What were you told - and believed - as a child

I believed that there was a man in the moon and I believed my mother when she said that as a child in Ireland she had found a comb belonging to the Banshee who would sit in a field combing her hair! Also that if you swallowed chewing gum, it would stick to your heart and you would die and that you would become ill if you washed your hair during your period.

My Mum believed that a girl could only get pregnant after 10.00. Well she must have because that was my curfew time. And you know what, she was right!

My parents told me that me kitten (who was very ill snd kept having diarrhoea all over the house) had been sent to a farm where 'it wouldnt matter'! I believed this till i was in my late teens when my brother heard me telling someone and laughed at me. Of couse the cat had been put down.

My dad told me that RIP on a headstone meant 'Return Im Possible'....I suppose he was right really!

Thunder was God rearranging the furniture. Don't swallow chewing gum, as above. Don't go out with wet hair you'll catch pneumonia. Don't swim on a full stomach because you'll sink (some truth in that one)

All those that Nina says plus don't sit on school radiators (piles) eat crusts for curly hair, don't step on the cracks in pavements ( fall down to Hell) eat carrots for good eyesight ( did you ever see a rabbit wearing glasses?)

KatyK I'm so glad you were told not to wash your hair when you had your period. My mum told me this as well but when I asked her in later years where that had come from, she called me stupid for thinking she would say anything so ridiculous!

My gran would turn mirrors to the wall and cover cutlery with a towel to stop them being hit by lightning, while the thunder was God moving his furniture in Heaven. I remember in my late teens reading that thunder was Satan having sex, which seemed a much more fun explanation

My mother was born in 1919 but didn't believe any of these superstitions. I laughed at my poor old granny for telling us nonsense like getting wet would give us colds or swallowing fruit stones gave people appendicitis. She had a superstition for every occasion and it was only later that I knew these old beliefs were the result of not understanding. She had had no more education after 13 and her own father was illiterate.

Its bad luck to open an umbrella in the house, never put new gloves or hat on a table, look in a mirror for too long and you will see the devil. My father would never be the third one to take a light from a match (I think that one came from soldiers in the trenches during the war). Never give an empty purse or wallet to someone as a gift (I still do this, when I gave my brother a new wallet for Christmas I think he was more pleased with the $50 I had put in it!)

Never put shoes on the table...bad luck apparently. Those white flecks on you fingernails mean you're a little liar and don't play with egg shells as they give you warts.

If you're at a party and the lights go out, jump on a table and proclaim 'My body is a temple of the Holy Spirit.' Yes, Catholic upbringing, this one came from the nuns though, not my Mum, she was far too sensible.

Just remembered another one - before you go to sleep, make a sign of the cross in front of your ears to stop earnings entering them during the night.

Some of these are so funny and definitely bringing back memories!

Talking about the Catholic Church, my Dad told me I must never whistle because it made Our Lady (the Virgin Mary) cry.

Just reread my last post. Should read earwigs not earnings

My mother is the most superstitious person I know, though my [gullible] sisters come pretty close; therefore I was brought up having to pay heed to all the superstitious nonsense outlined above, but never believed in any of it myself. However I DID believe that fairies inhabited the allotment sheds that I saw when I was going into town on the bus. My grandad told me that (fairy)tale when I was very young and I think I was almost in my teens before I actually questioned it. [shame]

Or even

We had a large wireless and I used to sit next to it when Listen with Mother came on.
I was told, and firmly believed, that Daphne Oxenford et al lived, in miniature form, inside the wireless.

The other one was that an older girl who lived in our road told me when I was about 7 that if a boy was rude to me I would have a baby and disgrace my family. I avoided boys for years

More from Catholics.

A whistling woman, a crowing hen, is neither good for God or men.

Never put bread on the fire. It's a sin, unless you burn it for the holy souls.

It wasn`t just crusts that made your hair curl, eating the burnt edge on cake had the same effect, but my hair`s still naturally straight!

Oh, and never stare at anyone with a pot leg (plaster cast) or you`d end up with one yourself. And "hold your collar and never swaller" when you saw a funeral passing.

Sorry, just remembered another one. The weed that grew in the hedgerows that I now know is Shepherds purse, we called Mother die, and if you picked it, your mother would die. I never dared to put it to the test.

dramatictessa I was trying to work out what the right word was!

So many chewing gum warnings! We had that one too but we were never actually allowed to have chewing gum.

My mother also said we should never pick bluebells because they scream when you pick them and also never bring may blossom (hawthorn) into the house as it was unlucky.

I still to this day turn a finished boiled egg over in the egg cup and crack the top to let the fairies out! So do my
grandchildren. Now where could they have got that from?!

Oh yes and another one of my mother's - don't look at a new moon through glass. I have no idea why but I still have a sense of impending doom if I accidentally do so!

I wonder where the story about crusts came from? My granny told me that to no avail. I still throw salt over my shoulder if I spill it and told my gd why. I think my secondary school teacher warned me about chewing gum. I believed God only gave babies to married people .

think the story about the crusts was during the war time when food was short and kids were told that to encourage them to eat the whole slice of bread.