Were you subject to spankings/beatings as a child?

In My Humble Opinion
61

My father ruled mostly through fear, which is all that he knew (he learned at his mother’s knee). Fear of his anger, fear of minor violence, and of course the ultimate punishment when we were little was a spanking on the butt with a belt. It didn’t happen that often, I guess, I don’t really remember. It’s too bad, because (like a dog that’s been swatted too often) I was distant to him for the rest of his life, not because I was trying to get even by withholding affection, but because I just didn’t trust his moods. Even when he was older and much more mellow, I couldn’t get away from those old feelings.

In summary, I don’t recommend fear, anger and violence as child-rearing methods. On the other hand, I’ve never had to raise children, and he probably didn’t know any better until it was too late.

eta: after reading old guy’s post (a name I resent, since we were born in the same year) I would have to say I agree with the impact of the spankings themselves, even though my father used a belt. It was the anger that was the most scarring, I suppose.

62

Your parents sound like great people.

I don’t feel even a tiny shred of blame toward the people around me for not intervening when I was a kid. First, there was nothing they could do. Second, while the physical treatment was overly harsh it wasn’t severe physical abuse, especially for the era. Third, I’m sure they had no idea what was really going on in my house. The emotional stuff was the worst part, not getting caned, and there was no way for them to have an inkling about that.

63

Goodness, what a tough thread.

I think I was given a token swat on the butt now and then as a small child, but nothing more than that.

64

I’ve never discussed it with my mother, but I think she really struggled with feelings of guilt and inadequacy, and the fact that the best thing for me was to turn me over to someone else. She probably took some criticism from other people for letting my aunt care for me so much-- in the 70s, when I was little, because my mother was working on her Ph.D and her career, and later, in the 80s, because it made me happy; my mother wasn’t a person who was comfortable with affection, for one thing, and my aunt was, so I got the hugs I needed from my aunt, and that made having her a half a country away really hard.

My mother was very successful at everything she did, except being a mother, and really she just shouldn’t have had children, but it was a hard thing for women to say no to back in the late 60s.

Ultimately, she let me go, and took whatever heat other people had to give her, which was probably a brave thing to do. I was a lot less angry with her after that than I was before, although it took a long time to feel comfortable around her.

65

I got ‘The Belt’ (“Don’t make me get…The Belt!”) probably around 20 times in my whole life. (coulda been 100, but, that’s another story). Always on the legs/butt. Always while I had on what I was wearing at the time of the whipping. Meaning: I was never made to drop trou for a whipping. Never ‘injured’ me, but, it sure got my attention. I learned that if I cried pretty quickly, the whipping would only last about 2 more lashes. I should have been an actor.

66

When I was about 6, my father beat the crap out of me. I hadn’t even done anything that most people would consider bad. I remember that my feet weren’t touching the floor; he must have been holding me up. And I remember not being able to scream, because I’d used up all the oxygen in my lungs, and couldn’t stop screaming long enough to inhale.

The next thing I remember was sitting in the kitchen, and my aunt, who was a nurse, was putting ice on my head.

I was going to run away that night. I went to bed with my clothes on, listening for everyone to go to bed, and I’d sneak out. But while I was listening, I fell asleep.

There were other hittings/beltings/beatings until I was big enough to hit him back.

I hated my father until I learned to pity him.

67

Back of the hand, belt, broom handle, and I was once “grounded for life”. And yeah, I deserved it.

68

Yeah, I got spanked. I also got swatted with a belt and switch a few times, too. Of course, that was balanced out by thousands of hugs and kisses and cuddles. I’d opt for moderate and swiftly delivered corporal punishment any day over the passive-aggressive silent treatment method of punishment my mom was, and still is, so fond of.

Personally, I think it’s overreaching to say that all corporal punishment is bad and abusive. For certain personality types, I think it can be the most effective and least cruel, method of discipline because it immediately gets the wrongdoer’s attention and snaps them out of their bad behavior.

For instance, my 3 year old nephew, Luke, is high energy and very mischievous. His parents don’t believe in spanking. They use time-outs and diversionary tactics to try and redirect his energy. If he hurts another kid, which is often, he’s made to say he’s sorry and sit on the step for 5 minutes. If he gets too rambunctious, they sit him down and read him a book. They allow no toy weapons in their home and will permanently remove any non-weapon that he tries to craft into a weapon, such as a cardboard tube that he uses as a sword.

He’s sent his 4 year old sister to the ER twice now.

I’m telling you, that kid is out of control. He’s not going to listen to reason anytime in the near future, no matter how many minutes he’s forced to sit on a step, because he’s incapable of it. I’m sure that at some point he’ll be able to grasp the concept of morality, but right now, he doesn’t. And he needs to be stopped. If he were my son, the next time he raised a hand to his sister, I’d swat his ass. (And if that didn’t work, I’d try something else.)

For people who argue that violence begets violence, I direct you to electric dog fences. They can be very effective against even the most stubborn dog, and yet I’ve never heard anyone say that it made their dog more aggressive. Quite the contrary. I think that sometimes physical pain is a great motivator.

69

Do you remember the video of that Texan judge who used a belt on his daughter? That seemed mild to me.

My father would lose control of himself and beat the living daylights out of us for the stupidest things. The kicking, slapping, punching and being thrown into walls or other hard objects huts but I struggle to find words to describe the sheer terror of being picked up by your hair and shaken.

A few years back, I told my mother that I had been afraid he was going to kill me, and she said she had been afraid he would go just a little further and kill one of us. A therapist pointed out that many of the parents who do kill their kids just have “bad luck.” They throw the kid at the wall and she lands at a bad angle, and her neck snaps.

One of the factors for the severe emotional damage was the sheer randomness of it all. One of the worst beatings was for giving my father the wrong sized spoon for breakfast. Another was when he woke me up in the middle of the night screaming at me demanding to know why I had been in his room. Which I hadn’t, of course, but eventually I came up with a reason which satisfied him.

But this really was abuse and not a question of physical punishment.

The emotional neglect and other emotional abuse were much, much worse.

70

I think you’re right. My aunt was a genius at the right technique for the child. She spanked me once, and I really deserved it. But I remember another time when I was just in a bad mood, and being cranky, and basically ruining the rest of the family’s time at a get-together that had taken a lot of planning. I was really little, so there wasn’t much talking to me, and my mother was pregnant and not up to dealing with me.

My aunt just picked me up and carried me back to the hotel, gave me a bath and put me to bed.

At first blush, it seemed like I was getting extra attention, which I probably needed (I was three and my mother was probably not giving me much attention because she was getting ready for the baby), and that would be rewarding. But the next day, I had to listen to my cousins talk about all the fun things that had happened after I’d been taken to bed, and I realized how much I’d missed. I grew up a lot in that moment.

Anyway, I had one cousin who was one of those kids who was into everything. He got spanked more than the rest of us. He also got grounded more as a teen. But I remember him doing things when he was a little kid like pouring water on a gas stove-- who thinks a kid will do that? I’m pretty sure he got a smack on the butt for that, and it probably prevented him from doing it again more effectively than a time-out. Also, my aunt couldn’t very well clean up the stove and make sure it was safe if she was monitoring his time-out.

On the other hand, my youngest cousin was one of those quiet kids who never got into trouble. I don’t think she was ever spanked. Time-outs worked really well with her, because she cared about what other people thought. The idea of having disappointed someone bothered her.

FWIW, though, I behaved much better for my aunt and uncle than I did for my parents, because I cared more about disappointing my aunt and uncle than I did my parents. It was a really good thing I was not with my parents in high school. I can see myself doing really poorly just to spite my parents-- that’s how bad our relationship was at the time, and they weren’t interested in trying to repair it; they were more interested in standing their ground.

71

I was born in 1956 like the OP. Beatings with belts happened, among worse things. It seemed to be common listening to other kids. Later on I realized many of the other kids were exagerrating the severity and frequency of the corporal punishment they received.

72

This highlights a point I’ve been wanting to make in these discussions.

My parents divorced when I was very young, so I have no memory of ever living with my dad. But once he moved back to our general area, I spent hundreds of weekends with him, my stepmom and my half-siblings from about the age of 7 on up.

All of them wore their hearts on their sleeves in a way my mom’s side of the family, who were loving but more reserved, never did.

There was sometimes yelling in my dad’s household, and I can remember a few times when my dad would say “I’m gonna get the belt!” upon occasions of particularly egregious behavior on the part of my half-sister or half-brothers. And there were occasions when I’m sure he did, though I doubt they were frequent.

But just as you say, this was balanced out by the overwhelming amount of love that flowed between all members of my dad’s side of the family. They were all emotional, but in the best possible way.

I always say that I would have been much the poorer growing up if I had had the influence of only one side of my family. My mom and her side were absolutely wonderful to me — but there was an openness, a warmth and closeness on my dad’s side that was just different somehow.

My dad had his flaws, but my half-siblings adored and revered him, as did I, until the day he died. We all still do.

73

Born in '71. Never subjected to particularly violent beatings, but ridiculously frequent ones. My mum was struggling with what I see in retrospect as a failing marriage and took her frustration out on the kids. Beatings were generally just about hard slaps around the head and face (school days), but during holidays the belt was more frequent. I think she didn’t want my dad to see what she was doing, so before school she had a shorter window to operate, but during the holidays she had all day and liked to use it too. My memories are of the utter exhaustion from the relentless hitting and crying for the most senseless things.
For example, I knew my room needed to be tidied, but also knew all dirty clothes had to go into the wash basket. I was a kid. I wanted to go out and play, so I threw a tshirt into my wardrobe unfolded and shoved it to the back. When I came home she’d found it. I was so scared. She had taken every item of clothing out of my wardrobe and drawers and thrown them on the floor. The next hour(s?) was spent with me trying to fold each item perfectly and replace it as some kind of restitution for the one unfolded tshirt. The thing is, it’s hard to fold neatly when you’re a kid and being hit with a belt between every attempted fold.
Another that amuses me to this day. She caught me one day tying my shoe laces the wrong way. She kept repeating like some crazy mantra ‘Left over right and right over left’. But somehow I had picked up the opposite way of doing it, so the bow I was making was the mirror image of the ‘true’ way of doing things. That one went on for a long time. Try it for yourself now, tying your shoe laces the opposite way. Not that easy. Why is it amusing? A lot of my work involves chirality or handedness. An in joke I guess :wink:
We used to have a ritual washing of our faces each morning just before leaving for school to try and hide the fact that we’d all been crying all morning.
I have pretty much learnt to deal with the repercussions of all this, although it took a long time and a lot of soul searching. The thing is, it’s not the physical pain that lasts, it’s the difficulty of negotiating adult life without ever having felt loved at any time. It’s really an extraordinarily damaging experience.

As far as my mother is concerned, I did ask her once why she did it, she simply told me I was exaggerating, so I left it at that. She’s not a clever woman, what would be the point in trying to torture her out of some sense of revenge? I even allow her to hug me when I visit occasionally, even though I feel nothing for her. I’ve learnt to talk about this stuff, and you know what? It helps. I wish I’d realised that when I was much younger.

74

I got spanked a few times. Those don’t really bother me. I deserved them and they weren’t hard or dehabilitating.

I got paddled in school once which was absolutely humiliating and taught me nothing except to hate the teacher, and for the first time in my entire life, I didn’t love school and look forward to it. It seriously changed my entire perception of school. Paddling should never be allowed.

But the one memorable occasion is when my mother really lost her temper and beat me with her high-heeled shoe. I had been seen crossing the street in a place I wasn’t supposed to go…but all I remember is how terrifying she was. She was bigger than me and she chose to beat the crap out of me with her shoes because she could. If I let myself, I could hate her for it.

Anyway it’s not the physical abuse I am bitter over, it’s the emotional abuse. All the wounds and scars were on the inside and no one believed me anyway.

For the record I am totally not in favor of spanking children. Not even lightly. I suppose sometimes you must have to but it should never be out of anger.

75

My mom never had any wooden spoons in the house cuz her and my dad broken them all over me and my siblings. We got spanked regularly, with a belt, spoon or other implement when they felt like it. Occasional bruises but not usually. We thought it was normal, we used to joke that every recipe my mom made called for 4 butts well beaten.

I know I got it the worst. I got blamed for things my brothers and sisters did because I was supposed to be ‘in charge’ of them. Only I wasn’t allowed to do anything, cuz I would get in trouble for that too. My brothers and sisters knew this, and so could basically do whatever they wanted when I was ‘in charge’.

The worst beating I got was when I got caught stealing candy at a drug store nearby. My parents took turns whipping me with a belt for half an hour, and I was grounded off of pretty much everything except food and oxygen for a year. I remember them writing the date on the calender, and when that day finally came around. Years later, my youngest brother was caught stealing lighters from the same drug store while skipping church, and my mom grounded him for two weeks, and then relented after 3 days. I saw things like this a lot. Not many physical scars, but lots of emotional ones.

I got paddled in school once, in 3rd grade, because some kid lied to the teacher and told her I was the one who did something I couldn’t have. I didn’t even know what going on until the paddle was out and I was in front of the class.

76

Our son has been spanked twice, both times for doing things that were dangerous enough that we wanted to nip the behavior in the bud, and in both cases, they were things he’d been told not to do, and immediately did again. The spankings worked both times. I think if we spanked him a lot, though, it wouldn’t have the shock value, the “Mommy and Daddy are REALLY serious” effect.

Once he took his seatbelt off on the highway, and tried to climb into the front seat. I know people who grew up before the 1980s may be thinking “That’s a big deal?” but aside from the fact that having an unrestrained child is a primary enforcement stop in our state, you can get an $800 fine for the 1st offense, AND we are talking about cars with child decapitation devices (airbags) in the front seats.

The other thing he did was hit our dog. Our sweet, mild dog didn’t do anything, but she could have, and at any rate, he needs to know you don’t hit dogs. The next dog might not be our meek dog. It might be someone’s squirrelly Mastiff. At any rate, he was 30 months old, and clearly daring us to do something, because he was looking his father straight in the eye when he hit her the second time. I don’t know what came over our normally pretty good little boy.

He’ll be 8 in a few weeks, so I’m sure his spanking days are passed. All he got each time was one swat on the butt.

He gets so many hugs and kisses, that he’s now at that “Mooooom, come on, I’m a BIG kid.” We’re not supposed to kiss him at all in front of his friends, and we’re only allowed to hug him goodbye, but when we’re home alone, he is not above climbing on our laps to watch TV in the evening.

77

I was slapped maybe twice in my life for particularly egregious backtalk, deserving it both times. I was spanked once by my grandfather, can’t remember why, but I probably deserved it. Other than those two or three occasions (all when I was under about 7 years old) nobody in my family ever laid hands on me.

78

About the same age as you. I got hit a fair number of times by my mother (often quite deserved) both as punishment and as abuse. And the funky thing is that as early as four I knew the difference. I did “y” and got a backhand from my mother and that was (and felt like) punishment. She smacked the shit out of me because “y” wasn’t working right for her and I was handy always felt like abuse. I didn’t mind it back then and not really all that much now. Different time, an unbalanced person and different ways.

What I do still mind was her usual MO of mind games and psychological torture. Saying “Uncle Y” died because of something I did wrong, threatening to kill one of my pets, that sort of thing. The bruises on my hide faded fast and were forgotten - those brain scars still bleed now and then.

(Dad spanked me once. I deserved it and he was right. He was also one of those who never yelled or threatened. Which may be why I never crossed him. His voice and how he used it carried respect both ways)

79

I was spanked from time to time as a child. Over our pants as I remember it, sometimes with a belt and I think my mother once used a riding crop when a belt wasn’t at hand although I’m pretty confident that she pulled her blows on that since it wasn’t extraordinarily painful. She also had a plastic spatula that didn’t hurt at all – my sister once started laughing during her ‘punishment’ on account of how softly it landed.

Aside from that, we weren’t punished in any physical way but rather the usual groundings, loss of privileges and the like. The spankings were effective enough if only as a stark reminder that this particular transgression went too far and I can’t say I suffered any negative effects from it. My older son was swatted on rare occasions, a few smacked on the clothed butt but my wife said she didn’t want to do that with the younger one and so we haven’t. I won’t compare the “effectiveness” of the two since they’re different people with different personalities.

80

I was spanked twice at a very young age. Barely hard enough for it to sting over 5 minutes afterwards. I remember deserving the one and barely remember the other, but probably deserved that one too. That doesn’t affect me much. What scared me more were the constant threats of violence over little things, like reaching into the utensil drawer at the same time as my father.

Frankly, I almost wish he had followed through on a threat or two, because these days I feel pretty pathetic about how I was scared by his empty threats. Well, they weren’t totally empty. There were always just enough glimpses that you wondered if maybe next time he would actually snap and instead of throwing something across the room and cursing, he’d be throwing it at you and wrenching your arm off like he always said he would.

I realized at a young age that I felt no love for my father and I very much doubted at the time he felt any for me.