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How much do you tell your kids about your youth?

Rhea

Rhea

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A little awkward this morning. LOL. Kids said, "yeah but you were a nerd when you were in school, mom." and without thinking I laughed, "no, I was not a nerd." Ooops. "Well, what were you?" What am I supposed to say? I was a stoner? When I was your age I was dealing drugs, skipping school and attending keg parties? Crap, I didn't want to go here... should have just copped to being a nerd.

I wound up saying, "I was one of the ones hanging around." Which got them both cackling with glee, "you were a loiterer!?" Yeah, that's it.
 
That's funny. My son doesn't seem very curious about my youth. I've shared stuff, but it was usually unasked, and afterwards I kick myself for boring him with another boring story.
 
James Brown said:
That's funny. My son doesn't seem very curious about my youth. I've shared stuff, but it was usually unasked, and afterwards I kick myself for boring him with another boring story.
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Maybe I shoulda told my kids your story. :D !!
 
My youth is on a 'needs to know' basis. If I think there is relevance and they can learn/relate then I may share. Same applies to my husband!
 
Me too, usually. Which is how they got to be all the way in high school and somehow think I was even possibly a nerd or even close to one! :tomato:
 
I've answered the questions they ask, with all honesty and respect for the privacy of others. I have a younger brother and two sisters, so my children have readily available sources of information.

These kinds of conversations usually start with, "Did you really.....?"
 
my siblings were generally co-conspirators.
 
Rhea said:
James Brown said:
That's funny. My son doesn't seem very curious about my youth. I've shared stuff, but it was usually unasked, and afterwards I kick myself for boring him with another boring story.
Click to expand...

Maybe I shoulda told my kids your story. :D !!
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Fair point. I didn't have a colorful childhood like you did. Quite frankly, as a kid I was a smart-alecky, self-righteous, know-it-all, desperate for approval, but who thought that people enjoyed having their moral failings labeled and given a public airing.

I didn't have many friends as a kid.
 
James Brown said:
Rhea said:
Maybe I shoulda told my kids your story. :D !!
Click to expand...

Fair point. I didn't have a colorful childhood like you did. Quite frankly, as a kid I was a smart-alecky, self-righteous, know-it-all, desperate for approval, but who thought that people enjoyed having their moral failings labeled and given a public airing.

I didn't have many friends as a kid.
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Ouch, yah, no. That doesn't go over well.


LOL, maybe you should tell your kid my story. :D
 
As I don't have children to tell stories too, for me, it's not important.

However, we recently did a history unit on old and new stuff with year 1 and 2, and I found myself relating more to the OLD than the new. So I was able to tell the kids that yes, I did use a twin tub washing machine. Yes, I did use a 'dial' telephone. Yes, I did watch black and white tv.

As for my personal actions as a teen? They weren't too bad I don't think. No one in my family has told embarrassing stories about it to Bilby - so I must be in the clear. :D
 
gmbteach said:
However, we recently did a history unit on old and new stuff with year 1 and 2, and I found myself relating more to the OLD than the new. So I was able to tell the kids that yes, I did use a twin tub washing machine. Yes, I did use a 'dial' telephone. Yes, I did watch black and white tv.
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I am surely older than you, and have experience with both the telephone and the tv. But I'm not familiar with a twin tub washing machine. (I do recognize this, although I never had to use one.)

Perhaps it is a US-vs-rest_of_the_world thing?
 
It's my hope that my kids are more responsible than I was growing up. My kids won't repeat my mistakes if I have to slip birth control into their Tang or whatever. My kids don't actually drink Tang, but it was the first thing to mind when I thought about what kids like to drink. So, I'll amend Tang with juice box. There. Done.
 
braces_for_impact said:
My kids won't repeat my mistakes if I have to slip birth control into their Tang
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That was your only mistake? I need a lot more antidotes than birth control to prevent repeats in this house...

But my kids are already much better people than I was, and I'm so relieved.
They have healthy attitudes about sex (and willingness to talk about it. Or, at least listen.)
They think alcohol is disgusting.
They think drugs are harmful.
They think cigarettes are for stupid people.
They think pranks are mean.
They think driving too fast is one of those stupid things that mom does and they are too cool for it.
And it would never occur to them in a million years to do all of those things at once, at night, with the headlights off, using the moon to stay on the road.

I have no idea what they are hiding from me, though.
But I feel some reassurance in the fact that I know and like the parents of all of their friends.
 
seyorni said:
And what are our kids keeping from us?
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As near as i can tell, nothing.
My son at college comes home with more stories about drunks and illicit drugs than i've got from 20 years in the Navy.

I've been open about my youthful misdeeds. Mighty few in school, quite a few in uniform. They seem comfortable sharing anything with me.
Although they don't quite accept my warnings that anything their Aunt &Co. might say about what I did to her in high school must be dismissed as the ravings of a mad woman with a scary dependency on brain-washing levels of alcohol. They seem to think some of her stories about me might have a grain of truth in there, somewhere.
 
I don't have any children, but I am interested in this from the opposite point of view.

My dad is a serious nerd - Physical Chemist, always has his nose in a book, drinks half a pint of beer once a week... boring.

It wasn't until I was long since grown up and left home that his youngest sister - my Aunty Marjory - spilled the beans, at a family get together (I think it was Christmas dinner, but it might have been a birthday). He specialises in Thermal Explosion Theory, but apparently while he was in high school, he was more interested in the practical aspect of the field. Most infamously, as she related the tale, when he blew up and demolished Old Ma Mansfield's garden shed.

When she mentioned this, the room fell silent, and everyone turned to look at him as he slowly turned as red as a beet with embarrassment. Then my sister said, "Is that really true?"

To which he replied "No!"

"I may have caused an explosion to occur inside her shed, but it was still mostly standing afterwards".
 
I tell them about things like fashion, and how different schools were, stuff like that. Fortunately the current world is so full of bullshit and clichés about the past that they think they know more than I do anyway!
 
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