I'd Never Told Anybody This… 

Last week I was joking with a friend about our funniest childhood memories and I shared this story of being 4 years old, eating my breakfast of milky Weetabix sitting in our very 70’s orange and brown kitchen, when my Dad turned round to me and asked me to bring in a lettuce. (Now for those of you that don’t know me, I did grow up in rural England but we were definitely not a farming family, and so I was not normally asked to go grab random pieces of veg from the garden!) 

Confused, I headed for the back door in my nightie, going in the direction I thought I needed to as instructed by my Dad.

My Dad (looking even more confused than me) asks me where I’m going as my hand reaches for the handle of the back door that leads to our garden.

“I’m getting the lettuce.” I said.

“No!” He says laughing. “I asked you to get the letters!” (Obviously a completely different door, direction and task.)

It’s a funny memory of childhood confusion that also had an undercurrent of fear and of being too scared to clarify exactly what was being asked of me. I think this could probably resonate with a lot of you, but is also a really good example of how the way things are at home in our childhood can really set the pattern of how we show up in the rest of our lives as adults - unless we take the time to unpack habits that might be sabotaging ourselves and our relationships.

I still admire 4 year old me for being prepared to have a go at pulling up a lettuce, having no clue what on earth I was doing or how I was going to do it. (To this day I’m still not sure if there even was any lettuce in the garden!?)

The narrative went something like this: “This has been asked of me by my scary dad, therefore I must do it no matter what.” (My dad was in the military and WAS quite frankly terrifying.) I was thinking I’ll suss it out as I go, and it seemed a way better option than asking any questions.

I am still game for trying most things with a ‘let’s give it a go’ attitude, which is great, but the people pleasing, which can lead to making assumptions and not clarifying things is something I think we can ALL relate to.

Whilst as a child we’re still finding our way on how to handle misunderstandings and know what good communication looks like (and we might not have had a parent that modelled it well to learn from), habits like this in adulthood wreak havoc in relationships.