Your biggest disappointment as a child.

I always wanted long hair but my mother didn't like it so I wasn't allowed. Most girls had short hair then so imagine many mothers were the same. By the time I had my children most girls had long hair, and still do.
My mother permed my hair which I hated.

Same for me Julie, I really wanted long hair like my best friend, but my mother said it was too much bother. I had one of those blunt haircuts, with a ribbon on one side, the minute I left home I let it grow, and had it long, until a tactful hairdresser suggested maybe it was time to chop it off.
Now in lockdown, it’s getting long again.

Never being allowed to have long hair. I so desperately wanted plaits and bunches, ribbons in my hair but no, every time my hair grew a little too long I was whisked upstairs to the bathroom for a haircut. I remember once I was beyond excited to be able to get my hair into two tiny little 'paintbrush' bunches at the nape of my neck and rushed down to show my mum. Big mistake! Straight back upstairs to get it cut short again.

Needless to say, as soon as I got to my early teens I grew my hair very long, and wouldn't allow anyone anywhere near me with scissors for a very long time.

My biggest disappointment was having parents who would rather not have had children.

I was never interested in dolls or doll paraphernalia so was hugely disappointed to get a doll for Christmas when I was ten. Ten! A wretched doll?!
My boy cousins staying with us over Christmas & my young brothers got far more interesting and exciting gifts!
There is a photo in the archive of us all sat beside the Christmas tree with gifts in hand. My smile is totally forced and to this day I cringe when I see it.

Oh Hetty58!
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Until later years my folks were pretty much always skint, so my expectations were invariably very low - I never really asked for anything since from a very early age I was aware that money was so tight.

The one big disappointment I do remember was nobody giving me the 45 record of Telstar for Christmas when I was maybe 14. I’d dropped enough hints! It was only 6/8d IIRC.
They did always make an effort at Christmas, though - it was always a magical time.

I always longed painfully for a puppy, but knew it was never going to happen. They did buy me a tortoise when I was 8 or 9 though - he cost 4/6d and I was over the moon.

Finding out at 14 that Mum and Dad weren't my real parents.

Being told by my mother that we had to be good - because she didn't like children and never wanted them. She'd only had us for our father.

My big disappointment was wanting a sister - I had a brother -but really wanted a sister. No luck there I am afraid!
A smaller disappointment was coming home from school and finding that my mum had given my driving game to the son of a visiting friend. I think she maybe regretted it because I carried on alarmingly and wouldn't be consoled

When I was about 5 or 6, mum and her friend, took my brother and me up to London, to have our photograph taken.
At lunch time, in a store restaurant, I heard that Welsh Rabbit was on the menu, so I asked for that, as I loved rabbit.
I was so disappointed when I was served with , what to me was just cheese on toast, i.e. ' Welsh Rarebit'.

LauraNorder My mother always told me that of course I wasn't adopted because she would have given me back!

It was always a disappointment that, although we had a piano I was never taught to play it, and although my mother often showed me photos of her in her ballet costumes I was never able to have lessons. I presumed that they didn't think I would be any good at these things but I suppose we just didn't have any money for that sort of luxury.

I feel mean now, I’m sure I had much bigger disappointments over the years.

Scribbles
I had a similar disappointment, my brother was born at home, I don’t know if I was particularly dim, but even though I’d been dragged by my dad through the night to get the district nurse, I don’t think I’d been aware there was a baby on the way.
My dad woke me in the morning and said he had a surprise for me, full of anticipation I trotted after him, only to be shown my brother, I remember being bitterly disappointed.

Meeting my little sister for the first time. I was five and, for months, my parents had been saying wouldn't it be lovely when I had a little sister or brother to play with? I was a lonely only, living in the depths of the countryside so the prospect of someone to share my games and activities was hugely exciting.
The great day came when I was taken into the bedroom and shown this tiny 4 days old scrap of humanity, sound asleep in her cot and seeming smaller than one of my dolls.
Horrified, I wailed, "but I can't play with that! and marched out of the room.

Realising I wasn’t adopted and was stuck with my mother.

I was very lucky as a child. We were comfortable off and had a lovely home . We tended to get what we wanted. Especially off our grandparents.

I was desperate for a chimpanzee. A real one. I was convinced my grandparents would get me one.

When I opened my gift I was horrified to see a chimpanzee. But it was a toy one. I just couldn't understand it at all. I was convinced I'd get one.

So that served me right for being so spoilt I guess!

I remember desperately wanting to be the next queen and I truly believed that this was a position that was chosen.

I must have been about 6 at the time and I can still remember the shock at the realisation that this would never happen.

I had been such a good girl, I was sure I’d be chosen !

My parents did not have much money. I knew not to ask for things as they would not be able to afford them, but it was always awkward going back to school after Christmas, hearing what presents other children had, whilst I only had colouring books, maybe a jigsaw puzzle. Each year I hoped for a “ big present” but it never came.
I was good at French and one year there was a school trip to France and all my friends were going.I was so disappointed that I couldn’t go.

Some of these are so sad, but also so funny! ?

Wedi
Off subject really, and I don’t want to rub salt in your wounds, but we had lots of jelly and ice cream.
Four little girls in a room in the cottage hospital, we were there for about a week I think. We had a marvellous time.

I was ten. My class had been lined up to have our booster Diphtheria inoculations. My arm swelled up, painful and inflamed and I ran a temperature. I had to stay in bed while my parents took my sisters to the theatre in Glasgow to see Margaret Lockwood in Peter Pan. I'd been looking forward to it for weeks. One consolation - or so I hoped - was that I would be unable to play the piano in the Ayrshire Music Festival the following weekend. Sod's law - my sore arm recovered and my protestations fell on deaf ears. I played really badly!
Another disappointment was when I started secondary school. My mum, my aunt and two older cousins had all been good hockey players and had told me how great it was, filling me with ideas of scoring goals and being the golden girl of the school. It turned out that, although I wasn't a bad player, there were too many excellent players in my year and I never made it to the first XI - occasionally a reserve, but no more .

My OH as a child found a bicycle hidden in his Mums shed. He was so excited thinking it was a present for him. He was so gutted when his cousin was given it for Christmas.

Two disappointments when I was 11.
First I didn't pass my 11 plus. I'd been sure I'd done well in the exam. All my friends went to the Grammar school and I had to make a whole set of new friends.
Second was at Christmas. My present was a driving game that my sister had been talking about, not the transistor radio that I'd been longing for.

I found out years later that there were more 11 plus passes than places at the Grammar school. They had to have a cut off point, and I just missed out.
I never knew that my mother had been to see the primary school headmaster to ask him why I hadn't passed.

My biggest 'disappointment' was something that has never changed - that my big brother wanted nothing to do with me.