I feel as if I have areas of both parenting styles within my upbringing for the concerted cultivation, I had activities that I was a part of. It felt a bit different because I was homeschooled so those were the only times I got to interact with peers my age. On the other side, most of my childhood was me being left on my own to play. I remember days when my father didn’t want to teach us (this was most days) so he would send me and my sister to our rooms or to the basement. Now as I child I would never complain about this I loved playing with my sister. We made up so many different types of games and we became so incredibly close. We would tell everyone we were twins because it felt like that. However now when I look back, I am angry at my parents. Why did they not teach me? There have been so many instances in life where I have felt so stupid and out of touch because of how little I learned growing up.
To this day I am still shocked that I am here in college getting my degree. I often think had I gotten a real education as a child where I would be? Maybe I could have been a neurosurgeon like I wanted to. As far as punishments go, that’s a hard subject. I often dealt with my father for this because he was the one who would stay at home with us. He would yell and hit, stuff like that. I know this impacted all of us children in my family as my brother took on the same role, often hitting and yelling. I still get nervous when I hear footsteps on the stairs, my heart stops when someone raises their voice. I flinch if someone gets too close. I feel as if the choice my parents made has ruined my life, only if I always say.
I have been trying to make the best of it. To not be like them in those ways. However, it’s also confusing because now my parents want to be supportive, they ask about my day and like to try and conversate however I don’t want it, and they can’t make up for the bad things they did. This isn’t to say I didn’t have good parts in my childhood, I did we went on “field trips” sometimes but those good things feel tainted by the bad things. These things impacted me in many ways. For the longest time, I said I didn’t want kids, I didn’t want them to feel like I did. Even those I love babies and I want nothing more than one. It’s just difficult to try to separate myself from my parents.
