Growing Up in Survival Mode Makes It Hard to See Choices

Omg yesss!!! This is one of my biggest complaints. My parents separated when I was young and we grew up pretty poor with a single mother. It seemed like everyone told me what I HAD to do with my life but never taught me HOW to do anything to achieve those goals. I failed at almost everything I tried, and as soon as I blindly tried and wasn’t perfect my parents would scold me and put me down. Eventually making me feel like what’s the point in trying if I don’t learn more first. I kept waiting for some magical age when I would have this wisdom on how to do everything needed to be a successful adult. How to take out a loan and buy a house, how to buy a car, how to manage debt , how to buy insurance, how to get a job, understanding benefits from your job, understanding your retirement plan or 401k etc. etc. 😰😰

Too busy surviving, to think of the future :(

One of the biggest realizations ive had is that i didnt have any help as a child.

The notion of future was something unatainable or uncontrolable for me. Being always in survival mode because of money and abuse got me used to letting go, not thinking about what I wanted or liked doing and not keeping a grip on those things. Letting go of art, letting go of poetry, letting do of sewing etc. Many gifts and dreams were neglected.... Thank you Fairy for helping!

I think a lot of people get trapped in that "go to college and your future will be set" dream. A lot of our parents, who didn't go to college, didn't understand that there was more to it than that. They just saw others doing it and assumed that's all there was. That's the problem with non-successful people having kids and not raising them properly.

I grew up dirt poor.Despite being naturally intelligent enough to be anything I wanted to be I never went to college.I couldnt sit still,I work in circles not a straight line.I couldn't sit in any kind of office environment.I ended up doing mostly minimum wage jobs.My one goal was to own land and not be beholden to a landlord.Despite all the odds against it I pulled it off and just paid off my mortgage a year ago on an old trailer and a beautiful mountain acre in a place people all over the world want to move to.What has served me is being open to opportunities and open to adjusting my expectations of what is necessary for me having a successful happy life vs what the rest of the world considers success.

I didn't learn this lesson until my 30's. I was always learning, reading, absorbing. But the tools to succeed? The encouragement? Nah, very little. But I sincerely appreciate and remember every. single. person. that DID encourage me. ❤️🌹

This quote nailed it for me: “I wasn’t raised to know that.” That said so much to me, it put words to a void.

The only guidance we had was “You can be whatever you want”. and then it was like Now go away. If you mentioned wanting to try anything you got……….no, that’s not for you.

It's not even a lack of financial stability, it's a lack of emotional stability. I think they are interchangeable because the outcome is the same - reaching adulthood and living in constant survival mode with no real sense of security. Both are worse. My parents were so caught up in their rocky, utterly dysfunctional relationship or lack of it and regrets over it that our well-being was kind of forgotten and I never even got a sit down talk on choosing a viable career. Still in survival mode to this day.

Hang on, it gets better. This is from a 33 year USPS employee. The stability is a benefit of its own.

She could have a teaching farm! Where groups come to the farm for field trips (schools, clubs like Boy Scouts or Girl scouts etc). She could teach them how to care for the animals and educational stuff about farming. Families even love doing trips to farms. And the people that come for her classes she can also sell her farm goods to them!

This sounds a lot like the experience of a lot of people just coming from immigrant parents or poor parents. I went to school in an expensive town, went to a good university. I never knew people got tutors in the summer in high school, never knew being an A student in university isn't enough, didn't know about informational interviews until I was 35. This is really common.

I am a "farm wife". I garden to provide food, preserve food, cook all of our meals, take care of our chickens and my rescue horses and handle the bills, cleaning, snow removal etc. It's wonderful but very different from farming for a living. My husband lived his dream farming for a living for 10 years, but due to increased costs had to start working outside of the farm and is happy doing so. My point is there's a difference between owning a farm and enjoying a certain level of personal farming, and farming to make a living. Completely different but possible! I'm proof at 56 years old. I used to work 16 hours days when I was forty. Patience has paid off 💖

Yes, just realizing that for most part, I lived life just a day at a time. Now, Im a poor widow, my grown children are estranged from me. Not sure why. Im independent & healthy, I do not bother my children or expect them to care for me. I too had no life goals beyond being married to an Army officer who I helped educate and raising my 3 children. All 3 are very successful and productive members of society. 1st husband had many affairs, was also a manchild who played games and did reenactments. I eventually divorced him. My second husband died because of Vietnam/ AgentOrange. I had cared for him and also for my mother. So, here I am, elderly and alone. My youngest daughter is a Narcissist who turned older children against me, telling them lies. I will be 70 in coming year. I am alone now and am re- inventing myself, again, It is scary...

Forties is the BEST for us damaged folks. We must remember to not compare each other to our compatriots because they have not lived our life. I know, it's HARD to do.

this hit home so hard. the experience my brother and I had was completely different. we had the same parents but our father shaped and moulded him , and gave him the guidance and tools to have a successful adult life, financially etc. Unfortunately I wasn't treated in the same manor, I wasn't taught any of those crucial skills and I instead severely abused especially during the most important developmental years of early childhood. I was robbed honestly, I struggle so hard for everything in my life and often think about this very thing on a daily basis. I am in my 40's and I feel like I have been "left behind" compared to my age group. my brother is two years older than me but he struggles to understand why I've had such a difficult experience within my life. I feel like I have so much to give the world but in many ways I've fallen short due to the trauma and survival mode.

I too had the Crappy Childhood and grew up in poverty neglect and lack and here I am in my 60's and I still feel I always just get by but never flourish financially. I keep feeling that it has a lot to do with my CPTSD but cant figure it out. Maybe you could do a video about our limited thinking and voices in our heads that KEEP us in that small world we grew up in.

My childhood was so weird. My family owned several fully paid for apartment buildings. Despite this, we had no food, dental or medical care. All I ever heard was how poor we were. It wasn't until I eas older that I realized we wearnt poor at all. I didn't get to eat at home or even at school because I did not qualify for free lunch. Finally I ran away and would get food that people left on outdoor restaurant tables. I still struggle. Just lost my job last month. Back to zero again. Back to being hungry. Its just so rediculous.

I can relate to Samantha! I had similar family and similar experiences. Go to college, go to college...yet I had NO guidance on how to do that. Many years passed, along with a variety of jobs. Decided at the age of 40 to go back to school to be a nurse, which is a far cry from the commercial art I wanted to go to college for in my high school years. Ended up have to leave nursing school due to a major life changing event. Long story short, I'm 50 now. I bought a farm almost 900 miles from where I grew up/lived all my life. I work the farm, and I have a small online business that is non-farm related. I LOVE my farm, and I wouldn't trade it for the world. With that said, it is A LOT of work. A LOT of trial and error. And its not very profitable...which is why I work an online business. Life is good now, but it was a very long, rocky, and difficult road to get here. Appreciate your journey because it will make arriving at your destination much more sweeter.