Our childhood experiences

DanniRae

My birth mother went onto to have 5 children with her husband. 4 girls and 1 boy. Although my sisters knew about me, my brother didn’t. And he only found out when both his parents had died. He decided he wanted to find me. It took sometime because he didn’t know my adopted name. Eventually he contacted an organisation that helped find adopted children. And they found me. 😍
We’re taking baby steps, I’ve met my brother several times, two of my sisters, and a cousin. This is something I could only dream of. It’s been fascinating finding out about the family.
The weird thing is when I look at them, I think I know them from somewhere, but not sure where. 💁

I was born at home in 1946, we still had the Anderson shelter in the garden and my elder sister, by five and a half years, put a union jack flag on top of the shelter to let the neighbours know I had arrived.
I was born on a Sunday and weighed 10 pounds. I was very lucky to live in a semi detached with indoor toilet and running hot water courtesy of a back boiler in the dining room.
I lived in the family home until the eve of my 18th birthday, I then lived in a Nurse's home for several years. Married at 21 to the only man I dated. We had 58 years together before he was cruelly taken.

GreyDuster what a wonderful account, I love that

I was born in 1946 to a mother who already had three adult children. I don’t think I was a welcome addition! We lived in a two up two down terrace with no bathroom, one cold tap in the kitchen, and an outside toilet, but we were fortunate to have our own toilet - the house on the opposite side of the road were ‘back to back’ houses and toilets were shared with other families. I remember when I was very young there was no electric lighting in the bedrooms - just gas mantles.. It wasn’t a wonderful place to live but we never went short of good food and always a roast on Sunday.
We rarely had holidays - mostly day trips to the seaside. My father once took me to London for a day on the Master Cutler and we had breakfast in the restaurant car. A real treat for both of us. I came back full of having seen the Crown Jewels! As I grew up, I remembered being very disappointed that we didn’t have anything you could call a garden, but the family next door whose son, the same age as me, was my good friend, had an allotment and we would go with his dad on a Saturday afternoon and make a nuiscance of ourselves, basically, though in fact I learned an awful lot about gardening from little jobs he would give us to do. Potting seedlings, sowing rows of veg and the like. It fostered a life long love of gardening in me. He would give us shears and let us massacre the privet hedge and when we got fed up, we would run off and play in the adjacent woods! In the holidays, we children would spend almost our entire time in the woods, or local parks. We had an astonishing amount of freedom then. No-one seemed to worry about us.
I walked to my junior school and cycled to my secondary school. After a year at college, as soon as I was old enough, I left home and joined the Army. That’s where, eventually, I met and married the love of my life.

I was born in 1923 in a London nursing home because the house my dad was buying was still being built. A new house with all mod cons.
When I was three months old Mum took me to Jersey to see her brother who had married a Jersey woman. The Jersey aunts said “petit bijou!” Therefore my nickname by which I was always called. When I first went to school I wondered why I was called another name.
I went to a small private school a few minutes walk from home. My mother took me twice then I walked on my own.. when I was seven I went to a bigger school where we had concerts. At one we had Billy Cotton and his Band before he became famous. Just Dad and a boys father in the school had a motor car (GO 1211) p a telephone. (Uplands 5827)
When I was three Dad took me to the cinema every week. My
Little sister screamed so she and Mum stayed home. Silent films. “What are they saying Dad”. I saw the first talkie and first colour film.. Between the two films there was the Pathe News and a stage show. One time it was Joe Loss and his Band.
My father’s job on the evening newspaper took him to the South coast for six weeks every summer so we all went and stayed in a hotel. Played on the beach all day but some days we walked into the countryside where we had milk straight from the cow.
When I was eleven we moved to a larger house in Surrey. My sister and I used to,play in the nearby woods all day even though we had a large garden. I went to the grammar school. A mile walk to the train station. Three stops away then a mile walk to school.

I was born in 1952 in a maternity hospital. Mum says she went semi private, whatever that was. When I was three we moved to a brand new house on an estate. I was very happy growing up there as each house had children to play with. Life was good but school was cruel, with the cane being used on me many times.

I was born in 194, lived in a leafy suburb of Liverpool. My Pa was a merchant seaman, a Welshman and Ma was Welsh too. My first language is Welsh, we lived in a Liverpool Welsh bubble. Our school holidays were spent in a hamlet in Mid-Wales with my aunt and cousins who lived in a cottage without running water or an inside lavatory. Water was collected from the well and lighting was a tilley lamp, food was cooked on an old fashioned range, so different from our home in Liverpool but I loved it there.

Born at home in 1951 youngest of 3 girls. who were 5 and 8 years older than me. Earliest memory is of sitting in a tin bath in the kitchen while Mum was sitting chatting to a neighbour and she said "I would have been back at work if it hadn't been for this one" I remember then being violently sick.

At the age of 3 Mum asked me if I 'minded' if she went back to work. So after that most mornings my Dad would put me in the car and drop me off with some complete strangers to nind me because Mum had got some agency work. She was a shorthand-typist in London Eventually she got more work and I was taken to school the first day, after that I would go on my own, across 3 roads and the back door was left unlocked so I could get in after school. Once I could reach the front door lock I had the front door key on a string round my neck.. In winter I would have to light a match to the gas 'poker' and shove it into the coals to get the fire going before anyone else came home.

At 11 my eldest sister (who was Mum's favourite) gave me a toothbrush, I had never had one before and didn't really know what to do with it. I had a mouth full of rotten teeth because once sweet rationing ended my mother though we needed sugar for energy.

I married far too young, to escape.

So no happy memories for me. Except a love of cats, we always had cats and they were my comfort, company and my best friends.

I was born in 1952 in Edinburgh and Christened at The Castle Chapel. This was because Dad was in the Army, we just happened to be there when my brother and I were born. My older sister was born in York 1951 and later the youngest in Surrey.
Mum had been in Orphanage in Aberdeen since 10 yrs old, Dad had left home in Glos at 16 to join the Army. Mum joined Army and met Dad in York, they were married after 6 weeks.
I was about 4 yrs old when we moved to Dads REME posting in Cyprus, but our lives were never straightforward. We lived in 8 countries and went to about 12 schools all due to the Army.
We loved it.
Massively disliked the UK when we got back I was 17 and wasn’t happy until I went to work in Iran 1975 met fabulous people of all nationalities, came back a year later overland stopping in Yugoslavia for a while to visit aforementioned friends for a while. I then travelled in America. I finally settled in London but
continue to travel.
Having changed school so many times it was difficult as i was basically shy and had to learn not to be, sometimes i was scared of being lost so became adept at map reading and landmark navigation which is now ingrained.
I have plenty of stories to tell. Maybe i should write them down.

My childhood was mixed. I lived in South East London in a semi detached 1930s house. My mother had a mental illness and would have psychotic episodes. She could be warm and loving but she could also be very cruel and firmly believed children should be hit to stop them from being ‘spoilt’. Dad was a softy, calm and quietly intellectual, always doing cryptic crosswords. I was relieved when I left home at 18 to go to University, I never returned and I emigrated after I married. By then we all got on fine and my mother was a lot better mentally , a good grandma when she met all our children. I remember going on very long hikes with my Mum and Dad into Kent. Mum would give me a cigarette to keep off the flies- I must have been 7 or 8, mid 1950s. I also have a memory of sitting outside a pub with a bag of Smiths crisps when my Mum’s sisters and brothers visited us from Yorkshire. Once I let the handbrake off and luckily Dad was nearby and he ran across and saved me. I never hit my children, I’d had enough of it myself and it just made me dislike my mother as it was usually totally unjustified.

Growing up in the war years we moved a lot as we were bombed out of our homes 3 times. My father, who was one of Monty's Desert Rats, was posted as 'missing presumed dead'. We eventually went to live wuth my maternal grandparents in Wiltshire. We were surrounded by fields and, when I started at the village school, had about 2 miles to walk there. Sometimes on the way home I would be lucky that a farmet was going my way, and would get a ride on the back if the big farm horse. The children of the village were lucky when the American soldiers were based on the Downs, just outside the village. They gave parties for us all and it was our first taste of oranges and bananas. Happily my father was eventually found alive in a hospital and was able to come home for some R&R before going back to fight. Unfortunately I didn't know who the strange man was when we went to meet him!

I've loved reading about everyone's childhood experiences, there are some 'real' pictures of our history.
I was born in the mid 40's, the second of three children. My parents had a small farm, quite a way down a long country lane.
We had an orchard and a pit, and we would sail on the pit, on a raft made by my eldest brother. My friends lived along the lane, and we would play in the fields, my friend 'pinching' one of her dad's Woodbines, and we would all have a smoke.
After a silly argument with one of my brothers, I realised I had gone too far, and decided to head for my bike as he began chasing me.
I charged out of the yard, and was hit by a car driven by a neighbour. The doctor was called, and he stitched me up, but the knee hurt for ages.
It's lucky I survived!
We had a great childhood, my parents were always busy though. But mum was a great cook, roast beef for Sunday lunch, chicken and salad for tea. We used to enjoy samphire from the marshes, mum would pickle it and it was delicious.
A taxi took children from our lane to school each day until we were eight years old, but we had to bike the 2 miles to school after that.
Happy days!

I grew up as an only child in Sussex in the 1970’s.
We lived in a large detached house that my parents had a 50% mortgage on. It had been my father’s grandmother’s house built for her in the 1920’s, and had been left to my grandmother and her brother. My grandparents gave their half to my parents when my parents married, as a wedding gift, and my parents bought the uncle out of his half. They also had a flat in London which my father had bought with his salary before marriage but they sold that when I was about 5 so I have hazy memories of it.
My mother did work part time for all of my childhood, usually as a book keeper, but for a few years went into partnership with her mother and a friend to run a small cafe by the sea. My father worked at the university nearby
Much of my childhood summer holidays were spent either at the paternal grandparents cottage in the Sussex Weald or in Brighton with the other grandparents. Both had their advantages! My fathers parents cottage was in the middle of nowhere and they had to run their own generator for electricity. My father told me that they had to pay the GPO (BT) ££ in the early 1960’s to get a phone line brought down from the village! I loved it there as they had their own small private wood attached to the garden, and it had a little stream and dove house which was all mine to explore. My grandmother also made lovely cakes (my mother did not bake) and I get my love of Earl Grey tea from her which she always served at 3pm with Lap-sang tea and cake.
My other grandparents were totally different, they were social butterflies! and my grandmother liked me to call her by her first name, she wore trendy clothes and went to parties so was quite exciting to have around! They took me to the beach and ice skating while my other gran( who had learned to drive during WW1 driving an General around) liked to drive us around the countryside in her little Triumph Herald. She was the only really old lady I knew who could drive (she was quite old having had my father in her mid 40’s and my father was mid 30’s when I was born😄) and preferred it to my grandpa driving her.
Both grandmothers were fantastic role models for me, my fathers mother with an independent feisty spirit and my maternal grandma who had a chemistry degree and a job before marriage. Her mum had been a suffragist too, so women's equality was talked about a lot in our house as was politics in general; my father had stood for Parliament at one time and a lot of his friends were politicians.
My parents had both lived abroad as children and young adults and My diet at home was completely different from that of my friends. We ate what is now called the Mediterranean diet a lot, coupled with rich French cooking! and middle eastern dishes.
My parents both loved travelling and foreign travel was a prioritised expense in our house. I had hardly seen much of the UK until my late teens! I do consider myself extremely lucky to have had the opportunities they were able to give me with this.
I went to a state primary but failed the 11+ so was sent to a private school for my secondary education, I dont think finding the fees was easy for them! I know my father leaned on his over draft and I was told they remortgaged to pay for 6th form! Nonetheless I am very grateful for the education I received; while I have never earned a huge salary (working for charities) I have loved my job and no education is ever wasted.
Although I had a nice home and fun grandparents, I did long for a sibling as it was often quite lonely. With both parents working (even at primary school) I walked home alone and had a key (nobody was in ) and I used to eat food prepared in the morning by my mother and left on a tray, then do homework and either play in the garden or watch TV til my mother got in about 5 and my father about 7. We always ate together and had the same food
Like many households then my mother did most of the housework but I know my father cooked on Saturday nights while my mother went to play bridge he also did the washing up and took me out on Saturdays he also helped with my homework especially latin and maths, he did a lot more than most dads I knew! and it was expected by them both that I would go to uni and have a career which indeed I did

I was born in 1951 in a nursing home near Paisley, where I remained for practically three months as prem. babies had to reach normal birth weight before being discharged.

Daddy, being a G.P. blew his top and took me home anyway, one cold February day, when he found out that the breast milk my mother milked out each morning and he delivered to the nursing home was given to healthier children!

My earliest memory is being on board the Icelandic steamship company's Guilfoss that sailed from Leith to Copenhagen in July or August of 1953 and watching the men in the boiler room shovelling coke into the ship's furnaces. You could stand on deck and watch, which I did clinging as instructed to Daddy's hand - an unnecessary precaution as I was wearing reins that Daddy was holding firmly. Later when the weather got rough Mummy and I sat wrapped in the ship's light blue blankets watching the stern rise then crash back down again.

Back in my bunk I was terrified that my beloved Jilly - a Pedigree rubber baby doll with china head would fall out of the bunk, but Daddy said neither she, Teddy nor I could fall out as he had pinned the blankets to the mattress with blanket pins - to me they looked like his kilt pin, and I believe I told my grandmother and aunt on arrival in Copenhagen that I had been pinned in with Daddy's kilt pin.

Pressed too soon. Just under two years earlier. My dad was a printer and] worked at Jarrolds in Norwich. Jarrolds also has a large department store and was the philanthropic family in Norwich. Each year, for children aged between five and ten, several double decker buses were hired and took us to the pantomime at Theatre Royal. Afterwards we boarded the buses again and went back to the printing works where we had a party with games, a fantastic party tea and, finally a visit from Father Christmas with wonderful presents.
I have a younger brother and sister and eight first cousins, who all lived in the West Midlands apart from two, who, along with their parents were Ten Pound Poms. We were especially close to the two cousins on my mother’s side; her sister’s children, who were almost exactly the same age as my brother and me. We spent a lot of time together in the school holidays. When they stayed with us we would have four adults and five children in a Ford Anglia Estate as we went to the seaside. My cousin and l, as the oldest and “two sensible girls” sat behind the seats!
A new primary school had been built in our village a couple of years before l was due to start but, as we all know, the birth rate was at an all time high between 1945 and 1970. Apparently, 1964 was the highest of all. The two reception classes were in an annexe at the other end of the village. This was a mobile building, there was a building opposite for school dinners and indoor PE, which was like an old Nissen hut left over from the war. It may well have been. I loved it and it was a lovely, gentle introduction to school. The teacher was excellent, too. The main part of the school was really good as well and I was very happy there. My favourite teacher of all was the teacher l had in the top infants. We would line up to go home on Friday afternoons and each child who had behaved themselves (strangely, every child managed to redeem themselves y then!) was given a sweet. Before holidays it was upgraded to a biscuit and, before Easter, a Creme Egg. We had a school choir in the juniors but this teacher formed a choir in our class and I was in it. We participated, as well as the older choir, in the Norfolk and Norwich festival and were awarded a second class certificate - excellent for a choir of seven year olds. We were rewarded with an ice cream, which was a rare treat. At the end of the year, this teacher presented me with a book of poetry which she inscribed. I will never part with it.
I realise I have rambled on and only reached the age of seven. Another time if I am allowed.

I’m a 1942 baby ….born whilst my dad was in the army in Italy. Always lived in our 3 bedroom semi in Woodford which meant they must have bought that house just before the start of the second war. Started school at 4 (can remember the huge rocking horse in the corner of the classroom, the camp beds where we had our ‘afternoon rest’ and not answering when the teacher called out my name on the register)! Mum picked me up from school on her bike ….I had a little seat on the back and she always brought with her a bottle of orange (the thick stuff that was issued and you diluted it with water) and I drank that as she peddled us home…it felt like heaven after a day at school

Some time after the war was over - my dad had a job as a soft toy salesman with an office in London (right opposite St. Paul’s cathedral) and mum worked there two or three days a week there as his secretary, but instead of a typewriter on her desk she had a sewing machine…so I guess she just answered the phone for Dad when he was out visiting his customers! I had loads of dresses as a child because she had all the time in the world to make them at work!

I have so many more memories and have realized that, looking back, my older brother and I had the best of childhoods and we were so loved and cared for, but at the time I thought that was how everyone’s life was.

Hi there. I had pretty much same problem with a mother with narcissistic disorders. She was really cold and I was left like you to grow up alone. My father left when I was 14. She remarried and then got divorced when I was 18. It’s super hard to have a parent like this. I’m sure you done well in life like me as e had to rely on ourselves. Thanks for posting. 😀

@Anniebach, what a terrible thing to have witnessed. One of my cousins was born on that day and my parents remembered the tragedy unfolding while simultaneously hearing the wonderful news of a new addition to our family.
I was born in December 1964 in the Norfolk bungalow that my parents had bought as their first home just un

I was born in 1946, adopted at 6 weeks old and had a good life with my parents. They were a lot older than the parents of my friends which meant my life was more restricted and revolved mainly round Chapel and associated activities. I was very lucky that they were comfortably off and I never suffered any deprivation even during rationing. My parents loved me in their way but were not demonstrative no hugs or cuddles. I found this difficult then with my own children and had to struggle to overcome it.
I was so much luckier than other children in my situation at that time and I will always be grateful for that.

Oh Jennyluck how wonderful for you! Do tell us more about the children of your birth mother finding you. It must have been amazing for you

born in 1955,sadly it was like WW3 violent father, terrified mother.Yes there was good relations, friends, happy times, but the shadow of returning to a family that was warm and safe was sadly not there.It has affected my life in so many ways,and to date i am still at times struggling with them ,but hey ho!

Born 1955. In a rented house whilst Dad commuted to London in a huge steam train. He’d had ALL his teeth removed @a v young age & I now do anything to keep my own teeth !I remember NHS school dentist always trying to find a filling to do ( don’t we all?! )
Money was tight. Never had a car nor telephone till I was in my teens .Bought lots of clothes @ jumble sales & that’s never gone away !Top loader washing machine / trips to the drier @ launderette.
Left in car with bags of crisps with blue salt packets whilst parents in pub
Sorry could go on & on 🤣

I was born in 1955, and adopted at 10 weeks old. My birth mother was married but not to my father, he found out, hence my adoption.
So I was bought up an only child, my dad had a long standing illness, so we were not very well off. We did occasionally go on holiday, when money allowed. But it was a happy childhood.
Jump forward 67 years, the children of my birth mother have found me. This year has been truly wonderful.

My mother birthed me in a private hospital and stayed there for 2 weeks with me. I wish there was that sort of care now for everyone. The memories of retained placenta and cord wrapped round the baby unfortunately happened when I gave birth to each of my children 30 years later! There was a laundry strike at the hospital when I gave birth, so we just had newspapers on the beds and cots. Anyway, back to the memory of childhood. I remember standing on the pier watching paddle steamers racing to be the first to moor, and to catch all the tourist passengers. I knew the names of all the paddle steamers and the companies from the colours on the funnels. I remember my mother sent me to buy a jar of jam from the grocer just down the road, but over a railway bridge. A steam train tooted at me so loudly that I dropped the jam jar and it smashed glass everywhere. I was mortified and decided to run away from home. I walked for miles until I got to a lighthouse and stopped. I didn't get told off at all when a policeman and mum and dad found me by the seashore. I was so glad to be home and forgiven.

I was born at home in the early '50s. Mum was rushed into hospital because of haemorrhaging .saved by" Joyce ", who I later found out was the consultant who had done a home visit. We lived in an end terrace three-bedroomed house until I was 2. I can remember the outside loo and the lighting was by gas.
We then moved into a lovely three-bedroomed semi with all the amenities.
I loved a journey by steam train and did one every year to an aunt who lived in the Midlands. Also, the closed line which is now a road that ran alongside Basenthwaite Lake.
Holidays were always with cousins at Butlins or Blackpool saying" hello "' to all the neighbours as it was Stop fortnight at the local pits. My father did not work at the mines and got fed up branched out and we flew to Belgium.
I can vividly remember the mining disaster and the awful scenes on T.V. It worried our village because we were surrounded by old pit heaps and they were all checked "We were told".
I lined up at school the term before I was 5 and the teacher counted how many she wanted and the rest went home. One little boy sat in a wheelbarrow all the time looking back he was probably autistic.
I went on the bus at 11 to the local Grammar school and life changed forever.