What crap did your parents try and feed you growing up.

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I disagree, false hope just leads to a bigger letdown when you find out the truth. I would rather be told as it is. If i suck, i want people to tell me, so i dont have to find out the hard way. Im effing tired of "finding things out the hard way"

If you're smart you will know the truth anyway. I know I suck at things, I don't need to be told. Being told you suck at something kills motivation to even bother trying. But the encouragement from a role model like a parent can make all the difference.

My parents never encouraged me to live overseas. They told me I "wouldn't cope with it". If I called them tomorrow and told them I was moving to America, I would not be told: "good on you, go for it!" I would be told: "Thats not a good idea"

I bet if they had, I'd bet my arse that I would have. Because deeply engrained in me, I fear it because of what I've been fed.

Last edited by hale_bopp on 22 Aug 2010, 7:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.

My parents never believed in false hope, im glad. i suppose its easier to be told what to think than to make it up as you go along.

It's more accurate for grown ups to tell kids "You have as much a chance of becoming President as you do of winning one hundred million in the lottery, but there is a remote possibility it could happen".

I find telling a kid "You can be the president" to be patronising, like their kid is stupid enough to believe it, I dunno, some probably are.

I'd never do it to mine. No wonder some kids are as messed up as they are.

But that's the thing, I don't suck. What he said wasn't true. I really could have been an engineer if I had wanted. The truth is good, but undermining a kid who is actually capable by taking a blow at their self confidence is to me worse than giving them false hope. At least with some hope people might try things and succeed at more than they suspected whereas if I had believed him (and his general attitude) I might not have gone to college or really tried to do anything beyond what's necessary just to survive. He and his wife made fun of me for doing my homework.

Even though it's not a well thought statement, I think the parents who do tell their children they can be anything they want are at least expressing love. it's pretty great having someone, even if it's only your mom, who has complete confidence in you. It's s**t having a parent who actively puts down your efforts of bettering yourself.

I remember this convo from early teens:

Dad: Just don't react to bullies. Ignore them!

Me: You were bullied.

Dad: Yea.

Me: Did you ignore the bullies?

Dad: Yea.

Me: Did it help?

Dad: No.

When I was a kid my mom used to tell me other kids were jealous of me so that's why they make fun of me about what I have on or things they say to me about them. Same as when they make fun of me about other things.

My parent's went through the whole, "Educational video games," bit. Pissed my brothers and I off to no end . . . all three of us were A/B grade students prior to this. We repeatedly told them our objections. About a year ago, this subject came up, and I said, "Well, were too advanced for the games you wanted us to play, yet you forced them on us anyway." So my mother replies, "But you didn't tell us," and I say, "Yes we did . . . you just didn't want to hear it."

Parents, word of warning . . . YOU DON'T ALWAYS KNOW BEST. If you can't listen to your kids, you have no business telling them what to do (sorry for sounding harsh).

"Your artwork is so great, you could be a professional artist!"

Yet when I post it online, I get criticized and told I'm not very good. No doubt I've improved over the years, but I'm still a far cry from being a "professional". To make it worse, when I show my parents examples of amateur artists whose work actually is good enough to be considered professional, their response is something along the lines of "I'm sure that artist stole/traced/copied it from someone else."

My mom and brother also say they like my style of art because they think it's "unique", whereas I think it's kind of a generic cartoonish anime style. Whenever I try to tweak my drawing style, they discourage it because they feel that the way I draw is part of who I am.

The way I see it, either I'm being way too hard on myself or they're being way too soft.

"People bully you because they are jealous or you".

Yes, of course... Well, I realized it was not true when I was 16.

Also "Ignore the people who bully you, they will stop."

Well, it turns out that they beat you even more...

EXACTLY! THIS!

Anyway, here's my list:

"I understand you" - no you don't, you have no idea how I think and feel, how can you when I don't even know?

"You're really smart" (or some variation) - no I'm not, I'm no more intelligent than the general populous, and if you think IQ tests mean anything, I did a few that proved it

"I don't treat you like a kid" - yes you do, every single day and every single minute we're in the same room, you treat me like some lower life form

"I'll treat you like an adult when you act like one" - yeah right, I could be a most intellectual 16 year old ever and you'd still treat me like a 6 year old

Its not what my parents did or did not say.
They were very over protective and discuraging.
An example of this was in highschool I wanted to play football.
I was not very big. I also have really bad eye hand cordnation.
For my first two years I played water polo insted. I think if they new anything about water polo they would have encurged me to play football. I decided to play football my jounior year. Like I said I'm not athletocly gifted. I was not getting into any games. It seems like every day espicily from my Mom. I was told that it is ok to quit. I stuck the season out. In a rare moment of self confdences I talked yje coch in to letting me on the field for the final searies of downs. My parants nagitivity must have gotten to me. I decided not to play my senior year. I wish I did. The team had a few injuries. I probbly would have seen playing time by defualt.

Oh...I thought you meant food :S

Oh Yes! And this tendency to think that because you are younger than them you are always wrong and whenever you disagree with them you hear "You are acting like a 12 years old, you know nothing of life"... Of course, I am 20 years old, I do not share your beliefs, I use logical and rational arguments and you were the one who never believed me when I told you I was rejected by other kids because I was not popular but just a nerd (because high school is so not a society) but I am totally wrong.

By the way, explaining to your parents how you work and how they should treat you to obtain goos results does not work and make you become a "stupid teenager"
(Mine are always yelling at me when I do something wrong or when they want me to do something because they assume I am a stupid teenager who will not do it or will fail at doing it properly and well, yelling just makes me... stop, I do not know how to explain this, it is just like I am having a panick attack and can no longer move and I become nervous and aggressive. I do not understand the need to threaten a child or a young adult to slap them just because you have no authority and dislike the fact that they see it)

You will never be as good, as everybody else. There are lots of things, that other people can do, that you will never be able to do, and part of it, is because you have a Learning Disability. - Said by my father, the summer that I was I was going into Grade 10.

Was that really 20 years, ago? Sheesh...what a nut job he was, to say that to me.