Being nostalgic for happy childhood memories is something we do from time to time as we get older.
The stresses that come from adulting make us yearn for how much simpler things were when we still possessed a sense of awe and fascination with the world that was slowly revealing itself to us before we refined our critical thinking skills.
While there are the warm and fuzzy memories of being with family during the holidays, a favorite toy, or a beloved pet, there are certain incidences from the past that are not-so-pleasant when looking back through an adult lens.
Curious to hear from strangers online about their childhood, Redditor beesechugersports asked:
"What horrible thing happened to you as a kid and you didn’t realise the severity of it until you got older?"
For children, it's all fun and games...at first.
A Dangerous Game
"I lived in the countryside in a farming town. Alongside the road my family lived on was a small concrete ditch. It was visible for about half the road and then went underground the rest of the road until it flowed out into a large canal at the end."
"I was a really thin and small kid. When I was about 9 or so my sister and I and some of her friends were playing in the small ditch to cool off. My sister thought it would be interesting to see if I could fit into the pipe that led underground. So my 12 year old sister and her friends held me by my arms and lowered me into the pipe until my hips were in. I could feel the rushing water pulling me in. I yelled at them to bring me back out. They did and then we left."
"I didn’t tell anyone about it for years and when I finally did they looked horrified. So yeah if my sister had lost her grip, I would have gone underground and likely gotten stuck and drowned."
Playing Dead
"Oof… my sister was messing with me and pretended to be dead. I thought she was kidding but I was little and not completely sure cause I hit her, pinched her, checked for breathing (those classes where EMs show you what to look for and firefighters telling you to stop drop and roll and don’t be scared of their masks REALLY paid off!)"
"So I went and dialed 911 but thankfully my sister decided she didn’t want to have to explain to my parents wtf happened so instead she got chewed out by the operator lol"
– ovrlymm
Kids get an early lesson on death.
Dying On The Job
"Our babysitter died while she was watching us when my twin and I were 3. We had no concept of death, and tried to wake her up."
"She had spilled water when she fell, and I still remember getting a dish towel to wipe it up, thinking she would be proud of how responsible I was being."
"I remember going to get our little toy pots and pans to bang together to make noise to wake her up, we had no idea what a heart attack was."
– Mushrooming247
Strawberry Ice Cream To Make It All Better
"I always remember a paramedic talking about responding to a scene where an aunt had died looking after a three or four-year-old child. The aunt was slumped on the floor but she had some strawberry ice cream around her mouth. Apparently the child had tried to feed her dead aunt some strawberry ice cream after she'd collapsed and died because whenever the child herself felt bad, sometimes her parents would give her strawberry ice cream. So she tried to help her aunt that way. That image really stuck with me."
– skonen_blades
Childhood traumas never go away.
Addiction
"It took me almost 25 years to realise that alcoholic parents aren't normal and other people have it different."
– Veeyas
"I remember asking a friend how many times they’d seen their parents drunk in their life when I was 16 or 17."
"When they said a handful I kinda knew I’d been f'ked. My dad had driven while drunk with me in the back more times than they’d even seen their parents intoxicated."
"It killed him a few years ago. Not while driving, like organ failure. People don’t notice it as much if they’re all extroverted and likeable when they’re intoxicated"
– CauliflowerThat6430
Abandoned On The Side Of The Road
"My mom admitted after she got sober that she would stop on the way home from work (an hour away) and get a 6 pack and drink 3 of the beers before she got home, then would drink a bottle of wine when she got home. She did this every day."
"My sister and I knew she was drunk, but my dad worked 2 jobs and wasn't home that much so he didn't see it like we did."
"The worst was when she drove me through the backroads at 10 PM and just stopped the car on the side of the road and told me to get out and that she didn't want me anymore. Luckily may dad was home when she got back and he came and got me."
"That f'ked me up for the rest of my life and she doesn't even remember it."
– TheGreensKeeper420
Daily Ritual
"My dad got drunk EVERY night, and his behaviour made us uncomfortable, but we didn't know it wasn't normal. He would send us to get him beers from the kitchen, and we'd gladly do it because it was one of the few things that reliably made him happy with us."
– LVL25_Lapras
These Redditors grew up in a hoarder household.
Moving The Clutter
"Having a 'cluttered house' and needing to spend a few hours carrying everything from the living room into my bedroom to make the living room appropriate for guests. I would sob and beg for it not to go into my room because I knew it would never leave, and the living room would get filled again with TJmaxx bags and garbage we don't need. Turned out a hoarded house isn't normal and it made me a pretty awful roommate to my friends in my teen years."
– plantsndogs
Symptom Of OCD
"A lot of people are unaware of the fact that hoarding is a symptom of OCD. Real OCD, and not the pop-psychology OCD that people claim they have."
"My bio-mom was a hoarder, and she had other OCD symptoms as well, everyone was expected to count the stairs as we climbed them, out loud, and one at a time, with no other options. Always monitoring the location of every person at every time (which was much harder in the 1970s than today), needing someone else to dial the (rotary) phone for them, because certain phone numbers were just "wrong," for various reasons (too many odd numbers, the pattern the dial sounds made were summoning demons, too many of the same number in a row, that sort of thing.)"
– Galaxy_Ranger_Bob
Ignorance is always bliss to a child until something goes wrong.
As a child, I was reckless and hyper and I would often ignore the warnings of my mother to dial it down a notch.
Kids, listen to your parents.
I ignored my mom when she told me to stop jumping up and down on the bed. I fell backward and slammed my head on the corner of the headboard that was also doubled as a low bookshelf.
Apparently, when your scalp ruptures, you bleed profusely. Even my mothers hands couldn't stop the bleeding. Since my dad was at work and my mom couldn't drive at the time, she had to call the neighbor and have them take me to the hospital where I got stitches in my head.
So yes, it's all fun and games until you get hurt. The consequence of refusing to heed my mom's warning is something that stayed with me and makes me appreciate all you parents out there who are doing the toughest job of all: Raising kids.
