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I'm not sure if this has any relevance, but my mother is not backward in any way, has an IQ above 150, is a school teacher, but made it clear, and still does, that she never wanted to have any children.
I'm not sure if this has any relevance, but my mother is not backward in any way, has an IQ above 150, is a school teacher, but made it clear, and still does, that she never wanted to have any children.
I think that it is relevant. I was born in 1945, and I question the motives of anyone, including the town moron, who didn't at least telephone a doctor. I will tell you that I was more or less a city boy, and my family is Jewish, both of which would lean more towards calling a doctor. I am not sure of the final answer, but I believe that you have every right to suspect.
Right, I'm questioning things, and whether injuries I sustained as a child, were actually accidental.
Apparently, as a toddler, I was "found" unconscious after falling out of my cot, and my parents say they don't know how long I'd been that way, but I was unconscious for at least half an hour longer. I'd been locked in that room so my mother could ignore me while I was in pain. (Apparently, her doctor told her to do so!)
No doctor or ambulance was ever called, so I was never checked out for injuries.
This is just one of many niggling questions, that seem only to be able to have answers that point to abuse of one kind or another.
Why, if there is a reason, wouldn't someone care enough about their child, to call for, or take it for help?
I won't be getting into the usual arguments about this, but would just like to throw the question out there, just for answers.
Well, it worked out well, didn't it? You are alive and you can form sentences pretty well and they even make sense.
Just kidding. I would be rushing to the emergency without a doubt.
Depending upon what year you were born, there really were doctors who advised to lock children in isolation when they cried, or to spank them when they misbehaved. Parents did those things following expert advice.
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This. It used to be common to isolate infants as far away from the parents as possible, so that the parents could get a good night's sleep. It was believed that to respond to a child whenever it cried was "spoiling" the child. This was not viewed as abuse, OP.
So it's hard to say, in your case, if we judge the situation by the beliefs and customs of the times. Even more recently, I heard of a couple who had a contractor build a sound-proof room for the baby they were expecting, so that they wouldn't have to be disturbed by its crying. If people can't handle a crying, helpless, needy baby, they shouldn't have kids. One reason adults have abandonment issues is precisely because of this type of treatment in infancy and toddlerhood.
Years ago, people, especially poor people, were often reluctant to go to a doctor. Many just didn't have the money, some were afraid to "bother" the big important doctor, and a few were just jacka**es.
Illustrating all three:
A friend of mine's older sister, about 10 at the time, came down with a very high fever. Her mother tried to wait it out (POINT: Not wanting to "bother" the doctor" + Not having much money to spare). By the time the father got home, the mother was more than ready to move.
However the father refused at that point to all the child to be taken to the doctor OR a hospital. (POINT: Jacka**) He was of the opinion that children needed to be toughened up.
RESULT: Permanent brain damage, partial hearing loss, and a bright young girl who became mentally retarded and would never be capable of taking care of herself. In the opinion of her sister, she might as well have died - and the person who was left post-fever was not the person she had been before.
This would have been in the 60's. A lot of parents in the 60s had been raised by people who lived through the depression. Poverty was a living thing. Most people did not expect to escape it. There was a lot of fatalism, and it was not that long ago that childcare books commonly recommended not naming the child until they were 5 years old, because there was no point getting attached. They would likely die before that.
Things changed a lot starting in the 60's but it took awhile to percolate throughout society. Your average working family, whether farming or industrial, didn't have time to sit down and read Dr. Spock - and would have found him ridiculous if they had. Frankly *I* find him somewhat ridiculous with the benefit of considerable hindsight, mostly for the strong Freudian slant of the first few editions of his book.
So without knowing what year this all happened, all we can say is, yes, it IS possible some doctor told your parents to lock you in your room and ignore you. What we take for granted these days - comforting our children, not locking them to set schedule from birth, feeding on demand, and a host of other practices that certainly seem common sense and commonplace now - was not the norm for several of the preceding generations.
The thing about abuse is that it almost never just stops. If you were abused by one or both parents in early childhood, the abuse would almost certainly have continued later in life. Abusers don't just stop abusing.
More likely whatever happened actually was the result of an accident, followed up by poor caretaking perhaps at the behest of the "expert", a doctor, who may or may not have been behind the times regarding childhood development and childcare depending on the time period and the age and prior training of the doctor in question.
Nowadays, of course we would expect consultation with a doctor (including an actual examination) and/or a trip to the hospital.
But not that many years ago this was rather less commonly expected.
BTW - Now that I have read your post stating the dr told your mother to lock you in your room due to her nervous condition, that really sounds like he was trying to protect a helpless infant from being shaken or slapped by a mother with a fragile grasp of her actions. So ... it may have been meant well.
Obviously the better solution these days is to get your mother professional help, but not that long ago, hardly anyone would go to see a "shrink" and even minor emotional problems would be hidden as best as possible by the family for the shame of it. Plus shrinks cost even more than doctors and even now insurance coverage is very restricted to nonexistant.
OP, how old are you? You sound like you're not that old - and you seem to indicate your mother is still working. Further, if she's a teacher, the odds are very high health insurance wasn't an issue.
I'm not sure if this has any relevance, but my mother is not backward in any way, has an IQ above 150, is a school teacher, but made it clear, and still does, that she never wanted to have any children.
Do you feel that it was related to abuse? I think you have to go with your gut on it. Is your mom abusive in other ways?
FYI a 150+ IQ is genius level...did she tell you that was her IQ or do you have any proof that it is? Because its very unlikely to have an IQ that high...and quite frankly, many people with very high IQs have mental illness or autism or other "impairments". A high IQ doesn't mean they have any common sense. Trust me, I know. I married one.
This would have been in the 60's. A lot of parents in the 60s had been raised by people who lived through the depression. Poverty was a living thing. Most people did not expect to escape it. There was a lot of fatalism, and it was not that long ago that childcare books commonly recommended not naming the child until they were 5 years old, because there was no point getting attached. They would likely die before that.
Just to clarify, are we talking 1860s, or 1960s? Or 1760s?
I was raised in the 1950s, and I never heard of such nonsense. Granted, what I heard of is not a proof of anything, but it is almost a hint.
Just to clarify, are we talking 1860s, or 1960s? Or 1760s?
I was raised in the 1950s, and I never heard of such nonsense. Granted, what I heard of is not a proof of anything, but it is almost a hint.
OTOH, I was raised in the 50s as well, by parents, one of whom was poor during the Depression, and the other of whose family was poor before, during and after the Depression, and going to the doctor was a big deal. I can practically remember the number of times my brother and/or I went to the doctor.
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