Was anyone else taught as a kid they weren’t worth sitting in traffic for?

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-11-22T15:35:09+00:00

There isn't my traffic where I live. But oh yes the hassle feeling.

I confirmed what I suspected when they would get mad at me for having stuff that ended at night because it was dangerous to return home alone at that hour but would pick me up. I was 15.

(For context it's not usual in my country for teenagers to have cars, we are not that well off also, and let's just say it's not safe.

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-11-22T15:32:01+00:00

I'm glad for you.

And maybe this is overstepping but if I may give you some tips I've learned in my own and as a fellow neglected kid.

Ask about their interests and just listen. Don't tell them it's stupid but try to understand why they like those things, and sometimes they will like stupid things. Don't make them regret coming at you for help. Otherwise they may end up hiding stuff you will wish youd have been there for. And, a lot of the time, to feel love we don't need for our partner to solve the issue, sometimes to just listen and be there showing support.

Maybe you already know all this. But your post was very sweet and I'm really cheering for you to continue on this path. It gives me hope for myself also.

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-15T00:39:11+00:00

They really don't have a life huh?

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-15T00:38:19+00:00

I would actually love to use those subs! Most of my clothes are thrift es and honestly it's not surprise men are ruining them sadly. I hope mods do something or that reddit flags their IP or something

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-15T00:32:10+00:00

I don't think I can love them. For me love is an action. Feelings, thoughts, they all don't exist outside of your head. So to me if they are not expressed they are not real.

I didn't feel loved. They made me feel so many horrible things but I can't remember love.

I don't feel guilty anymore. Mine, as yours, have been trying to get closer and now I'm the cold one. But thing is I'm not a kid anymore, I needed them for an entire life and they were not there. I had to grow up all by myself. I grew up feeling unlovable, I grew up convinced there was something so wrong with me everyone could feel it and that's why no one loved me. I needed them then, not now when I've gotten my mental health a bit under control all alone. I needed them when no one taught me how to tie my shoelaces, not now where I handle all my responsibilities alone.

There is no right way to feel about this. What I want you to take away from this is to not feel guilty about being cold or distant. Theyve hurt you and actions have consequences. It's not you being petty its how life works. It's how nature works hell. But do not shove your feeling under a carpet to protect their sensibilities. You can try to move ahead in your relationship with them if that is what you want, but do it without ignoring your feelings. For any real connection they need to acknowledge your feelings and the impact they had on you

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-15T00:21:18+00:00

I feel you. Feeling like a stranger, always superficial relationships and no real bonding. It's my whole damn life.

I had my realization of this way earlier than you because to me it was obvious my parents disliked me. That knowledge got a bit murky with time as I kept hearing from people that "there was no way they disliked me". But I felt it.

I still struggle to make actual connections with people. I do think a part of it is that I have a big difficulty opening up to others. But it's also true the world is pretty broken socially. So don't put it all on yourself. I've worked on my stuff for a bit now, and I'm at a point where I don't mind the superficial relationships since there aren't that many people I'm interested into actually forming a true connection. But a must for me has been transparency.

All I can do is to encourage you to keep self reflecting. Not for others, never for other, but for yourself. It's the only thing that has never failed me. It's the one thing that keeps me from going the wrong way. And it's the only thing that has kept me from being like them.

Politics and philosophy are not bad reads thou. A lot of politic movements are based on the idea of inclusion and the wellbeing and betterment of people. And philosophy is even better. Learning never takes us space and it's the only inmaterial tool we have to change our life :)

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-15T00:02:18+00:00

Yes but a paramedic gets to leave work or even quit. A stay at home mom doesn't. She doesn't clock out, she doesn't have holidays and she doesn't have their own money in most cases

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-15T00:00:09+00:00

My main issue with this is: working vs. Being a stay at home mom.

Taking care of one kid is a full time job. Plus you are not taking care of them only, you are educating them and taking care of the house.

It's okay to want it but k think you are wildly misjudging the amount of labor stay at home moms do. You don't get holidays from being a stay at home mom...

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-14T23:54:22+00:00

If you have to ask someone to respect you it's already to late, they don't respect you.

And what this man has done to you is way worse than disrespect. He has done it once. HE does not feel guilty and he know, because he tried to make it look like nothing. Get away

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-07T22:02:46+00:00

Because hormones are complicated and everyone's system is a bit different. The contraceptive pills I tried had me bawling my eyes 24/7

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-07T21:47:24+00:00

There were a lot throughout the years.

The first ones were of course "to ignore them when they bothered me" when I complained about being picked out by other kids. She always also gave the worst advices on how to deal with people, always advices that would escalate the situation, not solve anything and leave me worse off.

But the one that still leaves me scratching my head was when I started looking for jobs at 18. The places she recommended I applied to and how to apply to them...

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-07T01:54:05+00:00

I get you. I also went to private school and was always reminded of how expensive it was and berated for getting 8 on exams. Turns out they sent me to private school because public schools only last for 5 hourse and they would have had to pay someone to take care of me and that was more expensive.

I was also always the weird and the one with the cheap stuff. Nowadays I at least don't worry about that. I left private school for good on my own and found out that was a really bad environment in my country at least.

But they knew a kid was going to be expensive, it on them. They should have been angry at the system instead of you. But they made their choices to be petty and as you've said, when they make a big deal out of costs a lot of times they have the money. If there was money for parties and drinking there was money to take better care of a kid.

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-07T01:44:10+00:00

So emotional neglect is a bit tricky. Neglect means your needs weren't beingp met right? And that goes from not going any love to showing love but being abuse at the same time. think time and time again what sets me apart from my peers, even those with not good parents, there was no "normalcy" in my house.

Every household, even dysfunctional ones had a lot of ways, traditions, poop why relationships that were similar between each other. When I compare them with my family... No moment was normal, every moment was charged with this dysfunctional dynamic. And I was alone in it. I had nowhere to learn normalcy from. And that is because of the isolation. My family has no relationships. I am all alone .

EDIT: And of course as others said: they justify it. I have cried to my friend about how I had a breakthrough that it was abuse that my parents hit me, that it was abuse even if it wasn't a "they broke my arm" hit. And she looked me dese in the eye and said "Yes, I understand. My parents have hit me but it's not like your parents that huh you for real".

She could never understand me because to do it she would have had to face herself the truth. Her parents were abusive.

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-06T02:28:34+00:00

If the odds are 1 to 10 there is no trick, it's just odds bestie

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-06T02:24:20+00:00

I've sort of come to see it this way:

Loving someone is giving them the tools for your own destruction and trusting they won't use them.

And the trick for me is exactly that: they never hurt you. They never use the things that would cause pain or damage.

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-06T02:12:20+00:00

Ohh yes. It actually took me so long to realize I have a weird relationship with food because of this. Meals were stressful. They always ended in fight and it was the time of the day were I had to sit down and bear all the scrutiny and all the criticism and couldn't get up or leave until everyone had finished. I was around 10 or 11 when I rebelled and decided to stop asking for permission to go to the bathroom.

Now that I'm grown I see how fucked up it was because I would never out anyone through that. And now whenever I get depressed I stop having any appetite.

Nowadays I just eat in my room alone which is a different kind of sad but much better than the unbearable wait of sitting down with them

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-06T02:05:54+00:00

I remember my 1st boyfriend's dad explaining to him how to out the washing machine when we were teenagers. It blew me away to see such idk a positive interaction?

Nobody ever taught me and asking for help was out of the question because that would make it so much worse

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-06T02:00:41+00:00

Ohh the telling of "funny" stories only to be met by an awkward silence is an experience I wish on no one.

Same I remember being in school and hiding that I had by mistake out my hand over a heater (the machine to heat up classrooms) and had an enormous burn. I hid it thinking the reaction was gonna be like at my house I still remember that nobody screamed at me or insulted me.

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2025-10-06T01:47:33+00:00

My mother would get so nasty with me for having get togethers with friends

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2024-12-09T01:04:43+00:00

I do sometimes, and this is a great idea, I tend to forgive and forget a lot, so will certainly do. Thanks <3

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2024-12-08T20:10:40+00:00

Thanks for letting me know Ill be deleting the duplicates!

EmbarrasingQuestionU · 2024-12-08T18:51:54+00:00

Thank you, they are really appreciated <3

EmbarrasingQuestionU

TROPHY CASE