Lost Childhood

[Riiya goes paranoid.]

childhood for most people sucked. there were good aspects but think about it: being a child is close to being a slave. you have no choice in anything you do, you basically belong to someone else who dictates everything you do, where you go, how you behave, you have no freedom, no privacy, your parents can make you miserable if they so desire. most normal american children wake up, go to school, come home, do homework, and that's it (why so many of us are socially inept). i guess the only difference would be parenting, like, if the parents let the kids roam free and live life on their own terms. in modern society most parents don't because of things on tv like america's most wanted or 48 hours which inflict fear in parents. most kids have very little freedom.

instead of feeling bad about childhood embrace the things in adulthood that make you happy. for me these things include: driving, staying out until as late as i want, dressing how i want, moving to anyplace on the globe i want, buying which groceries i like, having whatever pets i want, doing things on my terms. things like that. embrace the freedom that adulthood gives you. maybe these things seem trivial and mundane but i guess from being controlled so much as a kid i find these little things to be especially valuable to me.

oh yeah, and i'm not sure what you feel like you missed out on exactly. partying? being a hooligan? i wasn't interested in those things when i was younger and i still am not. i find my own way to have fun. enjoy life YOUR way.

Even though I've always been a social phobic, I actually had a great childhood and plenty of friends. High school did suck though...

Riiya said:

I can't help feeling if we met maybe five years ago (assuming SA wasn't in the way) we'd get along and possibly be good friends. But now she already has a child and we both have our responsibilities, and the whole time I was talking to her all I could think of was "It's too late." Even if I see her again, the best we could ever be is casual acquaintances.

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I can't accept the idea that adults can never form more than casual acquaintances. Maybe it's harder when they have less time (though personally I have a whole lot more time on my hands as an adult than I did as a kid), but adults are just people and it should be possible to connect with them (even if I have no clue how).

And by that, what I really meant was you only get to be under twenty-one once. I don't have the excuse to do the things I could've done when I was (relatively) young. My brain is no longer "in progress" and I'm supposed to know better now.

Plenty of older people do incredibly foolish things that make you think they don't have developed brains, if that's what you want.

I sometimes regret not having grown up with any friends and never having fun playing with other kids (when I played with the neighbors it was only under strict orders against my will and just scary). I never regret not having the stereotypical teenage life of shallowness, drugs/booze, competing to be "cool" by trying to act even stupider than everyone else, and annoying other people. So, there are pluses and minuses.

dottie said:

being a child is close to being a slave

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True, I remember spending most of my childhood looking forward to becoming an adult so I could actually do stuff. There's no way I'd ever want to be a kid again.

i guess the only difference would be parenting, like, if the parents let the kids roam free and live life on their own terms.

If parents let kids roam and live on their own terms, we'd all have been run over by cars. Kids aren't competent to make good decisions. Some parents are overly-controlling for sure, but even with absolutely perfect parents it's frustratingly limiting to be a kid.

i can relate

when i was a teenager all i wanted to do was grow up. im actually happier now at times. i mean, i get incredibly lonely and depressed but i feel like i have hte freedom to pursue some kind of better life, whereas while i was in school i was very restricted

i wish my childhood was more enjoyable. i feel like i would be better socially developed if it was.

but i also like the person i am now. i mean, i hate my disorder, but i like my personality. i know im a good person and i guess im just confused about why nobody seems to notice that enough to be friends with me

but i wouldnt go back and change anything because it would change who i was today....in reasons other than just SA

[Riiya goes paranoid.]

Riiya said:

I lack the money to have that kind of freedom.

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You may lack the time, but there's plenty of freedom for the relatively-poor. There's the freedom to spend all day online without being told you're wasting your life, to visit the local (free) attraction of your choice, to go for a walk wherever and whenever you want, to listen to or watch whatever you want whenever, et cetera. If you had all that as a kid, well, lucky you.

Yes, but adults don't do the same kind of "fun" that kids do. Once you're out of college it's no longer appropriate to lie around and play video games all day long.

Lots of older people like to lie around playing video games. I'm not even a gamer-type, but sometimes I break out the DOS emulator and play Commander Keen or Doom or the like exactly the same as I did when I was 12. Nobody ever has any right to tell you that you're too old.

My dad suddenly decided he was too old for games in his mid-40s, but in his early 40s he'd rack up impressive Pac-Man scores on the atari.

Or to talk about Nirvana and make pop culture references that make you sound like pseudointellectuals.

Kids do that? :?

Kid 1: "Hey, do you think we'll ever achieve nirvana, or will we be stuck in the cycle of rebirth forever? The last episode of The Simpsons made me think there's no escape."
Kid 2: "In her most famous thesis, Britney Spears proposed that the eightfold path can be bypassed by listening to sufficiently bad music that you'll refuse to reincarnate for fear of hearing more."
Kid 1: "But Jerry Seinfeld countered that such music is a form of suffering that can only tie you more deeply to samsara in the long run."

I don't want to be lying on my deathbed and think back to the time I, you know, was studying for the SAT on a Friday night.

Relax, you'll have severe dementia and won't remember a thing. Or they'll have invented false memory implants by then.

Become a presentist... the past doesn't exist.

Talk about having an empty life.

Sounds pretty full the way you describe it... it just sounds empty to you because it's yours so you know it so well it bores you and the other side is always greener. Maybe not full of people, but so it goes.

'Course I can't claim to not feel exactly the same way much of the time. I'm just arguing with you because I like to argue and the other side deserves its due.

Hoth said:

Lots of older people like to lie around playing video games. I'm not even a gamer-type, but sometimes I break out the DOS emulator and play Commander Keen or Doom or the like exactly the same as I did when I was 12. Nobody ever has any right to tell you that you're too old.

My dad suddenly decided he was too old for games in his mid-40s, but in his early 40s he'd rack up impressive Pac-Man scores on the atari.

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lol i know, some of these things riyya described kids doing are the kind of things i still do! maybe you just need to look for less pretensious friends who would be willing to do these things with you. maybe look for "child free" people as friends. usually people who have kids (yeah im generalizing) get shackled to the kid so they are less fun/boring. that doesn't mean you have to be like that. you don't have to be boring or conformist because you hit a certain age. and you don't have to turn into michael jackson, either.

it's true though, good friends are hard to find.

Yeah, childhood had some good memories, but pretty much it sucked. I spent it waiting for the day when I could be an adult and do what I want. Sure, I do more bill-paying, and I work, but at least when I come home at the end of the day, the rest of the time is MINE to spend how I choose. Well, unless I would choose to spend it on a date or somthing in which case I'm SOL. I mean, I have more responsibility, but I don't have to fend off the constant berating I get if I don't do my chores perfectly, or if I do it in the "wrong" order, or I don't get proper permission first. As an adult:

-I can clean my room without first having to submit to mother a "list" of things I want to throw out. If I come across something I don't think I need, boom it's gone.

-I can put a poster up on a wall without being accused of "destroying the house" because of the permanent marks the scotch tape would leave on the fake paneling.

-I never use my dishwasher, but if I did, I wouldn't have to be reminded what a worthless pile of crap I am because I loaded it the wrong way. Even if I <gasp> LEAVE PLASTIC IN THE BOTTOM RACK AND IT MELTS I don't have to feel like our family went broke because I wasted water. Maybe I'm too "sensitive", but to this day I literally get nervous being in the SAME ROOM where a dishwasher is being loaded. Is that crazy?

-If my father calls my apartment, I don't have to be interrogated about why is that man calling here, and there you go defending wonderful father, if you love him so much why don't you go move in with him.

Wow, reading this list, no wonder I'd rather live alone. Also, no wonder I think I can't run a household and I wouldn't make a good partner.

Some people complain about posters on this board "whining" or "ranting", how it doesn't help anyone, but as I'm writing this down, this is really hitting home in a way I hadn't expected. Hmmm. I don't know what to think about that yet.

dottie said:

instead of feeling bad about childhood embrace the things in adulthood that make you happy. for me these things include: driving, staying out until as late as i want, dressing how i want, moving to anyplace on the globe i want, buying which groceries i like, having whatever pets i want, doing things on my terms. things like that. embrace the freedom that adulthood gives you. maybe these things seem trivial and mundane but i guess from being controlled so much as a kid i find these little things to be especially valuable to me.

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You forgot buying any kind of beer you want, lol. Or maybe you don't drink, in which case, good, more for me.

dave, it sounds all so familliar. our moms should be bff's!