The most terrifying words a child of the baby boom generation ever heard: “I’m going to tell your father about this when he gets home.” Or, “Your father is not going to like it when I tell him what you’ve done.” Or, “I can only imagine what your father is going to do when he hears about this.”
Just the title of this made my stomach tighten 😆. That was such a powerful phrase growing up. You knew mom was serious and you had to spend the rest of the day dreading it. I was an 80s/90s kid and from my memory ours was not the only household where that was the situation.
I'm surprised that you heard that from your mom in the '80s and '90s. It had largely fallen out of practice by then. You must have been raised by people who managed to keep their heads above the rising psychobabble.
My mom uttered those words in the early 1970's quite a few times. And, we FEARED my dad. Funny story, I'm in my 50's. I few years ago, my brother and I took my dad on a guy's weekend. While we were sharing sentimental anecdotes, I related, "Dad, I just wanted to be like you and be on your team so much. Whenever my brother and I fought over sitting behind you in the car, that was why I was fighting for the seat." You can likely guess how my older brother replied, "I wanted to be behind dad because he couldn't reach me as easily." And, here's a follow up anecdote. My parents divorced when I was 11. When my father's second marriage started to fail, he agreed to go to marital counseling. Soon thereafter I remember this very clear change of priorities. One morning, I said, "Come on dad, let's go play some tennis." He told me no and said, that his first priority was getting time with his wife and getting to all the things on her to do list. Putting her first was weird, a shock, but we knew it was right. And, those changes which he made while we were at formative ages in our early teen years and have made such a lasting impact on my brother and me and set the tone for our 30+ year marriages. The Judeo-Christian home structure, complete with its patriarchal (saying this with a wink and a grin) albeit sacrificial headship is critical for the development of young people, imho.
Just the title of this made my stomach tighten 😆. That was such a powerful phrase growing up. You knew mom was serious and you had to spend the rest of the day dreading it. I was an 80s/90s kid and from my memory ours was not the only household where that was the situation.
I'm surprised that you heard that from your mom in the '80s and '90s. It had largely fallen out of practice by then. You must have been raised by people who managed to keep their heads above the rising psychobabble.
My mom uttered those words in the early 1970's quite a few times. And, we FEARED my dad. Funny story, I'm in my 50's. I few years ago, my brother and I took my dad on a guy's weekend. While we were sharing sentimental anecdotes, I related, "Dad, I just wanted to be like you and be on your team so much. Whenever my brother and I fought over sitting behind you in the car, that was why I was fighting for the seat." You can likely guess how my older brother replied, "I wanted to be behind dad because he couldn't reach me as easily." And, here's a follow up anecdote. My parents divorced when I was 11. When my father's second marriage started to fail, he agreed to go to marital counseling. Soon thereafter I remember this very clear change of priorities. One morning, I said, "Come on dad, let's go play some tennis." He told me no and said, that his first priority was getting time with his wife and getting to all the things on her to do list. Putting her first was weird, a shock, but we knew it was right. And, those changes which he made while we were at formative ages in our early teen years and have made such a lasting impact on my brother and me and set the tone for our 30+ year marriages. The Judeo-Christian home structure, complete with its patriarchal (saying this with a wink and a grin) albeit sacrificial headship is critical for the development of young people, imho.
HINO, brilliant! It is so disappointing seeing the emasculation of men these days. Unfortunately it is usually the wives who are the ones doing it.