Childhood Bedtime Routines

One of the most prominent things I remember about my childhood bedtime rituals is that my dad would always make up stories to me. We very rarely would read from an actual book and when we occasionally did it was always one of those fill in the blank books where you pretty much got to make up the story as you went. (For example, the book would ask me to think of a happy place, think of what color the sky was and who was with me.) This was always my favorite kind of tucking in routine. If I could, I would have someone read this type of story to me every night for the rest of my life. I absolutely loved using my imagination and knowing that whatever I created, no matter how absurd, was no one's business but my own. Even when my dad would read these types of stories to me where I made up the surroundings as he read I would never talk about them out loud--I would always just quietly think to myself what my perfect magical land looked like. To be the youngest child of three, it was nice to have one place that was all my own and that was controlled by no one else but me.

With my mom, we would also hardly ever read from traditional bedtime story books and instead would look at "Where's Waldo" or "I spy" together. I don't remember really ever reading to my parents at all, I was always the one being read to. I also remember that my mother was very strict when it came to what cartoons I could watch. There were certain cartoons that she had deemed inappropriate or too intense. I remember that she would never let me watch tiny toons, for example, but I was always allowed to watch loony toons. To me, they seemed like the exact same show but to her, tiny toons was seen as vulgar (to this day I still don't understand how that is possible).

My parents generally would always talk to me like an adult; they were never the type to communicate to me through a high pitched baby voice. If I was bad I would get a time out, and nap time was never negotiable. My parents weren't exactly "tough" by any means, they just didn't give into the idea that a 4 year old could have more power than them. However, my mom was definitely always the stricter parent.