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44 Parents’ Rules People Didn’t Realize Were Unhinged Until They Grew Up
Interview With Expert
Our parents are a product of how they were raised. That means there’s a good chance that they may pass on the teachings and principles they got from their folks, for better or worse.
For some people, it’s unfortunately the latter. In a recent Reddit thread, they shared the weirdest, most absurd rules their parents ever imposed. Responses ranged from TV shows they couldn’t watch to questionable rituals that made absolutely no sense. The worst part is that they never realized the ridiculousness until they grew older.
Scroll through the list and see if you have any similar experiences.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
I (female) was no allowed to cut my hair. Like at all. This was my father’s rule. When I was about 13 I told my grandma I had the money and asked if she would take me to great clips. She did. Imagine my dad’s surprise when I walked in with a very short pixie cut! He didn’t speak to me for over a month. 🙃 Now I have 2 beautiful little girls myself. My 7 year old is obsessed with KPop demon hunters and asked if she could dye her hair purple… guess who is rocking purple hair!? My beautiful girl!
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#2
If you go to the kitchen to cook something for yourself, you have to offer to cook for everyone in the family too. Can't be simple food either, has to be a balanced meal.
I would fast until someone else caved and cooked.
This made me grow up HATING cooking so much. Still makes me irrationally angry.
#3
Once a month I had to pee in a bag, my mom claimed it was so she could test it to make sure I was healthy, but I learned later in life she was a long time d**g user and used it to pass d**g tests.
We had the opportunity to speak with several experts who shared valuable insights about these unusual parenting practices. Counselor and psychotherapist Hanna Lewis from Compare My Health Insurance says parents implement unusual or rigid rules to either manage uncertainty, exert control, or protect their kids from perceived harm.
As Lewis tells Bored Panda, these rules may reflect their anxiety about safety or their need for structure that feels reassuring.
#4
My parents told me to not put their contact info in my phone under “mom” or “dad.” It had to be their first names so it wouldn’t be obvious who to contact if I was ever taken. I didn’t question it until I told a friend in my teens and their response was, “Wait so your parents don’t WANT to be contacted easily if you’re kidnapped?!”.
#5
Growing up, my mom (and sometimes my grandma) used to tell me not to gesticulate so much and pointed out how wrinkled my other grandma was. I was a total Jim Carrey-style clown, always making faces and exaggerating expressions. They’d warn me that if I kept it up, I’d get really wrinkled when I got old.
I was honestly tired of hearing it but never had a clever comeback, until one day, after a tea-time visit at my friend’s place. Her mom made the same comment, and I just said: “At least when I’m old, I’ll be able to say I was happy and enjoyed life”. I mentioned this to my mom and she said that was clever.
My friend passed away at 35 from osteosarcoma. In our last call, she told me: “Get those wrinkles for me.”
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
I love this. This has always been my attitude when it comes to aging. Not everyone is lucky enough to grow old, I'd rather enjoy my time here without worrying about silly things like how I look. Wrinkles are beautiful they tell the story of your life!
#6
In my teen years, I had to wear clothes many sizes larger than what I actually was to hide my figure. Like, pants were size 8-12 and shirts size large.
When I moved away from home and gained independence, I realized I was a size 4 in pants and a size small in tops, and it wasn’t “s**tty” or “revealing” to wear clothes that fit properly.
Licensed marriage and family therapist Lea Trageser concurs that questionable rules may be a product of fear on the part of parents. But as she points out, these actions aren’t done for no reason.
“The rules are maladaptive attempts at fixing a problem that the parents witness or fear,” she explained.
#7
No pooping in the house.
Not mine, but a classmate’s dad had this rule and he was SERIOUS about it. So any sleepovers there was a zero tolerance rule about s******g in his house. We had to hold it or go on a group exodus to the nearest store to poop together.
What’s strange is this was in the Bay Area where everyone was on city sewer and septic wasn’t a thing. Also his house was massive (6 beds, 5 baths) so it wasn’t an issue of availability.
To this day I have no idea why he didn’t want kids s******g in his house.
#8
My sister and I had cats growing up. Our cats were absolutely not allowed in our rooms.
UNLESS...we asked and were given permission. getting to sleep with our doors open so the kitties could come in and jump up with us was treated like a rare treat, like a special occasion.
Now at 31, i still get a little feeling of "ooooo!" when I'm at someone's house and they just...have their bedroom open and their pet's chilling on their bed.
#9
We weren’t allowed to watch anything that involved witchcraft or magic. We’d watch the Little Mermaid, and my mom would fast forward through the part where Ariel sells her soul and gives up her voice. Lion King? The scene where Rafiki summons Mufasa’s spirit. Snow White? When the crone makes the poisoned apple. I couldn’t watch or read Harry Potter until I was well into my teens and that was only after a serious conversation with my parents explaining how none of it was real and to read it with a “discerning eye” to avoid…tarnishing my soul? I don’t know. Anyways, I’m super into fantasy books and tv shows now so it kind of had the opposite effect intended.
Laserleader 2 months ago (edited)
My parents were like this. We weren't allowed to watch most cartoons, because Smurfs and My Little Pony had magic, but live action Batman, or Mr.Rogers was okay (my dad did puppetry so they weren't afraid of the magic kingdom, but Muppets was off limits)
The thing is, these unusual rules carry potential repercussions, particularly on the child’s psyche. Trageser says that if a child grows up in an environment where they aren’t allowed to ask “why,” they may struggle to stand up for themselves.
Meanwhile, Lewis says irrational rules may suppress a child’s curiosity, autonomy, and trust. And when they grow up, they may carry guilt, anxiety, and resentment as adults.
#10
Okay, so growing up, my parents had this super strict rule that we couldn’t wear socks in the house after 6 PM. Like... what?? 😂 They said it was because your feet need to breathe in the evening. I didn’t question it. Just barefoot all night like it was some kind of family ritual. I remember once I had friends over and one of them got scolded for having socks on at 7:30. I was like, Oh nooo, you broke the sacred foot law. 😅
Sara Frazer 2 months ago
Kinda strange, but also I love being barefoot, as soon as I'm home from work those socks are coming off. Stepping on the soft lawn barefoot? 15/10 experience
#11
We weren’t allowed to have any lights on after 9 pm. like, no lamps, no tv, nothing. thought it was normal until I realized most people just… live in their houses at night.
Panda Cat 2 months ago
How about lighted clocks? When I was in high school I had a clock-radio with a light that was bright enough for reading and writing. I’ve always had sleep issues but turning that light up high kept me entertained while not being able to sleep. Now I know the health risks to excessive nighttime lighting and prefer to sleep in complete darkness.
#12
I wasn’t allowed to eat until my parents said I could and only what they allowed. I would go to sleep so hungry most days. When I couldn’t take it anymore I would go to the kitchen in the middle of the night and eat anything I could that they wouldn’t notice. Spoonful of peanut butter, regular butter, a slice of bread, a couple saltine crackers, etc.
There is also a possibility that these rules will become obsolete as the child grows up. According to parenting author Tim McCarthy, some children may eventually become more ready to comprehend their parents’ explanations. However, parents must also do their part.
“When the child is older, change the rule or at least explain why you made the rule, so they understand,” McCarthy said.
#13
We had to stand in the doorway of our bedrooms waiting for ‘inspection’ before we were allowed out of our rooms on Saturdays. Even if you had to go to the bathroom right across the hall, you had to stand (with your legs crossed) until mom thought your room was clean and tidy enough. I hated when my one brother got inspected first as he always had something to pick up and put away and it would take forever. You couldn’t just push things under the bed or closet as these would be inspected too. It made me compulsively neat and organized but it took me a long time to stop having to do it all before Saturday.
Jan Rosier 2 months ago (edited)
That is actual t0ture, if you make a kid wait to go to the bathroom. Powertripping bltch of a mother.
#14
Under no circumstance could i lay down after eating. supposedly my great grandpa died from choking on a peach pit. which like dude why are you eating the pit and how is that even connected????
Geoffrey Scott 2 months ago
Now that I am in the later years of my life, I MUST eat no later than 5 o'clock or so, or if I do, to walk or do some other activity to help with digestion. Aspirating stomach contents at night is a REAL drag.
#15
Well, I wasn't allowed to walk down the street to the convenience store - with a friend who happened to be a boy - after school because it made people think I was a "Street Walker" aka s*x worker. I was also s**t shamed at 3 for normal exploratory behavior with a friend, along with a lot of other stuff over the years. I'm almost 48 and still have personal issues regarding modesty and sexuality because of it, despite therapy. My mother is dead, and I'm not sad about it.
Panda Cat 2 months ago
At the end of my second year of summer school I told my parents to pick me up a week or so after classes ended so I could go with my boyfriend to visit his parents. My àsshōle father shows up right after I finish my final and insisted I leave because he said I wasn’t allowed to go “shack up with” my boyfriend. Um, visiting his very Catholic parents was not at all like shacking up with him. My father demanded my other relatives join him in shunning me. I really hated that man. My father. Not my boyfriend.
It would be a natural knee-jerk response to deem such actions as irresponsible parenting. But at the end of the day, it all comes down to them trying to do their best.
McCarthy put it succinctly: “Parents don't have to be perfect; they just have to be loving and do the best they can.”
#16
We had to take our shoes off before getting into our dad’s car. He’d even brush our shoes and feet off of any dirt that might’ve been accumulated. He didn’t want to get the inside of his car dirty. We couldn’t put our shoes back on until we were out of the car.
One night he was driving home and saw this man in a wheelchair pushing himself backwards along the side of the road. It was raining so dad decided to offer him a ride (this was the late 80’s early 90’s). He helped the man into the car, got him situated and drove him to his destination. Dad noticed his passenger seat was pretty wet.. much wetter than it should have been considering it wasn’t raining that **hard**. Turns out the man had peed his pants and it soaked into the seat.
That rule went out the window that night lmao.
Roshan Kassan 2 months ago
My exs dad used to get people to remove their shoes as well, before getting into his cars. he also used to spend HOURS every Saturday washing and cleaning his cars, so they would look good for church.
#17
I was forced to throw away a book about evolution and another one about mythological creatures because they "went against God".
I have searched for both as an adult so I could own them in spite.
#18
No Harry Potter books on the property because it "invited evil spirits on the ground"... I'm surprised I made it through childhood alive with that mother, you wouldn't believe how many demons are out there guys!!
Laserleader 2 months ago
According to my mom, everyone has demons swirling around them all the time. She also believes EM waves are making her hair fall out, so yeah.
Speaking of parents taking action, Trageser encourages parents to reflect on generational patterns. She emphasized the importance of, at the very least, trying to break the cycle, especially if they were also raised in an environment where absurd rules were in place.
“Without the guidance of a professional or intentional self-reflection, that is when the attempts can become harmful and maladaptive,” Trageser said.
#19
I met a girl who said she wasn’t allowed to watch/read Harry Potter when she was little. I’m like, “Oh, is your family religious?” She says, “No. My dad just didn’t think it was realistic.” So then I’m like, “Ohhh are your parents really strict but intellectual? Like ‘science is the only thing we believe in here!’?” And she responds, “Well no. My parents weren’t big on science-y things like going to the doctor and or vaccines.”
So no Harry Potter but not for religious reasons. They don’t believe in God or science…so..what?
#20
My mom (rest in heaven, Mom) forbade us from sleeping with our hair wet... Bc we'd wake up blind.
My friend's mom wouldn't let him keep his pet turtle bc, according to her, turtles made you dumb.
#21
My mom laughs about a girl she knew growing up who had a strict 10 pm curfew because “you’ll get pregnant if you stay out too late.” All through school this was the rule and her parents were adamant about it.
Fast forward a few years, mom’s like 21/22 and she runs into another old friend. They start talking and, guess what friend heard? Curfew girl is pregnant!
Mom’s response? “Huh, guess she stayed out after 10 o’clock.”
If you were a child who grew up following rules that didn’t make sense to you, Lewis advises looking back from a perspective of empathy. As she stated, many parents act out of love, but also due to limited resources or outdated beliefs shaped by their upbringing and generation.
And while it does not erase the impact, Lewis says trying to understand where parents are coming from and why they did what they did helps explain their behavior.
#22
My parents had this rule where you couldn't eat cereal after 6pm because your body doesn't digest grains properly at night. I didn't question it just quietly accepted that Weet-Bix was a morning only thing. Years later I realised it was complete nonsense and probably just a tactic to keep us from raiding the pantry before bed.
Now I eat cereal at 11pm out of spite.
Foxglove🇮🇪 2 months ago
As kids we always had cereal at bedtime. My brother had a huge bowl of cornflakes with a full pint of milk poured on top. Every night!
#23
Couldn’t wear watches because ‘time is a social construct’. Yes, we were late to everything.
OneWithRatsAndKefir 2 months ago
Clothes are partially a social construct, no? Yes, we wear them for warmth as well, but many people are also concerned about modesty.
#24
When I was in high school, my dad would take my car keys if my grades slipped (in his definition, anything under a B+). Which in and of itself wasn't too crazy...except that if I wanted them back before the next report cards came out, I could "earn" them back by *donating blood.*
I was never able to get him to explain the reasoning behind it. It was just like this weird blood sacrifice ritual to summon car keys back from the shadowlands or something.
#25
I wasn’t allowed to wear black two days in a row because I might be perceived as “gothic.”
#26
Not falling asleep on the couch of a bar in the middle of the night because that would reflect bad on my mother. Why would she be still in the bar if her children were so tired?
As if, being at the bar accompanied by two children in the middle of the night, on a school day, wasn't that bad.
On top of that, don't fall asleep at home when she was drunk and needed to tell her story, and help by picking her up from the floor. That's just plain rude.
On top of that, don't interrupt her sleeping all afternoon, or, on "better days" don't complain you're tired when she wants to go swimming/tanning and to the poolbar at 11 a.m. Why would you complain about doing something fun? Other children love to go to the pool! Ungrateful.
Also, don't expect you can bring your nintendo DS and sit covered up in a towel watching the screen (sun made it hard to see) because you're supposed to get a tan in summer, such a sabotage.
Don't complain when she wants to the regular bar after the pool closes at 7 p.m, because, you had your fun at the pool and now she deserves her fun at the bar. We could play our nintendo ds there tho, it kept us quiet.
Repeat.
#27
As an adult living in my parents’ house, I had to get permission from my mom to download an app on my phone…like for real she had parental controls on my phone that wouldn’t allow me to download any app without her code.
That is one of very many weird, controlling things she did into my adulthood. Then she cried and wondered why I wanted to move out and live by myself….
#28
You were only allowed to take two slices of cucumber from the communal salad bowl at dinner, no more. There was no cucumber scarcity or anything like that. Just that my mother insisted on making sure everyone had an exactly equal share. Just cucumber though, nothing else.
#29
We kids weren't allowed to laugh, because "if someone's laughing, someone's about to get hurt" like ????
#30
We weren’t allowed to read The Berenstain Bears because the dad bear was portrayed as a doofus and it wasn’t acceptable to have parental figures portrayed negatively.
Laserleader 2 months ago
I never thought the dad was a doufus, he just wanted his kids to learn to be independent, and let them learn their own lessons.
#31
It’s not a rule, but it was a daily occurrence that I later realized was insane:
My dad used to buy us each at least one 2-liter bottle of Coca Cola **every day**, since I was about 13. We’d just stroll around drinking it all day. Bring it to the dinner table. Have it while doing homework, whatever. This went on until I was probably 20. It means I probably drank well over 2,500 2-liter bottles of Coke in my life.
It’s like we were trying to hydrate, but with dibeetus juice.
No, there weren’t any concerns for our health for some reason. Yes, we are both diabetic (he passed long ago). Yes, I do wish that was never normalized in my home.
In the last decade, I’ve probably drank less that 10 liters of Coke.
Laserleader 2 months ago
Yeah. One day when I was 18 my dad mentioned he was starting to go type 2 diabetic, and I realized I couldn't remember the last time I drank water. He would buy cases of soda every week and we thought fruit juice was healthy because it came from "fruit". Juice and soda were the first drinks I gave up, then coffee and tea, and now I only can have water.
#32
Nobody was allowed to go to the toilet at night, we all had buckets (with lids) in our bedroom...
#33
I wasn't allowed to shower before my stepdad in the morning, even if it made me late to school, and my shower was only allowed to be 5 minutes or he would turn the light off and lock the door from the outside knowing I had a massive fear of the dark.
He also worked from home and not on a set schedule, and we had a decent hot water tank, but he would purposefully crank the heat up and let it run before he had a shower just so there wasn't any hot water left.
#34
No flushing at night (unless it was poop) because I couldn’t wake dad.
Had to go up the stairs on my tippy toes because I couldn’t wake dad. Still go up stairs weirdly quiet to this day.
If dad was napping during the day, had to have the TV on low. If it got loud/woke him up, I would hear about it/be guilted.
Friends couldn’t ring the doorbell in case my dad was taking a nap.
Dogs couldn’t go outside when he was asleep because they might bark.
It wasn’t until I had a bad migraine in college and my roommates kept on living though I was trying to nap that I realized it wasn’t normal.
Kira Okah 2 months ago
Swap dad for stepmother, and same. Effectively couldn't use the bathroom at night - opening the bathroom door would wake her up apparently, so would closing it, opening and closing the toilet lid was also too much, so was the sound of use. Apparently there was no reason that anyone would need to use it because they shouldn't be up at night to need it, except for her waking up needing to pee, that was allowed.
#35
I wasn’t allowed to paint my toenails black because….Satan. Yup. They were dark blue for years because it was as close as I could get to black.
#36
As a child, I wasn’t allowed to wear black. It was considered a “grownup” color.
I also could only wear white or beige underwear. No other colors bc they were “fast.”
Now my entire wardrobe is black and I have a huge collection of lace and trapdoor panties….
Janissary35680 2 months ago
Brain to hands: "Must not Google "trapdoor panties"... Must not Google "trapdoor panties"... Must NOT..."
#37
There were certain rooms we could not walk in because it messed up the vacuum lime pattern.
Sally Moen 2 months ago
There is this wonderful thing called a carpet rake that cleans up those unsightly footprints
#38
We were never allowed to wash our hair directly with the shower head, it had to go into a bucket first and then we had to pour it on our head. My mom was convinced it would prevent hair-loss in the future and sadly it didn’t work.
#39
I had a mate (UK - 1980s) who wasn’t allowed to come back to his house for any reason during the day, even to go to the toilet. If he did he’d be forced to stay inside for the entire day.
So if we were hanging out and he needed the toilet, he’d have to go in some bushes and wipe his a**e on a Dock leaf. Ffs!
SkippityBoppityBoo 2 months ago
My first thought was? One of his parents was maybe having am affair?
#40
We had 20 mins to eat a meal and couldn't talk during dinner.
#41
Forcing me (36f) to bathe with my friends until I was ten and straight refused.(Mostly but not exclusively female)Started a whole argument. Next time she tried to make me shower with the neighbor I fought and fought. She gave up. Im in the u.s. it was like 1998 and we didn't have any real reason why that was necessary.
#42
I lived with a parental dress code in high school. White socks, black shoes, pants an inch too short (making the white socks more obvious), button down collared s***s, and crew cut - made me look more like a geek than the horn rim glasses did ‘66-70.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
Took me a while to figure out what the censored word was. I think it's $hirts but I can't think why they'd censor that?
#43
My Mom's had a rule that my sister and I couldn't fly on the same plane together. We always had to fly offset where my dad would fly with me and her with my sister etc. One of the biggest arguments we had was when we were in our early twenty's and went on a trip together - on the same plane obviously.
No rules about riding in the same car or anything like that even though that's way more dangerous.
#44
No pierced ears before 16. Because at 16, I was grown enough to decide if I wanted pierced ears or not.
We could not say “holy cow” because cows aren’t holy (obviously not from Hindu background). So we said “perforated cow” as in a cow full of holes.
Littlemiss 2 months ago (edited)
I was called a G*ypsy and doomed for life because I got a 2nd set of earrings in both ears. My father tried convincing me I was a fallen woman (I was 12) because of it. But it was fine when my mother did it.
#45
We weren't allowed to scrape the butter knife of peanut butter, butter, mayo, jelly, things of this nature back into its container. They called it 'the devil's share' and you had to just waste whatever was left on the knife because if you didn't, the devil would be mad at you.
My family was f*****g weird about it and I never once saw the devil lick it clean, so I'm not sure why he'd make a fuss about it.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
I get this one, i hate when food is contaminated with other foods. I've always been a picky eater, growing up with 7 siblings my parents were always struggling financially so food waste was a big no-no. I couldn't eat any foods that were contaminated with something I didn't like, eg I hate peanut butter but I like jam, so I'd go to put jam on my toast and open the jar to see a load of peanut butter in there, I'd instantly feel sick and wouldn't be able to eat anything at all. I was dangerously underweight already due to early childhood a***e/neglect so things like this were a huge deal for me and still are huge triggers. (Coffee in the sugar jar is my biggest pet peeve right now, so many people do this one and I hate coffee so this drives me crazy, i don't want my tea to taste like coffee. Put the sugar in first or use a different spoon!)
#46
I wasn’t allowed to say I was bored. This always struck me as normal because my dad just didn’t want me to be ungrateful and he wanted me to recognize my privilege. But speaking with my old roommates about it, they pointed out that it’s kinda weird and not-good to not be allowed to express normal, age-appropriate human emotions.
The Starsong Princess 2 months ago
If I told my mother I was bored, she said I knew where the vacuum was. Since I didn’t care much for vacuuming, I learned to amuse myself.
#47
Not being allowed to asky "why" about f*****g anything because asking why is what leads to arguments 🙄.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
That seems insane to me! Kids are inquisitive by nature, not being allowed to question things can be bad for their development and hold them back intellectually. All kids go through that annoying phase where they ask constant questions and ask why about a million times a day,. While incredibly irritating for adults around them it's a perfectly normal and necessary part of childhood development.
#48
My car had a curfew but I didn't.
I could stay out all night doing whatever, but god forbid that $500 Celica was out past midnight!
#49
Not only were we not allowed to swear, we were not allowed to use substitutions for swears, since the intent was the same. so golly, gosh, gee, shoot, darn, b-word, f***k, etc were all punishable by a spoonful of cayenne.
#50
“No one talks about what goes on inside the house outside the house.”
As you can probably guess, there were Reasons.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
Yeah, grew up hearing this and "What happens between family stays between family"
#51
Hard hat and steel-toed boots to mow the lawn. My grandfather’s rule, though mostly enforced for himself. He was a civil engineer and this was the rule on job-sites, so i like to think it is just what made him comfortable. And it’s not like steel-toes are a _bad_ idea with a lawn mower. The hard hat was a little excessive for a corded electric lawn mower in the 70s/80s but ¯ _(ツ)_/¯.
Mousey 2 months ago
My Mum hardly ever wore shoes but wore gumboots mowing. The blade of the mower came off one time and cut her big toe in half. She was also 6 months pregnant with my sister. So a new rule was implemented after that had to wear steal capped boots mowing the lawn. I still till this day remember mums toe and cringe when I see people mowing the lawn without appropriate footwear
#52
No elbows on the table. But it was how it got enforced that was more insane than the actual rule. Elbows on the table got poked with a fork.
Sally Moen 2 months ago
No elbows on the table, as if we all grew up eating in a fine-dining restaurant with extra place settings and fine china
#53
We had to write out permission slips to put on the kitchen counter with details on what we would be doing if we wanted to go to a friends house. Had to have details of who would pick us up, how we would get home. Both parents had to sign it. Our parents had really conflicting work schedules and would barely see us sometimes or each other. So while it seem like such a weird thing, looking back it seemed pretty clever.
#54
Growing up Fart was a bad word, we were only allowed to use the word Fluff. We would hear someone say the Fart word around when my brother and I were little and we’d look at each other and giggle because they used a bad word.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago (edited)
I had an aunt growing up who hated any type of body noises, farting, burping, hiccups, even things like belly rumbling all resulted in her screaming at us and calling us disgusting. Anyone who entered her house was supposed to just automatically know not to do anything like that around her. We were taught to go to the bathroom to fart or burp, she once heard me burp in her bathroom and freaked out screaming at me while looking completely deranged. I refused to go near her after that. Some people are just nuts with their completely unreasonable demands.
#55
- No Teletubbies as an infant because they didn't use full words
- No Simpsons
- Nothing with witches, wizards or magic in general (although Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie were OK!)
- No clothing or merch with a skull on it (I even had pyjamas returned to the store because there was a small skull on the tag)
- "Sucks" and "D**n" were treated as swear words
Having a religious mother sucks. 😂.
#56
No touching/kissing until I wed. 🤨
Side note: Got married at 32...no I didn't wait. 😂.
#57
“If you ask for something, and I say no, I might change my mind later. If you ask again or remind me of it, the answer will be no forever.”
What this did was make me terrified to ask clarifying questions or remind my mom (who has a legendarily terrible memory) about anything.
It took a long time to rewire my brain once I was a working adult and did, in fact, need to ask clarifying questions or remind someone about something. Mom still thinks she did nothing wrong with that rule. The axe forgets what the tree remembers.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
We always got told 'maybe later' we quickly realised that if it wasn't an outright yes then it was a no.
#58
My dad didn't allow us to listen to, sing, or even mention the existence of Achy Breaky Heart by Billy Ray Cyrus. This was a very strict rule and he'd get very stern if we brought it up. We learnt to be a little bit scared of the song and I still have a weird compulsion to avoid it. Turns out Dad was just f*****g with us, and made the rule because he thought it was funny.
#59
I needed to have my hair tied at all times or I'd "shed too much". I also had to tie it either in my room or in the bathroom. I had long hair as a child and my step mother was bats**t.
T Barth 2 months ago
When I was a teen, I went to visit my boyfriend at his house. We were playing Atari, yeah yeah a long time ago, when his dad just bursts into the den screaming. " You need to do something about your hair! Its all over the bathroom floor! Its on my chair! Its in the kitchen! Why don't you two go to HER house?!" and then stomped back out. I was mortified. I had no idea I was " shedding" my hair. I was 14 years old and didn't think of such things. My boyfriend wanted to díe of embarrassment.
#60
They had a cast-iron bell they rang when it was time for us to come home. These were the days when kids were outside unsupervised for hours.
#61
We had to collect all our hair, from our hair brushes and beds, or just hairs we would find laying around the house, and my mom would dispose of it.
We are Native (Nlaka'pamux maternal, Navajo paternal) and in our culture people can take your hair and put a curse on you.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago (edited)
I shed a lot (i have very long thick, waist length hair) so I constantly have big piles of hair, I put them in my back garden next to a bird feeder beside a row of trees. The birds that nest there use it for their nests, I've been doing this for about 10yrs and I'm pretty sure the birds recognise me now.
#62
At my mom's house, anything with teasing was not allowed. The 2 biggest offenders of that were Dennis the Menace and Dumbo.
At my dad's house, the word Sucks was as bad as a swear and would get you sent to the stairs. Although he did own a copy of Dumbo that we could watch.
#63
Don’t sleep with the fan on, you will die.
Apparently there was an urban legend in Korea that someone died in their sleep and it was because of the fan.
ETA: You guys saying the s*****e thing, I’ve never heard that before. What I did hear was that in the 70s, I heard this all as a child, and in Korean (English is my first language) so forgive me if I get any details wrong the media put it out that it would k**l you. The idea was that you wouldn’t be able to breathe and that it would k**l you. I don’t see how s*****e would have parents avoid having fans on in bedrooms. Also, if you feared someone was s******l , would you go, hey I’m taking the fan out so you can’t hurt yourself? That doesn’t sound logical (I know the fan thing is illogical it you know what I mean. but hey I was born in the us, so what the f**k do I know lol.
Kira Okah 2 months ago
There is apparently a claim that the term "fan death" is a euphemism for sㅤuicide, but it's not. Fan death is very much believed to be real in South Korea, Japan, and a few places in China - that an actual electric fan spinning in a closed room will suffocate you. First appearing in the 1970s, it's believed to have come about from old people dㅤying in their sleep naturally in the summer and grief stricken relatives blaming the fan.
#64
Couldn't play with Legos, watch TV or use the computer right after lunch. I think my mom took the "no pool after eating" idea and thought it applied to everything.
Bi.Felicia 2 months ago
I wonder for how long after eating lunch does this rule apply? 30 minutes?
#65
You have to drink two glasses of milk if you want another drink other than water (juice). Three if you want cordial. I HATE milk now.
Panda Cat 2 months ago
My mom was stunned that I defaulted to water with meals for my kids. They could have whatever they wanted but they never wanted milk with a meal. My Swedish grandmother always put out milk to warm up before meals so it didn’t shock our stomachs. Obviously warm milk is nasty and my mom would put it back in the fridge, only to have my grandma take it out again. I often put an ice cube in my milk so it doesn’t get too warm but I’m a very slow eater.
#66
Okay so I was raised going to concerts and bars as early as I can remember. I was born in 88 so there was always a “fog” of smoke inside the bars.
My late mom would take me to concerts and let me watch horror movies (saw all the 80’s and early 90’s horror movies before the age of 10).
But my late mom would never allow us to have friends sleep over. Or, or more specifically, I couldn’t have friends over. My brother and sister had friends over all the time, but I wasn’t allowed to.
Find that extremely strange.
#67
Not so much a rule but my mom kept our house freezing cold. I remember having to walk around in sweatshirts and sweatpants in summer and bundling up wrapping myself in a blanket with a heavy coat in winter.
I'll never forget it was a few days before Christmas and hearing my mom sneak out of her bed to turn the AC on (it was low 50's that night), and hearing it hum on in the middle of the night.
Upstaged75 2 months ago
I'm probably the age now that this person's mom was then. And I sympathize with her. Hot flashes are NO joke! 😂 I could probably power a nuclear reactor with the heat that's always coming off my body.
#68
Nothing too dramatic but when I was a kid (before mobile phones) and I called home from a payphone or friends house, if my dad answered he would not engage in the call until I had said the "family password". He would hang up if I said anything except the password when he asked for it.
It was quite funny now that I think back on it.
Rika 2 months ago
Well, scams like "Dad, I'm in big trouble, I need your help!" existed before mobile phones. Nowadays, texts ask you to send money to get your kid out of jail, but back in the day, calls were used to lure a parent to a remote place by having someone say in a panicked kid's voice, "I'm lost, something bad happened, come pick me up at this place!" Then, instead of meeting their kid, the parent would be welcomed by a bunch of muggers.
#69
My dad would NOT let me and my siblings own a deck of cards. I think because he associated it with gambling? but every time I would win like a cute fun-sized one from Chuck E. Cheese, he would confiscate it and stow it with the other decks he took. I just wanted to play Go Fish, man. I still feel weird as a 30yo pulling out a deck of cards in front of him.
Blue Bunny of Happiness 2 months ago (edited)
My grandad believed cards were the work of the devil and refused to have them in the house. Thankfully, Mum disagreed when she left home.
#70
I was only allowed to watch spongebob if my mom was in another room because she thought it was annoying.
Lukas (he/him, it/its) 2 months ago
Same with my Dad, he hated Spongebob for some reason- and this was before it got bad!
#71
Not really that insane, but we weren't allowed to have toy guns.
This did mean that when my brother was climbing a tree he wasn't supposed to be climbing, i shot him out of the tree with his own pellet gun, and he couldn't tell Mom.
Upstaged75 2 months ago
My brother won't let his kids have any type of guns. Not even one that shoots bubbles. I think that's fine. Kids these days are already exposed to too much violence.
#72
I was raised by a single mom who honestly, I think was just too tired and busy to give me rules especially after raising my several years older sibling by herself too. Obviously not so much as a small child, but middle school and beyond, I could go where I wanted, when I wanted, with whom I wanted, for as long as I wanted, as long as I didn’t ask for money, and I let her know if I was going to be gone overnight (although that one was more of a suggested common courtesy and I didn’t get in trouble for not doing it every once and a while). But her hard-and-fast rule, was that I was not allowed to watch South Park. I could, and did quite literally watch whatever else I wanted, but South Park wasn’t allowed for some reason. It was my one rule, and I followed it because in my head it had to be important if she made it a rule. And to this day at nearly 40, I’ve never seen an episode of South Park.
#73
We often ate a fruit yoghurt pot for dessert. I always wanted to stir my pot before eating it but was prohibited from doing so. They said it was unnecessary.
To be fair, I totally realised this was insane and it used to make me cry.
#74
They said if we find money lying around, we can keep it. Maybe it was designed to keep us from leaving our money somewhere. But if your family ends up being thieves of each other's money, it's a really weird way to move out into the world... Especially with things like roommates.
#75
We weren’t allowed to say the word “lie” at my grandmother’s house when I was younger. If we wanted to accuse someone of lying, then we had to say that they were “fibbing” or “telling stories.” As us kids got older though they quietly stopped implementing this rule though for some reason.
#79
Anytime I stayed over at a certain friend’s house, we couldn’t drink anything until we ate all of our food. All of it. Not even water. It was odd.
#80
I was never allowed outside without shoes. The only exception was pools.
My mom was struck by lightning twice as a kid and was terrified that if we didn't wear shoes, we'd get struck or step on a nail (that happened too).
#81
My mother’s most insane rule was we could have ice cream but couldn’t get the sugar cones. Had to be the cake cups that tasted like nothing or a bowl. Never could figure why sugar was acceptable in the form of ice cream but not in a mildly sweetened cone.
She also only allowed us to drink 7up if we got sodas. Apparently sugar was okay if the soda was clear.
#82
I wasn't allowed in my parents room for any reason. There were like 2 times we had a movie night in their room and it was super special because I felt like I was in the forbidden forest. Speaking of forbidden forest, my other parents (divorced family) didn't allow Harry Potter because it was witchcraft.
#83
Entire house had to be cleaned (dust, vacuum, scrub etc)by 5pm on Friday. If it wasn’t we weren’t allowed to do anything for the week except things we had previously committed to/people were relying on us. So like if I didn’t want to go to my soccer game, I couldn’t get away with not doing the cleaning bc my teammates relied on us.
#84
When I was ages of O-11, if any sort of air conditioning, or ceiling fan blew close to me, I had to have a tea towel, or kerchief over my head to keep me from having a stiff neck, or earache. I rebelled and stopped that when I hit middle school.
Tamás Polgár 2 months ago
My mom banned fans from the house because "they cause pneumonia". She refused to believe I was boiling alive in my room during summer. Well, my room was facing south, theirs north. It was a good old European brick building, so their spot was naturally "air conditioned" while mine was an effing sauna.
#85
Nobody was allowed to use the upstairs bathroom for seven years because once my mother plugged something into an outlet in there and it sparked. Had to either go into my parents bedroom or go downstairs to use the bathroom. You could go in there to open a window/look through the cabinets, but the shower, toilet and sink were off limits.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
As a brit the idea of outlets in the bathroom is nuts. You won't find this anywhere in the UK (and i think most of Europe too) it's a safety thing, water + electricity = bad. The fact that it's so normalised in the US seems crazy to me. Most British bathrooms don't even have the light switch inside the bathroom.
#86
I thought it was illegal to turn the light on inside the car while it was moving. Turns out my dad didn’t like the glare it caused (which I understand), but you will not get pulled over and ticketed if the light is on when the car is moving😂 idk why, but as kids we loved turning on the car inside lights all the time, I guess? Lol.
#87
No farting in the house other than the bathroom. “Go in the bathroom if you’re going to do that”.
#88
My mother barely ever let me have sugar. She would only let me drink skim milk and tap water. One day I walked to the store and bought some Gatorade with my own money and she flipped out. I was like 16 years old at the time.
#89
I wasn’t allowed to watch anything that wasn’t Christian. So basically only Veggie Tales and Left Behind.
#91
If you’re on time, you’re late.
#92
My brother and I shared a car in high school and for whatever reason my mom (who never drove or even entered the car after we got our licenses) wouldn’t let me put an air freshener in it. She would literally look in the windows and if she saw an air freshener she would take it out. Made no sense to me then and still doesn’t.
#95
No gravy in the bedroom. Living room, office, bathroom, or even on the roof was just fine; just don't dare get caught with any in the bedrooms.
#96
If I wanted to play outside, I had to be back when the street lights came on. Reasonable, except in the middle of winter when the lights came on at 4:30 in the afternoon. I would get out of school, go home change do a little bit of homework, step outside and then practically have to step right back in.
Maybe not super insane but boy was it frustrating lol.
#97
I was not allowed any cable television, or basic of any kind. I was allowed 5 VHS tapes for ten years. Two of them were one movie.
Tamás Polgár 2 months ago
My mom was once told that we can't have a satellite dish because the trees near our house would obscure the signal. She believed this like gospel for many years. Then she bought some stupid subscription which kept rerunning the same 3-4 boring movies 24/7.
#99
The whole thread here is pretty crazy. I was not allowed to watch rated r movies until I turn to 17. I managed to watch a few at friends houses, but my mom would be furious if she found out.
Now, the weird thing is I was only allowed to watch PG films at home with one of my parents or my grandmother. If I was alone or at another person's house I was only allowed to watch movies that were rated G.
F*****g bananas.
#100
My dad was trying to get us to change out of our PJs on days when we didn't have school. I get he wanted us dressed and possibly to go outside. The thing is my dad came at us with the wrong attitude and we always pushed back. I even have a published poem about how he fought me to eat lasagna when I was 8 haha so he really made an impact on me anyway.
So to avoid a battle, he told us that if we stayed in our bedclothes too long, we would get skin cancer. We all quickly learned to change out of them after breakfast.
Dramatic and a bit much but it made me laugh when I was in my PJs all the time as an adult...in the hospital...with blood cancer.
Rika 2 months ago
I grew up with the same rule: you don't wear night clothes during the day unless you're sick and bedridden. I actually think it's a good rule, getting dressed in the morning is good for your mental health. Even if you're unemployed and you stay home all day, you'll feel more productive putting on work clothes in the morning instead of wandering around in your pajamas just waiting to go back to bed.
#101
Couldn’t watch Married with Children even as a teen, but could watch South Park and rated R horror movies as young as 8 🤷🏻♀️.
#102
No cutting nails at night.
#103
So... I will share the rule, and then why it's weird.
I was allowed to watch... MOST movies (r-rated or not) if I had a reason to want to watch it, and it wasn't something that was considered "realistic." (Silence of the Lambs? No. Alien? Eh, it's fine.) If it was historical, whether realistic (Glory) or supernatural (Sleepy Hollow) it was fine as long as the "Why" wasn't 'i heard it was good' or an empty response like that. I also started reading Stephen King when I was 11, and that was fine.
BUT. My mom has the news on in the kitchen all the time. ALL the time. And we were always helping her when she needed it. Which means I have direct memories of the LA Riots newscast, the whole OJ thing, Jeffrey Dahmer being m******d in prison (which led to 'mom what's a serial k**ler' being an actual question she gave a kid-gloves answer to when I was 7) and the Jon-Benet Ramsey m*rder. I will *neeeevvver* get the images in THAT newscast out of my head.
I think her logic was "the world is awful enough as it is and I want you to be aware of it, but you don't need to see fictionalised versions of it." 🤷♀️.
Tamás Polgár 2 months ago
I was not allowed to see Raiders of the Lost Ark because it's a "N**i movie".
#104
We weren't allowed to watch Code Lyoko or Pokemon because it had fighting in the shows yet Harry Potter and Spiderman were not only okay but heavily encouraged.
#105
I wasn’t allowed to watch Grange Hill, Byker Grove or Eastenders as the actors didn’t speak properly.
#106
Not mine, but a childhood friend in the "our parents were friends so we were forced to hang out" way had this specific rule in the house that he was, under no circumstances, ever allowed to so much as TOUCH the copy of Catan they had in the house until he was 18. his mom said it was too "mature" somehow. but also his like 8 year old younger sister could play as much catan as she wanted whenever!
#109
Superstitions. No hats on the bed or anything black on the bed. Supposed to mean death.
Danish Susanne 2 months ago
I heard of a girl whose mother said she was not to leave her hat on a bed, but when she asked her mother why, she couldn't answer. I turned out she had it from her mother so the asked her why. The grandmother laughed and said "oh that was because the neighbours then had lice and I didn't want you to bring them home. But that was a long time ago".
#110
No watching shows that were funny unless she also thought they were funny. Fresh Prince? Nope. No way. Married with Children? The whole family was watching.
Sally Moen 2 months ago
Well this one is pretty universal, except in homes where there was more than one tv or screen. For example, I watched alot of Masterpiece Theatre on PBS, years before I grew to enjoy watching Masterpiece Theatre
#111
We were not allowed to watch sitcoms as my dad hated the canned laughter. To this day, as a 54 year old I’ve seen very few of them, and I don’t feel I’ve missed much.
#112
No ponytails for morning church service because they’re too casual. PM service and Wednesday nights were fine, though.
#113
Idk about insane but when I got a smartphone my foster parents had a software or something on it where they could remotely control our phones and could turn apps on and off from their phones; we had to turn them in at night and we weren’t allowed to have any search engines on it. They also did checks and would go through our phones to make sure we were behaving. When we wanted an app or a song we would have to get their approval and they’d put in a password to get it. Just stuff like that; I don’t think this is insane but just abnormal.
#114
I wasn’t allowed to watch Keenan and Kel because it would “make me stupid”. I was, however, allowed to watch Ren and Stimpy.
KnightOwl86 2 months ago
Me and my siblings loved Keenan and Kel so much we named our cats after them! (Kel was everyone's favourite, he lived for 26yrs! Keenan lived for 23yrs.)
#115
One of my parents rules was that I could only ask for about three cigarettes a day. Dysfunctional family lol 🤗.
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John Dilligaf 2 months ago
not my family , but a friends. They never referred to their parents as mom or dad. It was always Mr or Mrs Smith. Like - "I can't come out right now, Mr Smith says I have to help clean out the garage" or "Mrs Smith can you you sign the permission slip for the school trip tomorrow?" They weren't adopted or anything, and the family was perfectly normal otherwise. Just that one weird rule
nottheactualphoto 2 months ago
My cousins were made to "yes ma'am, no sir" their parents.
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SaraCapybara 2 months ago
My cousins had a rule where when one of the parents walked into the room, all the kids had to stand up and had to stay standing until the parent sat down.
Lady Eowyn 2 months ago
I don't remember a lot of rules, insane or otherwise. Come home for dinner when Mom rings the bell was the only standard one. My dad imposed varying rules for varying amounts of time but nothing that sticks out.
Otto Katz 2 months ago
You guys had a bell, too?? We had a brass ship's bell on the porch, parents would ring it when they wanted us home for dinner, it could be heard all over the neighborhood!
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John Dilligaf 2 months ago
not my family , but a friends. They never referred to their parents as mom or dad. It was always Mr or Mrs Smith. Like - "I can't come out right now, Mr Smith says I have to help clean out the garage" or "Mrs Smith can you you sign the permission slip for the school trip tomorrow?" They weren't adopted or anything, and the family was perfectly normal otherwise. Just that one weird rule
nottheactualphoto 2 months ago
My cousins were made to "yes ma'am, no sir" their parents.
Load More Replies... SaraCapybara 2 months ago
My cousins had a rule where when one of the parents walked into the room, all the kids had to stand up and had to stay standing until the parent sat down.
Lady Eowyn 2 months ago
I don't remember a lot of rules, insane or otherwise. Come home for dinner when Mom rings the bell was the only standard one. My dad imposed varying rules for varying amounts of time but nothing that sticks out.
Otto Katz 2 months ago
You guys had a bell, too?? We had a brass ship's bell on the porch, parents would ring it when they wanted us home for dinner, it could be heard all over the neighborhood!
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