30 House Rules People Had As Kids That They Only Later Realized Not All Households Followed
Everyone's childhood is strange in one way or another. After all, what is normal? However, after reading this Reddit discussion, you might start thinking that yours wasn't so unusual.
A post created by user u/ctsom asked people to share a house rule they had as a kid that they thought was completely normal until they grew up and realized that it probably wasn't. And many obliged!
From mandatory milk consumption after dinner to a ban on home-alone showers, here are some of the most memorable answers.
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We had "family council" every Sunday night after dinner. We would sit and say good things that happened that week, share our grievances if we had any (we always did), make a dinner menu, and assign chores.
Frankly, it was stellar parenting. Though, if I mention it to my mother now, she will brag about it for a solid 20 minutes before we can move on.
Probably makes ppl better at social skills (unlike me, the introvert that hates basically the whole human race, generally, spare a few ppl) and also teaches organisation :3
My mum used to pay me to be my own babysitter between the ages of 10-14 or so. The rule was that as long as I didn't make a mess and I'd put myself to bed by the time she got home then I got $10 in the morning.
Any of the kids (7 of us) can play with any toy that is left out. The owner of the toy can't take it back until whoever's playing with it is done. If the toy is put away in the owner's room, permission must be asked.
My parents would check my and my brother’s teeth for “sugar bugs” every night after we brushed our teeth, before we got in bed. If they thought we were trying to skip brushing our teeth they would tell us they could see the sugar bugs in our teeth and would make us go brush again. My brother and I were so convinced these sugar bugs were real we would constantly ask when we’d be able to see them, my parents always told us only people 13 and older could see them, but by the time we got to be 13 we had completely forgotten about the sugar bugs in our teeth.
I love thinking about creative parenting tactics like this, I’ve even used that one while babysitting a fussy kid who doesn’t want to brush their teeth/get ready for bed and it helps a lot.
My parents would do little voices of the sugar bugs being scared of my toothbrush and then screaming as they were brushed away
When I was really young I had a “night night bell”. It was this old clay bell(?) that hung in the kitchen, and when I had to go to bed I got to ring the bell and everyone would come say goodnight and then I would go to bed. Not really a rule, but a weird little ritual in our house.
No curfew as long as I told my mom where I would be. I was always honest bcs I loved being 16 with no curfew.
We had this too! As long as we dropped her a "still alive" message when we went out, all was good! OH and CALL HER if we got stuck somewhere!
Maybe it's not a "house" rule. But when I was six my mom told me that if a behaved she would let me skip school on Saturdays and Sundays.
One day my teacher said "see ya Monday" and I knew
We weren’t allowed to eat anything without first asking. Even a glass of water, we were required to ask first. When my boyfriend and I started dating, I would ask his parents if I could eat or drink something if I was hungry or thirsty and it was a hard habit to break when his mom told me I could literally eat or drink anything (other than the alcohol).
It was so weird to just go into the fridge or pantry without permission. I sometimes have to fight the urge to ask my bf if I can eat OUR food in OUR apartment.
When I went to my parents house over Christmas, I was reprimanded for getting an apple without asking first. It’s just all so weird but it used to be so normal.
If you ever ran out of toilet paper whilst on the toilet, you had to sing the "Stranded" song or else no one else in the house would bring you a roll.
My family had a thing we called the food blanket. When we’d eat casual meals, we’d lay a blanket on the living room floor and eat on it, like a picnic. My parents didn’t want to get any food on the carpet. Instead of “set the table,” my mom would say, “go lay out the blanket.” I remember being really confused when I learned every family didn’t have a food blanket.
Not being allowed to leave the table until your meal was finished. I remember eating at a friends house and looking really uncomforable trying to finish a food I didn't like, only to be told, "You don't have to finish it if you don't want to." Mind blowing.
If I got hurt doing a certain activity I wasn’t allowed to do that activity again.
My mother ended that rule though when I broke my wrist snowboarding when I was 16 and didn’t tell her until a month later when I couldn’t move my wrist at all and it required surgery with a bone graft to repair.
That just sounds like a rule waiting to backfire, kids get hurt doing stuff, that's part of being a kid
I wasn't allowed to take a shower if I was home alone.
I also learned at age 7 that other households closed the bathroom door when using the toilet and keeping it open was weird. I learned that by keeping the door open at a friend's house, a friend walked by the bathroom, saw me, told their mom, their mom called my mom, and all of a sudden the new house rule was we close the bathroom door when using the toilet.
I can understand the shower under a certain age since small children might slip and fall, but over a certain age refusing your child privacy when they're naked or have their pants pulled down should be considered some kind of abuse.
If you don’t get A’s you don’t eat at the table. I legit thought this was normal until I had dinner at a friends’ house and my friend brought home a devastating report card. His parents were so supportive and loving..
When I got in trouble I was put on "reading restriction" as a punishment. I loved to read as a kid (still do!) so it was an effective punishment at the time.
We weren't allowed to watch anything remotely sexual like if people were kissing on screen my mom would freak out and run to cover the TV with a pillow and go "blah blah cough cough" loudly until it was over.
Once I tried to see a pg13 movie with my friends and my mom cried and my dad called me horrible for making her cry. I was 14.
Haiku night dinners.
Some nights we spoke in haiku
And *only* haiku
That sounds tedious. I can't believe you did that. I'm sorry for you.
When I was sick I couldn't be in my bed because it would make it dirty. My mom put a towel in a corner on the hardwood floor and I had to stay there until she deemed me better enough to use my bed.
My father never let us talk around the dinner table. Once when I was 15 I asked everyone around the table how they were doing and how their day was. My dad got up angrily after hurriedly finishing his meal and said: "I can't stand people talking around a meal, if I wanted to talk to you I would."
We finished our meal in silence.
Wow, this is just sad. I remember dinner time being a time of talking to each other (whilst eating too, of couse). My Dad would often be the one to ask: "So, did anyone hear or read something interesting today?" It was not uncommon for a simple little thing to morph into a long discussion. Good times... I miss them.
We weren't allowed to get into the fridge or the cabinets without asking permission. My family was very poor and we had a limited food budget, so eating something without permission very possibly meant eating one ingredient of a meal my step mother was planning on cooking within the next few days.
I went to friends' houses and they just ate whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted.
I grew up with 6 siblings. In the TV room, there we more people than couch seats. We had a rule that you couldn't steal someone's seat if they got up to go the bathroom, get a drink, etc.
My parents instituted it because of all the fights that would happen over seats. We all instantly realized how great a rule it was. No more arguments, but more importantly, your seat was safe for the night.
I never thought it was a "normal" rule as defined by the OP, but it is a great rule that every family should have.
No sliced bread in the house. Like my parents were perfectly normal in every other sense. But I think my mom assumed the uncut bakery bread at the grocery store was better quality or healthier or something? Anyway, I remember going to a friend’s house at like 13 years old and making a sandwich with pre-sliced bread! It was awesome! So much easier! My friend and her family laughed at my revelation but I’m not kidding it was a game-changer. I’d been cutting my own slices for years and they were always slightly uneven and it made making sandwiches or having a piece of bread a bit of a pain. I went home and immediately demanded sliced bread. It took a bit of convincing but eventually my mom caved to my demands. To this day my parents still prefer unsliced bread but whenever I visit my mom will go to the store and buy a sliced loaf just for me.
The bakery will slice the bread for you "fresh" bread machine sliced.
I can see their reasoning. Sliced bread has preservatives and bleach and other stuff to make it last longer. It's not the healthiest option over homemade bread or unsliced that you would buy from the baker and should go bad after 2-3 days if made without preservatives. My mom made bread for years, but eventually got tired of it and bought sliced bread. I definitely noticed that I couldn't eat as much with the change and it doesn't sit as well with me. But everyone does the best they can. I try to buy a fresh loaf that I know I'll eat before it goes bad.
You can freeze part of the loaf. The bread I buy is sliced but it doesn't haven't any preservatives and it molds quick if I don't either freeze or finish it.
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My bf grew up in communist East Poland and he never saw sliced bread til he immigrated to U.S in 2000. He often waxes poetic about how much better the bakery bread was, over there the moms went to market early in the am for the day's food. I've baked fresh bread a few times for him but I think it's flavored with nostalgia, he said our flour must be different 🤷♀️
It's very much the nostalgia talking. Mom's and dad's went to work mostly in the morning, not to markets. And sliced bread was to be found in most larger shops before 2000
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Some people (mostly older generation) thought the slices would dry out and go stale before they got used.
When taking "real" bread (flour+ascorbic acid, water, yeast and salt, optionally oil), this is the case. Americans are notorious for adulteration of their food (Wonder bread, do I need to say more?). A good bread is like the aforementioned "real" bread, unsliced, and cut with a hand crank operated circular bread saw. Keep it in a paper (waxed) bag: it will get stale faster, but will taste better until that time, and MOLD CANNOT GROW ON BREAD ANYMORE! Even when eventually become stale, it'll be perfect for french toast!
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Debating sliced vs. unsliced bread; this is the most controversial BP topic ever 😂 I honestly love it.
I hate the butter tearing the fresh bread, as I like it thinly sliced. My mother used to butter the loaf and then cut a thin slice - much easier.
In almost 100% of cases whole loaf bread is baked in store when it comes to white and whole wheat - thus whole loaf equated to freshly baked.
There is a Candian show called Murdoch Mysteries that takes place late 1800-early 1900s. They walk by a store that advertising sliced beead and a character quips "slice bread? Thats the best thing since...ever" lol
Okay that last sentence redeemed it all, love is having things around not for yourself but for the ones you love even if you don't personally like it
I am genetically incapable of slicing bread, or cheese come to that. I end up with ridiculously unwieldy wedges.
I prefer the fresh baked bread, but I get the shop to slice it for me, otherwise it ends up in about a third of the slices and crumbs everywhere
Bread knives are NEVER sharp enough! So annoying. We never had sliced bread; it just wasn't a thing in the 3rd world country I grew up in - well, not that I was aware of. But it was great cause sometimes you just wanted 1 thick chunk of bread and butte but sometimes you wanted a sandwich.
My mom freaks out about hearing commercials on TV. The second it goes to commercial break it has to be muted. She also mutes it if she thinks it's about to go to commercial, even though sometimes she's wrong. And she doesn't really pay attention, so she doesn't notice a lot of the time when the commercials are over so she leaves it on mute when the show is back on. It's very difficult to watch TV with her.
I can relate to this. These days with IPTV it's always possible to skip or pause when advert breaks come on, and I'm quite a master at hitting the +30sec button the exact number of times for ad breaks on some common channels. I'd even change channels and come back later to what I'm watching if it's in real time broadcast and I can't skip them.
I come from a large family. Any time we'd order pizza, we ordered a few different kinds because, obviously, there were different preferences. Any left overs were left in their respective boxes and placed in the oven.
I did that when I lived with a couple of roommates and of course their reaction was: "I just burned this box. Why was this in the f*****g oven?"
Where else does anyone keep leftover pizza apart from the oven? It'll be eaten for breakfast the next morning anyway!
I had SUPER laid back parents but there were a few certain things that they were randomly crazy strict about.
No gum.
No play doh.
No cereal with sugar as one of the top 3 ingredients.
No Simpsons.
I had basically no rules growing up, but those four things would make them lose their goddamn minds. I still get anxious when I’m chewing gum and I’m 35.
We weren't allowed to watch Simpsons either, after certain incidents...
We weren’t allowed to walk in our dining room unless we were using the room for a special occasion. The carpet always had that “just vacuumed” look so it was a dead giveaway if anyone walked across it.
If you couldn't find something, and you asked someone for help (sibling or parent) and they found it for you, they got to punch you in the arm.
I get very frustrated when husband/children call me because they can’t find something then I walk in the room and instantly see it. But punching? No
My dad made a rule that I had to kill seven flies a day during my summer break.
First thing upon coming in the house you have to change into clean pants and wash your hands. (Guests were exempt from the pants rule but not hand washing). If you took your shoes off while you were out you had to change your socks as well.
No singing at the table, unless it's a birthday.
Still to this day I don't cope well with quiet, but I guess when I was a kid the karaoke party never stopped. It was a good rule, but not necessary for most households
Note: this post originally had 43 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
Some of these are strange but others are flat out abuse. "If you ask for help finding something they get to punch you"? "If you're sick you don't get to use your bed"? Those people should not have been parents.
A 'no' for the actual punch part, but some people can't seem to find anything, that is right under their noses. 'Mom, I can't find my shoe!' Well, if you just turn your head to the left a bit, you would! 'Honey, where are my car keys?' On the table, where you left them. If you'd just moove your wallet, you'd see them! In some cases, wanting to punch someone for stuff like this should be a fair game! )))
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There were far more positive and neutral posts on this one. Usually, they're all negative.
If I wanted to change a rule or do something I needed permission for, I had to write up or type up a professional style business proposal outlining the entire thing. Needs, scope, reasoning, cost, every detail. I'm great at drafting documents of basically any kind. I had to dig to think of a positive one, my parents had some really messed up rules and methods, but that one was actually pretty cool. Anyway, drafted my first proposal at 8. By 21 I'd written municipal policy and code that was adopted by my city.
They never actually taught me how to write that stuff either, I figured it out on my own because I was a huge nerd and if there were words on a page I would read them. I had a secret set of medical encyclopedias and college text books our landlord left in our basement which I took with me when we moved. I remember a friend showing me a dirty magazine stash, and when they came to mine I showed them my...gasp...encyclopedias complete with full color pictures of horrifying medical conditions. And my secret calculus notebook. And my stacks of pretentious college lit class type novels. My parents never knew, but my friend was pretty sure I hadn't understood the assignment. In my mind their porn stash was awesome because it contained hidden knowledge, so it was basically the same.
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We have a rule that is someone asks you to borrow something, YOU HAVE TO SAY YES, no matter what (some exceptions like if you are using it or if it's something like a tablet)
To my kids frustration this one was therapy approved. My two youngest sons were always getting into c**p. No matter what. One is on the tism scale and the other was blind in one eye and deaf in one ear. They always used excuses to cause c**p, break stuff, start fights in school with other kids. My youngest was an infant when these two yokles started acting up. I figured out a way to tie them together figuratively. Our family therapist died laughing about it she liked the idea so much. When one of the two causes c**p the other was grounded. No dates, no sports, no mall, no time with the g.f. They had to police each other. I didn't have to struggle with trying to straighten it out. They knew the other brother was gonna be peeved when c**p hit the fan. The first few times they got into trouble they didn't take it seriously until they weren't allowed to go to important events since their brother got em grounded. After that they started corrective assertive dialogue, the therapist ....
Label for it. They worked out their issues and learned to communicate instead of pounding on each other or others. On top of that they shared a food budget of 20 each a week. Their shared food. It got serious they gave each other temporary food shortage. That happened once. I never saw two kids straighten out faster. And again the therapist knew about the food budget... That was her idea. We were spending 600 a week for my now ex husband and three sons in food. The baby and I were doing 150 a month. My ex is a giant as are my kids. They over ate to make sure they got enough while denying everyone else food. The two youngest boys were the biggest culprits. It became easier when the eldest boy and the ex husband saw the really generic food I picked out for them to all share. They went into normal mode quickly. The younger boys tried eating the food I had to use for myself and the baby. My youngest was born with a rare stomach condition and was just starting baby food while only nursing ..
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Some of these are strange but others are flat out abuse. "If you ask for help finding something they get to punch you"? "If you're sick you don't get to use your bed"? Those people should not have been parents.
A 'no' for the actual punch part, but some people can't seem to find anything, that is right under their noses. 'Mom, I can't find my shoe!' Well, if you just turn your head to the left a bit, you would! 'Honey, where are my car keys?' On the table, where you left them. If you'd just moove your wallet, you'd see them! In some cases, wanting to punch someone for stuff like this should be a fair game! )))
Load More Replies... There were far more positive and neutral posts on this one. Usually, they're all negative.
If I wanted to change a rule or do something I needed permission for, I had to write up or type up a professional style business proposal outlining the entire thing. Needs, scope, reasoning, cost, every detail. I'm great at drafting documents of basically any kind. I had to dig to think of a positive one, my parents had some really messed up rules and methods, but that one was actually pretty cool. Anyway, drafted my first proposal at 8. By 21 I'd written municipal policy and code that was adopted by my city.
They never actually taught me how to write that stuff either, I figured it out on my own because I was a huge nerd and if there were words on a page I would read them. I had a secret set of medical encyclopedias and college text books our landlord left in our basement which I took with me when we moved. I remember a friend showing me a dirty magazine stash, and when they came to mine I showed them my...gasp...encyclopedias complete with full color pictures of horrifying medical conditions. And my secret calculus notebook. And my stacks of pretentious college lit class type novels. My parents never knew, but my friend was pretty sure I hadn't understood the assignment. In my mind their porn stash was awesome because it contained hidden knowledge, so it was basically the same.
Load More Replies... We have a rule that is someone asks you to borrow something, YOU HAVE TO SAY YES, no matter what (some exceptions like if you are using it or if it's something like a tablet)
To my kids frustration this one was therapy approved. My two youngest sons were always getting into c**p. No matter what. One is on the tism scale and the other was blind in one eye and deaf in one ear. They always used excuses to cause c**p, break stuff, start fights in school with other kids. My youngest was an infant when these two yokles started acting up. I figured out a way to tie them together figuratively. Our family therapist died laughing about it she liked the idea so much. When one of the two causes c**p the other was grounded. No dates, no sports, no mall, no time with the g.f. They had to police each other. I didn't have to struggle with trying to straighten it out. They knew the other brother was gonna be peeved when c**p hit the fan. The first few times they got into trouble they didn't take it seriously until they weren't allowed to go to important events since their brother got em grounded. After that they started corrective assertive dialogue, the therapist ....
Label for it. They worked out their issues and learned to communicate instead of pounding on each other or others. On top of that they shared a food budget of 20 each a week. Their shared food. It got serious they gave each other temporary food shortage. That happened once. I never saw two kids straighten out faster. And again the therapist knew about the food budget... That was her idea. We were spending 600 a week for my now ex husband and three sons in food. The baby and I were doing 150 a month. My ex is a giant as are my kids. They over ate to make sure they got enough while denying everyone else food. The two youngest boys were the biggest culprits. It became easier when the eldest boy and the ex husband saw the really generic food I picked out for them to all share. They went into normal mode quickly. The younger boys tried eating the food I had to use for myself and the baby. My youngest was born with a rare stomach condition and was just starting baby food while only nursing ..
Load More Replies... 