Are there some things your folks believed and pushed onto you against your will or to your embarassment or discomfort?

My mom insisted we wear orange on St Patrick’s day.

@anartist
In support of the olden Orangemen or in spite of the commercializing of Green for that day? People from Ireland have told me they think the USA makes a much bigger deal of St. Patrick’s day then Ireland does.

My parents expected me to work hard, do my best and treat others with respect. They did it and they taught me to do the same. I am grateful to them for their pressures and demands. I am also grateful for their love and support and criticism when I needed it.

They were not perfect but they cared and wanted the best for me always. I love them.

My parents were staunch atheists and if they caught me praying they would beat me with the communist manifesto so hard it left marx.

My aunt would have me come with her to hand out Jack Chick tracts in our neighborhood. And she would get upset enough when no one took them from her that she’d say things in an attempt to shame or scare passers-by into taking one. That would be embarrassing enough to me as an adult, except at the time I was 8. In the manner in which children believe that what their family does reflects on them, I was completely mortified at her behaviour.

Wearing fitted clothing. And socks.
Oh, the humiliation! And chafing.

@Dr_Lawrence
I am grateful to my grandparents who raised me until I was 5yrs old for the same things you wrote. It was a huge contrast to the hippie idealism and social “chopping off the nose to spite the face” of my experience with my parents.

Isolation

@aprilsimnel As well you should have been. The ravings of a madman as far as I can tell.

The only thing they forced was dance lessons.I am still mighty enraged over this…—tappity-tap tap—;)

@Neizvestnaya Orange Irish on my mother’s side. When I grew older I wore something that had orange, green, and white on St P’s day. And I’m sure it is over-commercialized here, but, hey, how can you hate a holiday that emphasizes beer?

Yeah, cleaning up after men. No, thanks.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir
I hear you on that one but when the man says, “I really don’t care about things being as clean as you like them…” then there comes a point you kinda end up doing the chore just not to be grossed out anymore. I can forgive a little of that if he’s kicking ass in other areas.

@Neizvestnaya Luckily, I am waaaaaaaaaay more of a pig than my husband.

Ther was never one big thing. I wasn’t forced into sports, music, or even hunting (which is a big thing for the males in my family).

There were tons of little things, though. If I wasn’t cleaning the dishes the same way as my dad, or mowing the lawn in the same pattern, or brushing my teeth the same way, I would hear about how I was doing it “wrong”.

I had an interesting mix of views being thrust upon me while growing up. My mum is COE & wanted me to believe in God, my dad was a rabid Atheist, My dad was a racist (not anymore thankfully), my oldest brother was an anti-racist activist, my dad believed that no-one deserved respect, my mum was very conservative & believed in the social order.

Yes. I never accepted much of it and walked away from it when I left home. I think parents must allow kids the opportunity to become educated and form their own philosophy for their lives.

I can’t think of anything my parents pushed so hard that it caused me embarrassment or emotional discomfort. Now my mom did do things like in 4th grade she sat me down in the bathroom and tweezed some of my very stray eyebrows, which hurt. And, I was not allowed to join the Girl Scouts, because she didn’t want to be bothered with obligations. And, my dad used to tell a story about how I would not eat two more bites to finish some food because I was full (which he thought was fantastic that I would not eat them, but I found it embarrassing). And, my house growing up was rather messy, as I got older it became worse and worse, and I found that embarassing, I used to clean up before friends would come over, but it really was never a house I was very proud of, although I loved my own bedroom. But, nothing that created intense pressure on me to conform to an idea or act in a way that would embarass me.

About religion my parents were atheists and religion almost never came up. We did celebrate Chanukah and Passover, more of a family gathering. Religion was basically absent from my upbringing. It did not affect me growing up though, it was a very diverse community and religion was basically a non-issue. We didn’t care what religion each other was.

No political or religious views but my parents pushed me to study science at school. I hated it, and was useless at it, and ended up quitting without a degree. What I really wanted to do was go to art school, and my biggest regret is that I was never able to (after leaving home, I could never afford it).

Well my mom was quite fond of telling me that if I’m not good, I’ll end up in Hell and serve as Satan’s bitch for all eternity.

Closer to the question though, not exactly what you’re asking but…she would find commendable traits in me; drawing, a moment of clever insight, responsibility, acute sense of comprehension, whatever…compliment me for them, but then she would immediately attribute all of them to herself, pointing herself out as the one and only source of any talent or whatever I might have, making it seem to other people around us that I’d be nothing if it weren’t for her.
Which is true in a way I guess, but it was still annoying.

@Symbeline
Ugh, our family has one of those people and it’s always rubbed me the wrong way for any attention to my efforts credited elsewhere. On the flipside, if there were undesireable traits then they got chalked up to coming from another branch of family. I say this, fark it- if I create it or finesse it then it’s mine because I could have just as easily chosen not to act at all and any “family owned” talent would be unseen. grrrrr