15 Weird Parent Habits Kids Remember Growing Up

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2 days ago

Growing up in a house with parents means you're inundated with habits all the time. But what if you found out these habits were not considered "normal" to people who lived outside your home? When Reddit user jcf1211 asked: "What's something your parents did that seemed normal at the time but you now realize was actually really weird?" I wanted to share the "weird" habits below:
"My dad ends every yawn like he's Goofy going over a cliff. I didn't know that wasn't normal for so many years."
—LeftoverAlien
"My mom is really into birds, and my dad likes nature. Growing up, if anyone in the family spotted an uncommon bird or animal, they would say the name of it, and we would all stop what we were doing to watch it. It wasn't until I was in my late 20's that I realized this wasn't something everyone did. I happily carry on this weirdness, and my wife happily humors me by watching the bird/animal and saying 'wow' as one does."
"Our family pet was a Burmese python. It broke its cage at one point, and my parents never replaced it. It lived in our bathroom most of the time and also in their bedroom. If you left the door open, it had free rein of the house. It was 12 feet long."
—Lewwely
"Oh man, in my family, we clung to ancient superstition way longer than normal. Like, if we couldn't find the car keys? Must've been a demon. Phone stops working? Cursed. Someone gets sick? Definitely the evil eye. It wasn't even said jokingly; it was dead serious. It got so deep that I honestly started believing it as a kid. The wildest moment, though? I came home from school one day and my mom was standing in the hallway, pale and shaking, saying blood had dripped from the ceiling (spoiler: it hadn't). Turned out, she was dealing with pretty intense delusions, which I only started realizing as I got older and began untangling all that stuff. Looking back… yeah, that was a full-blown WTF."
"There were a lot of us kids, and my parents couldn't really afford to take us to theme parks or other expensive places for entertainment, so we played ball or jumped rope, etc. But if we saw a really great, grassy hill while out driving, it was not uncommon for someone to yell out, 'Pull over!' And we'd all jump out of the car and roll down the grassy hills until we were exhausted. Free and fun."
—Grigsbyjawn
"When my dad is driving down the road, he reads out loud the signs: McDonald's, Honey Baked Ham, China Garden, Jones Drive. We have no idea why he does it, lol."
"My mom was perfectly capable of playing Dungeons & Dragons with us on the weekend, but chose to take that time to be by herself in the kitchen, where she made baked goods for us. No one is more powerful than the DM's wife. My dad also took pleasure in killing our characters. He had a kill box where he would write down the characters he killed, with what and who was playing. He killed my first character with spiders. Henceforth, all my characters have arachnophobia."
—Sovonna
"My mom used to make me call her by her first name in public because she didn't want people to know she had kids. I thought all moms did this until I was like 12 and mentioned it to a friend. The look of horror on her face made me realize this wasn't exactly standard parenting..."
"When I was little, I caught my Dad picking dead skin off his feet and putting it in the houseplant beside him. I said, 'Hey, I'm gonna tell Mom!' and he said that dead skin was good for plants. So I grew up thinking dead skin was, in fact, good for plants."
—shlee44
"They told me 'fart' was a swear word, and then I got made fun of at school when I accused other kids of swearing when they said it."
"My parents had this rule that if you (or anyone) called someone a 'rotter,' you (or that person) had to be chased around and tickled. It led to many fun times of being chased around, running from tickling. But looking back now, it was two VERY weird things to go together. My parents are very silly humans, though."
—Juneau_Fire
"My parents raised us bilingually, and as they were our only source of English, they decided not to waste time on 'baby words' and teach us only proper English. So we were the weird little kids who, when interacting with the English-speaking cousins, would say, 'I need to urinate,' talk about 'domesticated members of the canine family,' or casually mention the 'anachronisms' we observed in movies. Also, what slang we had was a generation out of date."
"My family didn't watch TV that much; we were all big readers. So we would all sit in the same room and read our own separate books, quietly. Every 15 minutes or so, one of us would come across something interesting, or something they didn't understand, and would read a paragraph out loud to the group. Otherwise, pure silence, broken by the occasional turn of the page. The first time my husband came over to spend time with me at our house, he told me that it was NOT NORMAL."
—Reflection_Secure
"My mom and grandparents (her parents) would walk out of their way to pick up change on the sidewalk/street/parking lot. Anything that looked shiny, they would hustle over and pick it up. Once, my Mom stopped the car along a busy road because there was a weirdly large amount of change on the side of the road, and she picked up about $5 worth. It was super embarrassing at the time, but I find myself getting excited about finding a penny here or there now."
"My whole extended family had a concept called 'outside food,' which was food to be eaten exclusively outdoors. This included Pixy Stix, watermelon, ice cream cones, popsicles, etc. This is not real. The real name for this food category is 'Shit kids are liable to spill.'"
—Acceptable-Remove792
Did your parents have any "weird" habits growing up that you thought were completely normal? Tell us what they did in the comments or anonymously in the Google Form below: