The Edwardian Father : Stern Stuff

[jass]

Whilt writing my previous post on this subject, my mind wandered to thinking how it affected us as children. I wonder if anyone was affected in similar ways to myself (and I must stress that I am not prying here - I know this sort of thing is very personal).

 

Some of my behaviour was really quite bizarre looking back, although at the time I thought it was my fault that I was like that.

 

Some of my chilhood behaviour and habits I would not wish to discuss on this forum for obvious reasons, and that is why I would not wish to pry into the lives of other people.

 

Some behaviours I will 'admit to' were stubborn refusal to go to the toilet (which required hospital treatment for severe cramps/internal problems I started getting), and bed-wetting - a classical sign of things not being right, although this just got me into more trouble.

 

Lastly, and perhaps most worrying, was cutting myself with dad's razor blades. I have just looked at some of the scars that are still visible as if to remind myself that it really did happen.

 

Although these things happened long ago I will never forget. They are still not easy to talk about, and I feel that I am, to some extent, betraying my mother. Then again, perhaps even this is a legacy of how I was raised.

 

The scars are not merely physical, but mental too.

 

If, by any chance, there are people who read this thread, and who find it difficult to control their anger towards their children or partner, I would just ask that you think about what you are doing.

 

It isn't over when the thrashing stops. It becomes a lifetime of pain and suffering. How I wanted to be able to love my mother and to look back on my childhood with happiness and contentment.

 

As stated in one of my previous posts, I have been fortunate to be able to use my experiences in a positive way. Being able to share experiences and talk frankly with my sister has helped immensely.

 

Sadly, it is well documented that many abused children grow to abuse their own children.

 

Be good to your kids, show them love and be worthy of being called mum or dad.

[medusa]

What a sad thread, that there are so many people who remember childhood as a time of sadness and fear. My heart goes out to you all, that you have made good adults out of that fear.

 

My parents showed nothing but love and support (apart from when I was a little git, which I often was), and for that I still thank them. I fail to understand what motivates people to have children if they're going to treat them in this way.

 

I'm sure there are many who spent their childhoods in private hells who will empathise with your feelings- thank you for sharing.

[peterw]

Whilt writing my previous post on this subject, my mind wandered to thinking how it affected us as children. I wonder if anyone was affected in similar ways to myself (and I must stress that I am not prying here - I know this sort of thing is very personal).

 

Some of my behaviour was really quite bizarre looking back, although at the time I thought it was my fault that I was like that.

 

Some of my chilhood behaviour and habits I would not wish to discuss on this forum for obvious reasons, and that is why I would not wish to pry into the lives of other people.

 

Some behaviours I will 'admit to' were stubborn refusal to go to the toilet (which required hospital treatment for severe cramps/internal problems I started getting), and bed-wetting - a classical sign of things not being right, although this just got me into more trouble.

 

Lastly, and perhaps most worrying, was cutting myself with dad's razor blades. I have just looked at some of the scars that are still visible as if to remind myself that it really did happen.

 

Although these things happened long ago I will never forget. They are still not easy to talk about, and I feel that I am, to some extent, betraying my mother. Then again, perhaps even this is a legacy of how I was raised.

 

The scars are not merely physical, but mental too.

 

If, by any chance, there are people who read this thread, and who find it difficult to control their anger towards their children or partner, I would just ask that you think about what you are doing.

 

It isn't over when the thrashing stops. It becomes a lifetime of pain and suffering. How I wanted to be able to love my mother and to look back on my childhood with happiness and contentment.

 

As stated in one of my previous posts, I have been fortunate to be able to use my experiences in a positive way. Being able to share experiences and talk frankly with my sister has helped immensely.

 

Sadly, it is well documented that many abused children grow to abuse their own children.

 

Be good to your kids, show them love and be worthy of being called mum or dad.

 

Exactly the same Jass. In those days neither my mother nor my doctor recognised bed-wetting syptoms. The doctor said that given time it would cease, it being a sort of ‘natural’ thing!

 

As a youngster I used to vent my anger on school chums, often without very much in the way of provocation. Fights were many, and winning them made me feel better — but only for a very short time.

 

Funnily enough, for many years I’ve had a scar on my left hand — ageing lost some of its visibility — caused accidentally when I was ‘slapped’ with the flat of a carving knife but lifted my hand at the wrong time to ward off the blow.

 

That scar went on the night I started this thread. I was tired, and for the first time in 10 years made a big mistake by allowing two of my dogs to meet more or less head on. I grabbed hold of both by their collars and held them at arms-length. I was stuck in my wheelchair near a door, wondering what to do next! Anyway, I decided to give Wagger — the biggest — a heave over my chair and close the door on it. The idea went well — except that for a second I relaxed my hold on Buster and he bit me (accidentally) instead of its brother!

 

Now, when it’s healed I’ll have a bigger scar!

[Jossman]

I too was bullied by a father who had returned from the war as a Sergeant Major. To him I was one of his men, to be abused and bullied. Thrashings were common with the hand, fist or slipper across the face. I feared the thump of his feet over the ceiling as he got out of bed from doing nights at Foxes. We had to be silent nearly all morning, every morning. My family hated him, including his own close relatives. It affected my school work and how I passed the scholarship is a mystery to me. My elder sister was treated like a little princess and got the best of everything including an extremely good education. My younger brother got the same as me.

I left school at 14 and 6 months to catch the recruitment into the navy as a boy entrant of 15. The best move I ever made. He never laid a finger on me after that. The sad thing is I never spoke to my mother or father for 15 years, which broke my mothers heart.

 

Now at 61 and my mother 87, father 91 are very close. Dad has Alzheimers and cannot remember anything. What a sad waste of life. I sympathise with you all.

[Falls]

Jass, I really feel for you with a mother like that!

Mine was the same - I was beginning to think I was the only person who was beaten and belted by her mother - but all done behind closed doors, while a gracious, smiling, caring respectable 'front' was presented to the neighbours.

 

I was told that I was a "horrible child...", "an ugly little so and so...", "Nobody likes you - you'll never have any friends...", "You can't do anything properly...you'll never be any good at anything..." and "Get out of my sight - I can't bear to look at you..."

 

I haven't told anybody this before: my friends all have, or had, really loving Mothers, and I don't think they could begin to understand what my childhood was like. !!!

 

Hello Thursday,

 

This is de ja vu. Is it possible our mothers were some how related or went to the same sadism training school? We definitely seem to share common experiences.

 

Having been given the "Your Worthless" and "Get Out of my Sight " routine, did you mother yell in your face if you tried to do something constructive, to tell you that you were a "Big Heerd" with "Ideas above your station? Mine did.

 

To someone of a sadistic disposition, like my mother, the beauty of psycholigical abuse is that it doesn't leave any visible marks that are likely to bring the social workers (not many around in those days) to investigate.

Therefore she could continue the regime at home (I was an only child) while trying to pass among friends and the family as a paragon of virtue.

 

In reflection, I think both sides of my family and my parents friends did have a good idea what was happening; however, none of them had the courage to do anything official about it. What they did seem to do is go out of their way to have me at their homes, away from my mother, as much as possible. This often included weekend visits and even longer trips to the coast or places like London. Therefore, I did experience normal family life -all be it out side my own home - and survived.

 

Regards

[peterw]

Hello Thursday,

 

This is de ja vu. Is it possible our mothers were some how related or went to the same sadism training school? We definitely seem to share common experiences.

 

Having been given the "Your Worthless" and "Get Out of my Sight " routine, did you mother yell in your face if you tried to do something constructive, to tell you that you were a "Big Heerd" with "Ideas above your station? Mine did.

 

To someone of a sadistic disposition, like my mother, the beauty of psycholigical abuse is that it doesn't leave any visible marks that are likely to bring the social workers (not many around in those days) to investigate.

Therefore she could continue the regime at home (I was an only child) while trying to pass among friends and the family as a paragon of virtue.

 

In reflection, I think both sides of my family and my parents friends did have a good idea what was happening; however, none of them had the courage to do anything official about it. What they did seem to do is go out of their way to have me at their homes, away from my mother, as much as possible. This often included weekend visits and even longer trips to the coast or places like London. Therefore, I did experience normal family life -all be it out side my own home - and survived.

 

Regards

 

Now I come to think of it, both my aunts (mother’s sisters) welcomed me with open arms, as did my grand-mother and grand-father. I was a regular and welcome visitor, perhaps because they were all aware of my father’s disposition; although in my grand-mother’s case I think it was because I was at that time her only grandson.

[Plain Talker]

I can't remember if I posted this poem elsewhere on the forum, but I feel it is appropriate to the thread.

 

Parentcraft

 

Why shouldn't

We

Scream at our kids?

It

Never did

Us

Any harm.

 

Why shouldn't

We

Use the

Barbarous Belt

Or Brush?

 

Our Fists

And Boots

Are enough

To keep

The brats

In line.

 

What's the

Point of

Treating

Them like

Decent

Human Beings?

 

They are

 

Only Kids,

 

After all.

 

copyright The Plain Talker, May 11 1998

[RiffRaff]

I was born in 1951, hardly the Victorian or Edwardian era, and I always called my father "Sir" until I was in my late teens.

I presume it had been "expected", and therefore I'd grown up knowing nothing different.

He in turn was a strict but fair man, and I guess was just continuing how he'd been brought up, having been born just after the end of World War 1.

I remember finding a fountain pen in a drawer (I'd be perhaps early teens) and asking my mum who "Des" was, because these three letters were engraved o the barrel......

She had to tell me that they were my dad's initials!

I truly had no idea what his name was up to that point!

[peterw]

I was born in 1951, hardly the Victorian or Edwardian era, and I always called my father "Sir" until I was in my late teens.

I presume it had been "expected", and therefore I'd grown up knowing nothing different.

He in turn was a strict but fair man, and I guess was just continuing how he'd been brought up, having been born just after the end of World War 1.

I remember finding a fountain pen in a drawer (I'd be perhaps early teens) and asking my mum who "Des" was, because these three letters were engraved o the barrel......

She had to tell me that they were my dad's initials!

I truly had no idea what his name was up to that point!

 

Nowadays I think I might have asked when he was knighted, but a humorous but true story to lighten the thread a bit.

 

I had a very good friend who’s first name was always in doubt. She claimed her name was Margaret but her birth certificate said she was Marguerite. Before she died at the age of 90 I cleared it up for her by discovering that she had been christened Margaret and the registrar had made a mistake.

 

Margaret had a daughter, and when the pair of them arrived at the hospital the daughter was asked for her mother’s name. They said they had her on record as being Marguerite but she was insisting she was Margaret.

 

So the nurse asked the daughter, “What do you call her?”

 

The reply to that was “Mother.”

[thursday]

Hallo, Falls,

My mother did have a brother (who I adored!), but I was kept well away from most other people, including Granny and Grandad, who were miles away anyway, and quite elderly, so I didn't even get the relief of visiting anyone. (much as I would LOVE to have a relative who even half liked me, I'm afraid I haven't. Perhaps I'll "borrow" you, and pretend!)

I had to do the shopping on Saturday mornings - two or three trips -, before the shops shut at 1pm, and was made to practise saying (to a schoolfriend's mum) "Thankyou for inviting me, but I want to hurry home, so I can help my Mummy...." Only when I had repeated this with enough 'sincerity' in my voice, was I sent to the shops. I got round it, though, by telling Diana's mother that I wanted to come and play, but I had been told what I had to say - and said it! Goodness knows what she thought! She came up the hill and collected me one day, and I had a wonderful afternoon playing with Diana, but when I got back, I was beaten, as I "obviously" hadn't told Mrs. S. the vital sentence! My stepfather was a teacher at my primary school, and reported on everything I said and did: any budding friendships were fiercely forbidden, so I never really spoke to anyone. I was seven years old!!