Family Photos

My mom never shared our childhood photos. When she was in the hospital last year, I took boxes and boxes of them and scanned them and returned the originals.

It was nice to have the memories, good and bad.

Keep what you want. They may be important to your children and grandchildren

Spring

I was saying I have unhappy memories attached to a lot of the photos.

If I didn't smile for photos I was shouted at so yes, a lot of false smiles in photos unless I was not the main subject.

I'm not sure what that has to do with your daughter, sorry

So what you’re saying VS is if you are smiling it is false. Yet our EC has decided photos where she isn’t smiling are ‘proof’ she had an unhappy childhood. Bit tough on parents….. As another poster said, maybe we overthink these things.

I think you're right, try to pick out the ones where you have some confidence that you were genuinely happy. If you can find the ones that do link with happier memories, you could make one album of them.

Then you could make another album with photos that are representative of your genealogy - you only need one photo of each person, especially if you have difficult memories of them. Label them with names and make it a factual record rather than an emotional one, if you can.

That would help a lot if I can identify and keep those, thank you

You probably can't remember every situation, but isn't it possible that in some of the photographs, your smile was genuine?

I think there are different kinds of moving on Bluebell and I think you can move on emotionally but still think about things.

These photos exist and I would like to do something with them

I've thrown quite a few away but still unsure what to keep or whether to make an album.

I feel like my childhood pictures might be interesting to my children one day but definitely not in an amount that needs to be lugged around in life

Also I feel like pictures of family members probably do belong in an album of some sort, even family members we have no contact with.

But do they belong in the same album, do they belong with pictures of me smiling as some sort of false legacy? Even of my children know they have abusive family members by their own memories do future generations need to know or should it be glossed over so they have a fresh start?

Ah, I can see now after typing my thoughts what thr real problem is and I am definitely focusing on one issue to procrastinate another. They will probably be put away again for another day.

I suppose there's no way of knowing without asking. There's that saying isn't there that the camera never lies but it can do.

I've never been a lover of photographs. Have loads of the boys of course but have always hated having mine taken. I only have two on show, one of my gran and one of DS who lives in Aus.

I know what you mean. I seldom look at ours but when I do, especially the ones of us and our ES just months before he estranged us, I do wonder what lies behind his smile.

I frequently look miserable in group photos, mainly because, by the time the photo is actually taken, my smile is worn out and has drooped! It's not a sign that I'm unhappy.

I'm fortunate in that there's no sad background to my childhood. On the other hand, I agree that natural photos where the subject is caught smiling or laughing are much better.

There’s no way you ll ever know what parents or anyone else thinks whether it’s joy, false memories, fear, wishful thinking, or guilt You are making sure your childhood isn’t repeated by your parenting so that’s all you can do there is no value in constantly second guessing, what they think.
I believe you ve had counselling for your childhood but judging by all your posts you have never been taught how to move on That doesn’t mean you should deny your past or not feel sadness for the child within you but about you forming new memories for you and your children which I feel you ve done so why dwell so much on the past wrongs, rejoice in the fact that their wrongs changed you for the better