I was born in the early 80s. I think I turned out okay. I’m a productive member of society and I have a good relationship with my Mom. Dad left the family when I was 7. But I feel like I’m a fairly well adjusted human. Just curious how y’all are doing?

37 comments

  1. Moved out of my mother’s house at 16 to live with my dad & haven’t talked to her in 6 years. Havent seen her in around 12 years.

    Fuck her.

  4. I think Im doing okay. Good job, nice house, not struggling for money. Im working on myself physically, but all in all I cant complain.

  5. if i’d have gotten my ass beat like i should have i would either be a less depressed and mentally fucked waste of space or in prison for killing her, it’s a toss up.

  8. I grew up in the ‘60s, my dad hit me a lot (hands and belt) for disciplinary reasons. I like to think I’m a pretty stable, productive, well-adjusted member of society. Very successful by conventional standards. No trauma.

  9. Extremely disciplined, well, spoken, respectful, never get in trouble and fairly successful in terms of my professional life, actually. Im still very close with my parents as well. Didn’t have any psychological effects or bad memories.

    I wasn’t physically or verbally *abused*, per se, and I’m not condoning that people should abuse their children.

    But, I grew up in a southern small farm town so my parents were very traditional and somewhat strict and kind of had a “tough love” but respectful relationship with my dad. Definitely got spanked or whooped a few times, got the belt once, and got grounded a couple times. Any time I did something wrong, I sure as fuck never did it again and learned from it.

    Negative reinforcement certainly worked for me, but again, I was very much conditioned to it my whole life and I’ve always been very even-tempered. My younger brother on the other hand, is slightly on the spectrum and struggles with emotions, so he was treated completely differently and I’m sure that kind of behavior would mentally destroy him and scar him for life.

  10. I have a crippling fear of disappointing people which has led to me not wanting to try new things for fear of failure, and crippling anxiety. I need constant reassurance that has driven multiple friends and partners away. I’ve only recently discovered that everyone is bad when they start new things and if I can force myself to continue I will no longer be anxious about letting anyone down, and will instead enjoy a new hobby.

  11. I no longer speak to the parent who did that to me, it caused a lot of trauma and I relived it whenever I saw her. I have been diagnosed with PTSD for that and therapy has helped a lot. I am productive, I am making a family of my own and breaking that cycle, but the abuse certainly didn’t help me do any of that. I’m also into BDSM and have been since teenage years, probably the root of that lol.

    Not everyone reacts to trauma the same way and I’m glad you are doing okay! My mom also did more than just the three things you listed, some were more severe.

  12. I mean, I was spanked as a kid. Never had soap in the mouth, but probably would have happened if I had said the wrong thing. I don’t feel abused. My parents did the best they could. I’m a dad now, have a decent career in cybersecurity, been married for 15 years, and I’m building my own house. I can do just about anything I decide to learn how to do, like dropping 80′ trees or troubleshooting the washer when it stops draining, and replacing the drain motor. Or using powershell to automate the mundane shit I did as a sysadmin. I help out with my kids robotics club, and do my own mechanic work. I play 3 instruments. I know how to clean a fish an how to field dress a deer. I was spanked because my parents thought that was the best way to show me that there a negative consequences for negative behavior. I was also rewarded for good behavior. As a result, I did learn that do dumb shit=bad experience and do good shit=good experience.

    With my kids I use the same general idea, where negative behavior = negative experience
    Positive behavior = rewards
    But I don’t use pain to create the negative experience.

    But I am *into* consentually spanking another adult, maybe that’s related somehow.

  13. Pretty damn good. Those things only ever happened when I acted up and deserved it. Still super close to my family.

  14. It depends on the other side of the coin. Were they also loving, expressive of their love, and used reward when it was due?

    Otherwise you’ll become a people pleaser.

  17. I have a job, a house, two cars, and two kids in college. I don’t know if that is successful or not.

  18. I’m good, have had a great relationship with my parents all my life. Love em to death.

    I was a horrible child, put them through hell and they only ever did these things as a last resort and gave me fair warning before doing it

  21. I was spanked. But only when I did something really bad that I knew was bad.

    It really made me reconsider doing really bad things when I knew there were dire consequences. It was very useful. However, spankings for just anything are useless.

  22. Let me first say that i’m glad i’ve been raised the way i did because now i know how it SHOULDN’T be done.

    ​

    As a 90s kid who had a dad who didn’t show love by saying it but by buying stuff, and who didn’t raise me by saying “no” but by yelling and spanking my butt… I think i turned out okay. Over the last year i’ve been gaining a lot, and i’ve finally been able to speak out for myself, have my own opinion, and i’m not afraid anymore to say “no” or to set boundaries.

    My mom and dad both had no idea on how to raise me. My mom never let me do things because of my bad motor skills and she was afraid i would spill a drink during a birthday when we would ask what someone wanted to drink and i would bring it. I was never allowed to use kitchen equipment or anything.

    So combine my mom and my dad and you get a kid who. In his early 30s is super insecure about practically anything he does in life and who only now has started to form his own opinion.

  23. I had that stuff done. By itself, it would be okay. My city commonly uses these methods today. It’s what else my birth giver did, that made me go no contact and force her off my property last time she visited. The beatings for no reason. Being forced to eat dirt if I wasn’t starved for failing a regular assignment. Literally stripping everything from my room except a blanket and pillow because I skipped a class that wasn’t mandatory anyways. And that was after being punched in the face. And her constantly bullying away almost every friend I’ve made. There’s WAY too much to mention nearly all of.

    It mostly didn’t turn out well, and I have my traumas. But it did have its ups. Life seems way easier in comparison to being in that house. I’m able to empathize and better understand people going through this stuff and some other things. And it did force me into some hobbies I still do to this day, one of which I’m about to start making a living off of. I’m glad my life has gone as it has, as I’m content in the now, but I’d never go through everything again.

    Edited because autocorrect sucks

  26. I’m fine, but I have struggled with pushing down the urge to do similar things with my own kids. I never want to and I haven’t so far, but it’s almost instinctual to do the same things my parents did to me.

  27. I’m good, happily married, own a home, and raising a great daughter.
    My family is very close, we have a family dinner usually once a week or so.

  28. I’m almost certain I would have turned out exactly the same without the beatings and punishments. Probably would have been more confident too.

  29. I turned out just fine. I grew up having repsfor my parents. I am happily married with 2 awesome kids. We own our dream home and I love my job.

  31. Woman here who is also a parent, former teacher, and has a degree in Early Childhood Development. There have been a ton of studies on this, and none of them have shown any benefit to corporal punishment.

    While I don’t deny that there are probably people who were hit as kids, and yes, spanking is hitting, who turned out just fine, that doesn’t mean it was a good thing. My grandfather smoked like a freight train and lived to be 92. That doesn’t prove that cigarettes aren’t really that bad.

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3447048/

  32. I was spanked as a kid, and I was quick to figure out not to do the shit that got me spanked in the first place. I grew up respectful, kind, and got good grades. Other adults frequently made comments about how well behaved me and my 4 younger siblings were, and that felt good.

    Now I’m an adult, been an electrician for 10 years, own a house paid off and a new Subaru. I get along well with my boss and apprentice, and I’m living a good life.

    My mum had a friend who didn’t spank her kids, they are now foul mouthed, drug dealing, high school raping pieces of shit, and I’m glad they don’t life in the same city as me or my sister.

    We’re there ways my parents could have done better? Of course, but they did their best and that was pretty damn good.
    Me and my 4 siblings are all doing great, my sister is a heavy equipment operator working on a pipeline job. My oldest little brother is a welder and got married last year to his highschool sweetheart. My middle younger brother is still in high school, he is good with computers and fixing them, still trying to figure out what career he want to take but he’s getting all the encouragement he needs. My youngest brother is also in high school, he’s a pretty good kid, like most youngest children he gets away with shit I never would have, but still a good egg.

  33. Continuing to work on healing from cycles of trauma and pass as little of that onto my kids as possible. Those sorts of things weren’t great, and sure as shit didn’t help in any positive way…but that wasn’t the stuff that did any long-term damage in my mind.

    It was much more the bigger picture of my parents having an unhealthy and disconnected relationship, my struggles with undiagnosed ADHD and depression and the resulting falling short of expectations, my parents’ general inability to relate or offer loving connection to me or my siblings, and so on.

  36. I was born in the early 2000’s my parents used corporal punishment and I ended up a redditor. The only real effect is when was a child I’d be forced to eat hot peppers or drink hot sauce and now I really can’t enough spicy food.

  37. I’d say that really didn’t have as much of an impact on my life as my father dying when I was 8.

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