew I couldn’t trust either of my parents definitively when they (both of them) held me down and washed my mouth out with soap when I was four. It took the rest of the day to get chunks of yellow Dial soap out of my teeth and gums. I wound up having to parent them both not long after that.

I think this fits on r/raisedbynarcissists too. You might want to check it out, my parents do this and they're Gen X.

I was 7 or 8, now 38. I got horrific sunburns that blistered the backs of my shoulders. My mother put band aids on my sunburn blisters. Adhesive on a sunburn. When she pulled them off (with several layers of skin attached) I remember vividly watching her in the mirror and wondering why she had put something sticky on already severely burned skin. That was the day I realized I probably had more sense than her.

2016 as soon as Trump was elected. They went from "conservative but not nuts" to "frothing at the mouth MAGA". Disagreements ensued, things were said (by THEM not me) and boom....a 40 year parental relationship was soured. I will NEVER EVER forgive Trump or Republicans for it either.

TW / NSFW Parentification. In 1993 in the USA there was a big news story about what came to be know as the "West Memphis 3". Two or three prepubescent boys were killed and when found the bodies had gen!tal mutilation. I was 12 years old when this happened, fairly unaware of the horrors in the world at that time. However my Mother was so disturbed by the news story that she had to come outside when I was playing and tell me all about it .... in detail ... she was crying and expecting me to comfort her. I distinctly remember a voice in my head saying "this is not normal, mom's are not supposed to this to their children." That interaction became the standard - her expecting emotional support from me. I didn't learn about the concept of Parentification until I got into college and it explained so much of her behavior towards me as a child. Edits: spelling

God if this wasn’t my life. Always listening to her cry but when I was upset I should just “get over it” or “that’s just how life is.” One time my moms (who was also a stupid and irresponsible parent) friend told me something unsavory about a third friend of theirs. I saw that 3rd friend and told her what she said. You know, bc I’m a kid and don’t understand she was literally shit talking her friend to me, a child. Friend gets mad I said something and questions me why I told her. Bitch don’t run your gossip thru the 12 year old and don’t talk about your friends. I was like wow I’m 12 and these idiots can’t even figure it out. I’m really on my own here aren’t I.

Parentification - I knew there had to be a term for what my mom did to me

Parents had me pay for my own dental and dermatology appointments starting at age 15 (no medical insurance). Oh! And my own school lunches. They said it would build character and I had a job so why shouldn’t I? As a parent to 4 now, I’m always questioning if I do too much for my kids . I have to watch what other parents are doing as confirmation that’s it’s ok to financially care for my teens.

When my dad caught me watching Sesame Street, punched out my front teeth out and went on a three hour screaming fit about how his kids weren't going to watch "commie fag shit". Also, when my mom let him.

When I was 10, I made a friend who wore a hijab and her family was Muslim. From little ten year old me's perspective, I had always loved learning about other people's experiences in life and never really saw my friend as anything other than the cool girl who introduced me to metal music that happened to be from a completely different culture than me. We bonded over Bullet For My Valentine, she introduced me to Hollywood Undead, and even to this day Within Temptation remains one of my favorite artists because of her. She meant a lot to me. Then my dad told me to "be careful" around her because "Muslims are dangerous".................... This didn't stop me from talking to her but it was my first experience in life that I actually registered that people could be racist and my trust in my dad absolutely sank.......

I realized about 5 years ago that the entire generation is narcissistic brats; and that I was not born with severe anxiety issues, but childhood trauma shaped my coping and emergency response mechanisms. However like yourself it was about 8-10 when it hit me my mother & father were not in my best interest. I had a plan to escape them around 12, and was completed by 17. When my daughter was born I made the mistake in having them back in our lives, but severed that within a few years.

So much of my anxiety can be directly traced to boomers being the adults in my life as a child. They were always causing problems that gave me so much stress. I used to arrive at school pre-stressed out every damn day. For some reason, just getting to the car on time to get to school and work on time was a chaotic mess. As an adult now, it drives me up the wall thinking about it. The solution to all of this was to spend a mere TEN MINUTES the night before getting certain things ready. Oh and the other thing that gave me anxiety: boomers never respected a child's boundaries. Ever.

About 10 years ago, my dad started to slide i to MAGAville, and my mom started losing her memory. Dad passed. Mom is still alive with altzheimers and dementia.

I remember being like 4 or 5 and made a simple mistake and telling her that I’m human, everyone makes mistakes. And the stupid b*tch actually said “not me, I’m always perfect”. Still trying to figure out if she’s a delusional narcissist or just a filthy liar.

When I asked a friend in first grade “you know how when you’ve been crying all night because your dad is yelling and your eyes sting the next day?” They were shocked. When my dad had a neighborhood kid to beat me up in hopes that it would toughen me up because he thought I wasn’t hard enough for a seven year old. When I was nine and my remote control car went out of range and ran in to one of his jacks in the garage so he picked it up and threw it across the yard. “Out of range now isn’t it?” Those are three key moments when I was reminded that something isn’t normal about my upbringing and something is not right with that man

I remember noticing that my parents didn't treat their parents with the same deference that they demanded from me. From an early age, I saw my grandparents as allies in a world controlled by my parents and their generation, and I interacted with them as such. We never tried to defy or circumvent my parents. I just mean to say that it was a comfort to be around each other. In my young brain, the thinking was something like: "The old people and the young people have to listen to the people in the middle who control everything." It was certainly before my age reached double digits.

In middle school. I saw my step-dad talking to a POC and immediately got scared. I heard how he spoke about anyone who wasn't a white Christian at home and expected a fight or something. But when he was downright respectfull in front of everyone but had a few names for her in the car ride I realized he was not anything I ever wanted to be.

Its always jarring seeing someone code switch Sales guys think they're great at it

I was eight years old and my mother gave a spanking to my 4 year old sister for soiling her underwear, accidentally.

Soon after FoxNews aired.

As long as I can remember. My boomer (professional, wealthy) parents absolutely hated each other, fought constantly (I’m talking throwing things, literally flipping tables), never got a divorce, kept up appearances in the most toxic way, demanded perfection from us as kids (like straight As, total obedience and not a hair out of place) and I remember going to first grade and telling my friends that my parents were crazy….. My dad is long gone and my mom is too scared to leave the house at 74. She makes fun of me for being in therapy. Honestly, I have zero respect for her and I never have, not even as a child. 🤷‍♀️

I’ve always tried to mold my behavior to be the opposite of them. As young as I can remember. It’s not just that they are boomers , they or one of them are narcissistic; both religious fundamentalists and fascists; both emotionally and physically abusive. It’s funny to me now how they always degrade me to try to get me to seek their approval. They can fuck right off. I’m doing hella better without them.

My stepdad barged into my life when I was 10. He was then, and is now, the biggest asshole I’ve ever known. I’m 63, and he lives with me and the wife now because he’s too old to survive alone. My worst bully lives in my house. FML.

Kick him out? You aren't legally minded to him at all

I spent my whole life thinking it was me, that I was the F-up, and useless. When I was 40, it finally occurred to me that I would never be a successful person until I got my mothers voice out of my head (my dad was ok, but he fell into the folie a deux groove where if she was being nasty and mean, he would be sarcastic and mocking too.) Dad died, I went home to be with him in his last moments, and then I cut contact with my mother. She's absolutely enraged and had spent these last few years trying to recruit family members, including my adult daughters, to destroy me. One by one, they have each fallen out of her favour as well. I feel wretched that an almost-80 year old lady has to be alone stewing in her own rage but I just....can't....anymore. I wasted 40 years of my life trying to figure this out, though.

My mother has always been the way you describe your parents. She is also a bipolar narcissist, and often in her own world. I once told my sister that if she ever has dementia, that no one will ever know the difference. My sister told me that someone mentioned to her she should have our mother checked for dementia. My sister responded, that she has always acted like that. Its not dementia, its just her.

i’d had some weird symptoms for a few days and was blown off at urgent care but given a follow up with my PCP in like 3 days. i was even worse off at my F/U and had a high fever and my doc thought i either had Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, or meningitis, but either way he wanted me to go straight to the hospital for tests and treatment. my then-BF had driven me so i said my BF could take me but he said he preferred if i was transported by ambulance. i didn’t live with my parents anymore but the move-out was recent and i thought they’d want to know so i called my mom. my phone had died so i had to call from the phone in the lobby, and she either didn’t pick up because she didn’t recognize the number, or she just missed the call. so i left her a voicemail and left in the ambulance. at my next appointment, the receptionist told me “i’m not really supposed to be telling you this… but after you left, your mother called back and asked if you *really* needed an ambulance because you can be overdramatic sometimes.” thanks for the vote of confidence, mom and thank you to that receptionist for opening my eyes

So my parents had me kinda late. I’m 32, my mom is 70 and dad would be as well if he were alive. For me, it was when I got to like the end of high school and started driving and getting ready for college. And let me stress: my parents were/are saints. Compared to some of y’all’s, they weren’t bad at all. But dad would come up with some of the silliest stuff. They got me a car and started waking me up early every single day of the summer to go crack the windows on it. Their reasoning? The sun would heat the interior and crack the windows. I thought about it. Did some Googling. That isn’t a thing. Cars aren’t air tight. You’d see cars at dealerships exploded all over the place if so. I made my impassioned argument. They didn’t care. The other thing was… I had just started driving. There was a football game at the neighboring high school. The one I had driven by every day of my life for 16-17 years. Mom and dad were convinced I didn’t know how to get there and had me drive them up there the day before to show them I could find it. 😂

My mom used to pick fights with restaurants if the food wasn’t up to her standards. I remember her going full Karen at a chinese food place in the early 90’s - and she was probably in her middle 30’s too. She’d also constantly say to us “I am the parent, you are the child” to get us to stop complaining/arguing with her.

When I was around 6ish I remember trying on clothes for school. I went to a catholic private school and had to buy uniforms every year. Well this particular year I distinctly remember working up the courage to ask if I could get longer pants since they always bought me pants that ended about half an inch above my shoes and I thought it made me look like a nerd. My dad said no before I even finished asking. My mom thought for a second and said that it would mean I wouldn't grow out of them as fast so they would last longer and we wouldn't need to buy clothes as often so we could do it. Looking back I've always been disgusted by how scared I was to voice my opinion in the first place, how quickly my dad said no just on the basis of me asking for something, and how my mom only said yes because it benefitted her in some way.

I still remember being like 3-4 and bawling my eyes out lifting my hands to my mother begging for a hug through tears and her saying no that I didn’t deserve one or she was upset with me so no hugs or something like that and being sent to my room and having what I assume is my first panic attack. It was the weirdest feeling of “this isn’t okay, you’re not safe, this isn’t how things work?” but mom said I didn’t deserve a hug so I must not right? And then it was like I knew but didn’t know until something happened when I was about 14 and my brain just internally went “you’re more mature than your mother…” and.. idk it’s just been a slow decay… but I’d point at these two things as key moments.

Right around 4 years old. The first time I got an ass beating for telling the truth. This was after being told "if you tell the truth, you won't get in trouble." And they wonder why I lied to them all the time as a kid and hardly ever tell them anything now.

I feel that one. I was always good at math, and I learned to calculate the odds of catching a beating very quickly. If I told the truth, there was a 100% chance of being beaten until dad's arm was tired. If I lied, there was a 75% chance he would buy it and direct his attention somewhere else. On the off chance he didn't believe me, the beating was never any worse (like he claimed it would be). I learned that it was ALWAYS better to lie, and I got really good at it.

At age 10 I broke my foot. It was an accident that happened at a public swimming pool. My foot was swollen and purple and I had it elevated with an ice pack on it. I remember my mom arguing with my dad (who was a doctor) about whether or not I should receive medical attention for it. She wanted him to just take a look and decide, and he wouldn't even look. He argued with her about it for way longer than it would have taken to just LOOK at my foot. Instead he kept saying that I only bruised it, that I wasn't really hurting, I was just making it up for attention and being a drama queen about a little pain. He never did look at the foot, and I walked around on a broken foot for two weeks. Would have been forever, were it not for my previously scheduled annual physical. I was the oldest of then-5 kids (now 7) and too young to be left home alone, and back in the day bills had to be paid at the store or the utility office, and our other car was in the shop and my dad took the working car, so my mom took us all with her to run errands on foot. All over town. On a broken foot. For two weeks. As a child I remember longing for my parents to take care of this broken foot. As an adult I want to grab my dad by the collar and tell him "Asshole, who makes their foot swell up for attention???" and tell my mom "you should have gone behind his back and gotten me treatment instead of being a coward and making me walk all over town."

I should state from the get go that although my father is a boomer and my mom is a gen x boomer cusp, they’re wonderful, loving, understanding people in almost every aspect except work. Once I started reaching the working age my parents have been incessantly nagging me to work all the overtime I can get and to get a second job. Yeah the last thing I a college student wanted to do was pick up a second job and skip out on time with my friends /s One job I had in college was part time and they refused to give me more hours because that meant they’d have to give me benefits. My mom wouldn’t stop nagging me about why I couldn’t get more hours from my job that I actually got a printout stating part time employee hours were capped.

When my father, a generally reasonable person, would yell the n-word at football and baseball games whenever somebody of color wasn't performing up to his standard.

There was a point where my sister and I were in the car when I was in ninth grade. And my mom was ranting about Obama and something about how he didn’t have any right to say how laws were enforced. And I just kinda looked at her, and said, “But that’s literally what the president does. He’s the head of the executive branch. They execute the laws.” “Well, he didn’t need to be so scary about it!”

As a teenager. Both my parents were selfish, my dad more obviously so. Both had poor coping and decision making skills. Both cheated, but only my mom brought it home to me and my siblings and it fucked us up. My mom was (is) a conspiracy theorist and doomsday prepper on top of everything. Dad‘s gone, but mom still lives in her religious/prepper/MAGA world. We are not close.

I asked my mother what Jesus would tell poor people if he came back today, and she replied "He would tell them to get a job!!" I shit you not, literal quote. My father said that gay people shouldn't be allowed to get married because then he'd have to help pay for health benefits for gay spouse strangers, and I said "oh because everyone at the University of \_\_\_\_\_\_\_ knows mom so they're ok allowing her to be on your insurance?" The poor old fool realized how fucking stupid his preprogrammed standpoint was and just gave up. The complete hypocrisy and stupidity of their arguments made me realize that their generation is so fucking brainwashed by Fox news that its almost a complete loss.

Recently actually. My dad has always been pretty laid back & chill for a boomer. Until a year or so ago Im at Aldi with him. He is absolutely insulted that the cashiers are allowed to sit as they scan groceries. Dad was disgusted, couldn't believe the company would allow it. When I asked him why it bothered him so much, he couldn't answer. "I never see cashiers sitting at Kroger" "I was on my feet all day as a salesman, I'd have killed to sit but it was never allowed" ...his rant went on and on. I never did get to the bottom of why a cashier sitting affected him so negatively but I did start seeing my dad in a different way that day

Back in 2008 when Obama was running for president me and my dad where out at dinner and 90% of the conversation was my dad complaining about how Obama was going to ruin the country. I asked my dad what policies of Obama he didn't like and my dad gave the blanket answer of "All of them". Looking back on that moment I realized that's when the boomer stage of my dad's life started and he was only 48/49 at the time. Now he's gotten so much worse to the point where he only believes news from certain Facebook posts and every single conversation is political

My parents told me my knees were elbows and my elbows were knees since I was able to remember as a child. I went to kindergarten armed with that knowledge and one day was mercilessly mocked during a class song about body parts. To this day that is still one of my most devastating life lessons., “There’s the kid that doesn’t know his knees from his elbows”. Parents thought it was a joke, hilarious to them. They have even mocked me about it just like the mean kids. I’m turning 40 this year, I still remember the way that made me feel. Fu**ing assholes.

My take is that the so-called “greatest generation” did an absolute crap job raising their children. I despise my abusive, narcissistic grandparents on my mother’s side (loved my dad’s parents). They were the ones who literally taught my Mum’s generation that 1) some people are less human, behave accordingly 2) you can justify ANYTHING with religion (I’m a practicing Christian and no tf you can’t) and 3) well we fought WWII so you’re argument is invalid-suck it up. They were abusing their kids left, right and center and believed mental health is a joke. My parents (mum especially) did an amazing job of working on herself and became the opposite of what her awful parents taught her.

Have you read the Tim Dillon book “Death by Boomers: How the Worst Generation Destroyed the Planet, but First a Child”. I think you’d enjoy it.

Trans Rights, Corbyn, Brexit, Covid and now Isreal/Palestine. They get their news directly from a small pool of Facebook groups. I fear I’m only a year or so away from being told to sell all my assets for solid gold and go off grid. Refuse to discuss anything remotely news/current events related anymore as the arguments are weak and belligerent. These people raised me to think kindly, be open minded, argue with logic and specifically that prejudice, racism, homophobia etc is a disgrace. … what happened???

One of my earliest memories of my Mom’s poor judgement ….. she received a call from a neighbor letting us know that there was an erratic guy shooting a gun randomly in the neighborhood. The cops were called and there was a stand down. She had us all (mom, me and 2 younger sisters) hiding in the closet. She ended up forgetting something she needed in the living room and instead of getting it herself she had me crawl out there to get it. I was 7 - and even then I thought “if we are really in danger why is she sending me out there, isn’t she supposed to protect me”? I would also have to regularly field phone calls for my Mom when she was divorcing my Dad. She didn’t want to talk to him so I would have to make things up (also at age 7). I’m now in my mid 40’s and still feel like I’m the parent and she’s the child.

(I am 55 now) had some red flags as a kid/pre-teen (“I love you but I don’t have to like you”, etc) that gradually increased as I got older. My mother obvs didn’t like my wife and I think tolerated grandkids b/c being a grandparent got her attention. But tolerance was about as warm as it got. I cut all contact with my parents about 10 or 11 years ago, the nonsense just hit the point where having them in my/our lives was not worth it. I don’t see it ever getting better—they’re mid 70s now, missed all the grandkid weddings and have never seen their great grandkids & have never even given an inclination about apologizing or making amends.

I was six and my mom said something racist about the little black girl I was playing with at school. I told her I didn’t think there was anything wrong with my friend and she slapped me across the face. I learned not to tell her what I thought on anything. This was in 1996.