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Redditors Share Weird Household Rules They Grew Up With

Growing up I thought that my parents were harsh. They rarely let me attend sleepovers, I never went to sleep away camp with the cool kids, and anything television beyond PBS was an absolute no-no. I've walked around with a chip on my sheltered shoulder ever since. Until yesterday, when I saw an enlightening thread on r/AskReddit.

Reddit user u/ctsom took to the subreddit and asked fellow redditors to describe the weird rules they grew up with as kids. The customs and boundaries range from extremely strict to extremely weird. And like me, you may end up feeling like your upbringing was relatively normal.

Posted by haunted_admin
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  • 1
    Text - supaloops • 15h I was not allowed to clear my plate when eating. I had to always leave some food on the plate. If I wanted to eat that much, I had to go get a little more to leave on the plate. The exact opposite of what most people have as a household rule.
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  • 2
    Text - _njhiker • 12h 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. Reply 511
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  • 3
    Text - missdontcare_ • 12h S 3 Awards 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 Reply 34.5k
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  • 4
    Text - Zenosparadox1•13h 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 dee!ed me better enough to use my bed. 12.0k Reply
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  • 5
    Text - mosaicevolution • 14h My dad made a rule that I had to kill seven flies a day during my summer break. 11.0k Reply Gem_37 • 13h How did you give him evidence? 3.9k ADHDpotatoes • 13h S 4 Awards His dad could see the weight of his actions in his eyes. 10.5k gandalfx • 10h S10 Awards Imagine the scene... • I come home through the door, a shame filled tremble, barely noticeable. Father looks up from his work, which is manual and manly. Our eyes lock. He knows. This is not a seven fly stare. T
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  • 6
    Text - CharlieChooper • 13h 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. Reply 15.6k Shadowturtle9 • 13h SAME OMG, my parents would ground me from my DS that I "loved" but it was actually just a trick so that when I was grounded it didn't really matter. Then they figured it out, and instead of grounding me from my DS, they grounded me from reading, and that was when I first started li
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  • 7
    Text - anxiousjellybean • 12h 2 Awards 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 l'd put myself to bed by the time she got home then I got $10 in the morning. Reply 45.9k
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  • 8
    Text - lazynomad53 • 13h Wasn't in my home but my aunt and uncle never let us use the up stairs washroom when we were kids because they thought we'd touch the walls with our dirty hands so they made us piss in a jar they kept under the kitchen sink and just poured it down the drain when we were done. Never thought it war strange until I brought it up to my cousin a few years ago, we laughed pretty hard about it.
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  • 9
    Text - thedraindeimo • 13h Not a rule, but still to this day I am befuddled at my mothers reasoning. When I was a boy we lived in a pretty rural part of Mexico, horrible infrastructure. Power would often go out in the middle of the night. She would proceed to wake my brother and I up, simply to wait until the power came back on. For the life of me I cannot figure that out. She wasn't afraid of the dark, she just wanted to make sure we saw the power return. Edit* Every one keeps suggesting becaus
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  • 10
    Text - secretagentsquirrell • 14h 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.
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  • 11
    Text - moorehawke • 11h Wakey wakey time. No noise annoying mum and dad until 7am. This was a really necessary one bc I was a very early riser as a kid and I loved to talk to my parents. The rule was that I could come to their bed and curl up next to them, but I couldn't talk until 7. It was actually really nice, and made sure I got enough rest myself. Tragically, once I started rowing like 7 years later, mum and dad had to get up at 4 anyway to get me to the sheds. Sorry guys.
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  • 12
    Text - dahaoab • 12h 1 Award 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. Reply 15.2k
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  • 13
    Text - plentyofrabbits • 13h 3 1 Award My grandmother thinks that "fart" is a dirty word. She prefers "poopsie," which is, in my opinion, far dirtier. 6.8k
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  • 14
    Text - Wazula42 • 12h S 1 Award Thad the same routine with my parents. Long as I was honest and safe, they didn't lean on me. My dad even bought me a pack of condoms before my first prom. Awkward-ass conversation but in all seriousness, l'm genuinely glad he cared enough about me to say "I'd just rather you had them with you, that's all". Naturally those bad boys expired looong before they could be used, but it's the thought that counts. 6.7k
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  • 15
    Text - Ushouldknowthat • 14h S 2 Awards 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. Reply 20.7k
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  • 16
    Text - MyBroPoohBear • 11h I had to wash the dishes every night, even if I wasn't home for the meal. There were times l'd get gone from an away basketball game (I was in the team) after 10pm and the dishes had sat since they finished reading around 6:30pm. My older brother's nightly chore? Take out the garbage. He'd be done in 2 minutes. I'd have 30+ minutes of washing, drying, putting away, and cleaning up the kitchen. Reply 3.2k
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  • 17
    Text - gothchrysallis • 12h 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. Reply 26.8k
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  • 18
    Text - GetMeTheJohnsonFile • 13h We had to have milk after dinner, but before bed. Asked my mom when I was older what that was about and she realized we could have just had milk with dinner if we wanted, but she had been raised kosher so it wasn't something she thought about.
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  • 19
    Text - code_name_jellyfish • 12h 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. Reply 16.2k
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  • 20
    Text - batman1227 • 10h 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
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  • 21
    Text - bigmacnpoet • 11h 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 l 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 b
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    haunted_admin
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