“What’s Something Your Family Raised You Doing That You Later Learnt Was Really Weird?” (45 Answers)

In high school my dad had a rule “if you’ve done it, I’ve done it. And if you and your friends are going to do it, do it in the house and have them stay the night.” Coupled with “if you EVER need a ride you can call me to pick you up.”

He was talking about d***s and drinking. He wasn’t encouraging it, but allowing a safe space.

This was one of the better things in my childhood.

Before I was totally competent swimming by myself, my mom would put a life jacket on me, tie a long piece of nylon rope to it, and chuck me in the river. She'd basically swim me on a leash down the river for fun.

Mom, you are the classiest redneck.

When I became an adult I was shocked to find out that other families did things with their kids. My Mom was a shopper, my Dad golfed and played cards at the club. We NEVER had any family activities like hiking, camping, bowling or anything in the 60’s and 70’s. When I had things my parents could have come to watch, they never did. My daughter was a good tennis player and I spent every afternoon and all weekends with her playing. She did get a full ride tennis scholarship in Hawaii for college.

I don’t think I had one real conversation with my Dad. When he was dying, I asked him if he could tell me he was proud of me. He said “I’ll think about it”. That s**t effs you up for life.

Catholic mother, muslim dad; neither really practicing. We celebrated Christmas though, and on Christmas Eve night instead of doing the “normal” Christmas stuff like cookies, milk, etc. my dad would loudly pretend to violently chase Santa out of the house by yelling and cussing him out and throwing his shoe at him, which we would later find in places like the fireplace.

Using a ship's bell to call for dinner. My parents got tired of yelling for us so they mounted a ship's bell to the hallway wall. They would ring it for dinner and any other occasion when they needed our attention.

Like Pavlov's dog I get hungry whenever I hear a ship's bell ring.

Having your teen partners just.. move in.

My brothers both had their girlfriends move in with us when they were 14 and 15, due to their home life being rough. When I was 14 my boyfriend of 3 months got kicked out, so he moved in with us no questions asked, for 2 years. Several of our friends also just moved in with us. 🤷‍♀️.

We lived during the summer months outside under a tree of our choice..we had 30 acres....did this for years.

Grew up in a hoarder house. I look back at my childhood now and can’t believe the cluttered nightmare I grew up in. Now I relish throwing things away when I’m done with them.

We were not allowed to have a drink with our meals. It could be the driest food ever or you could be thirsty as all hell, nope, no water, finish the meal first.

Bathing/showering only on Saturday evenings. I must have smelled so bad back then , especially since my dad smoked in the house. It was to save money on the water bill. But a pack of cigarettes a day was in the budget.

My Taiwanese born dad called tortillas burrito skins. I still call them that when I’m tired.

Knocking on strangers doors to tell them their religion was wrong.

A nice one between all the sad ones:

Apparently, people think getting your kids salamanders as pets is weird. But I disagree, they are super cute, I've had salamanders from 8 up until 18. It taught me that animals other than mammals were awesome too.

Clapping at shows we were watching on TV as if we were part of a live audience. Friends thought that was weird.

In the summer, my dad used to get us up (myself and 3 siblings) at 9am, give us breakfast and then boot us out of the house and lock the back/front doors from the inside. We weren’t allowed back inside until the streetlights came on (unless it was ONLY : using the washroom or getting a drink).

Our ages were 10, 9, 7 and 4 the first time he did it because he told me “you’re old enough to look after them on your own now” and “your not sitting around the house on your fat a**es all day”.

My step-mom never questioned it because she figured that he was just getting us to play outside for a few hours. Once my second youngest sister (the 7 year old) got heat stroke and my dad was PISSED that he had to drive us all to the hospital and “waste time”

Realized when I was 14-15 that he just wanted us out of the house so he could drink and watch NHL. We never really questioned why he was kicking us out because the other kids that lived on the street were also outside around the same time as us. Once we were invited into my brothers friends house to play his Wii and we were like “???????? Youre allowed to go inside and play the Wii????????????? wtf????”

Edit — for those mentioning the Wii :: this was around 2006

Edit 2 — for those concerned with how we ate, yes we did eat during the day :: My dad sometimes would put fruit or something out on the back deck table, but usually we’d get food from friends parents, we’d find cash lying around and save up enough to get candy from the Dollar Store, there was a farm near the house and we’d eat the chives that grew naturally on the side of the property/steal crab apples (tiny green apples that are super sour) from their trees.

Whistling for each other. My mom didn't like yelling up the stairs. Apparently an easier solution for walking up them and addressing whomever she needed was to stand at the bottom and give a couple of sharp whistles. We would approach the top of the stairs, and from the bottom she'd tell us what she needed.

Time for dinner? Whistle.

I want you to come downstairs? Whistle.

When I whistled for my at the time husband, he got irritated and said he wasn't a dog. I thought about it and I was like... huh. I guess you're right.

I now feel like whistling is disrespectful, and I'd never do it. At the same time, I have no problem that this is how our house went. It was more peaceful than shouting, and less work than walking. Just one of those weird family quirks, I guess!

Upon arriving home in the evenings from somewhere, my parents would have one of us kids wait in the car while the other went inside, got their shotgun, and went through every room in the house and backyard to make sure we were okay to enter. I was unaware that my mom was being followed around by a very dangerous man, and I was checking to make sure he wasn't waiting inside the house. I'm not sure why, but it seemed like a good idea to be safe. I assumed they were looking for bears.

Whenever it was one of our birthdays, my father made us keep a pen and pad next to the phone to list everyone who called and when. He’d then keep a “blacklist” of everyone who didn’t call, or didn’t call in a timely fashion (for example, the closer you were related, the earlier in the day you should call under his rules). I didn’t realise this was messed up until I was an adult and had a lot of therapy.

Not cleaning our bathtubs. In the 18 years I spent living with my parents, I probably cleaned my bathtub 3 times. We just considered it normal for it to be moldy and dirty. At least that's how I saw it, because my parents just never talked about it. When I was a teenager, my mom started giving me tasks to do around the house. I would sweep and mop the floors, I would clean the surfaces, I would clean the toilets and sinks... But the bathtubs were never mentioned. They were just never in my radar as something I needed to clean, and my parents never said otherwise. It was when I moved out and lived with roommates, and eventually romantic partners, that I realized this wasn't normal. Now I gag when I visit my parents and I have to take a shower in those disgusting bathtubs.

Not me but a friend from years ago, their family never said 'I love you' to one another. We were in our late teens/early twenties, they mentioned they'd only heard it a handful of times. My family says it liberally. I remember hugging them before they moved out of state, saying I love you and pull away to see them crying.

Weird, but wholesome: every Christmas eve, Mom would bake a cake and put birthday candles on it.

Christmas day, we'd all sing happy birthday to Jesus, and blow out the candles for him.