While I was little my dad was my hero. My mom didnt want me and the home i lived in with my mom was doomed for a bad, unhealthy, horrible life.
My dad rescued me when I was 5. Growing up i slowly had to relize that my dad wasnt that great. He was mean to others, an alcholic and Im starting to think he is bi-polor. The hardest things I've ever had to relize was my dad isnt the hero he was. He is in fact somethig i never want to be anything like.

What was the hardest lession for you guys to learn while growing up.

That one has really made me think, your case of learning your parents weren't perfect applies to nearly everyone to some degree, but it was clearly on a bigger scale for you.
I don't think I had many surprises, but knowing I couldn't be looked after at home until I possibly got married was quite a hard blow, I managed living on my own but the hardest part was realising it was indefinite, and could last all my life. So learning you can't invite people to share your life at will was probably my lesson.

My childhood was a little like a storybook. My parents have been married for 30 years. They were high school sweethearts. My mother, little sister and I are best friends, and my dad is my hero. Still. My sister and I were improbably good kids; our lowest grades all through school were B's, we both had good friends, were generally kind and generous, (except to each other, but that's a different story. We were nice, but we were still siblings,) we didn't do any drugs or smoke or drink and we didn't generally hang with a "bad crowd." We came from large families that were very close. Like I said, a storybook.

My hardest lesson growing up was learning that real life wasn't like a storybook, and growing up in one made me ill-prepared for it. My marriage to my high school sweetheart wasn't going to last just because my parents' had. My friends didn't all love me as much as I loved them. My parents' families were not the big, friendly clans I thought they were. In short, my life was not a storybook.

Sort of relevant, I think the hardest lesson is the step from school into the real world. School is where they teach you nothing useful but at the same time fill you with hopes and ambitions. Changing the world, making a difference, living life the way i want to live it. Then one day youre cut loose and BOO! it aint anything like what that, sink or swim, dog eat dog. Hold onto those dreams tight or they'll slip through your fingers before you even realise.
Well you know what i mean.

People change - Your dad did what he thought was best for you at the time.
From your post I think that you don't now see what he really did for you then - because his later life has clouded your thoughts- which is a shame as reading your post he took you from a life you didn't want to live.
Hoping you've found happiness.

That a sane person is someone you don't know very well.

A scrape I got while stacking my bike.

Oh! lesson not lesion.


That family are always there no matter how crappy you are to them.

Learning when to keep my mouth shut. Sitll haven't mastered this one!

Seriously, I have a tendency to be very open and honest and say exactly what I think without sometimes considering how the other person will take it. I find it hard to cope with people who read hidden meanings into my words that weren't there in the first place and then find that I've offended them unintentionally.

Sometimes, I just suffer from "foot-in-mouth disease". For instance, on one occasion recently, I was discussing building a house with a friend. I had been to look at display homes. She asked me if I had checked out a particular company's display house. I said yes and followed it up with a resume of all the building faults I noticed in their display. I said that you'd have to be mad to buy one of their homes if they couldn't even get the display right. Oops! Guess who just bought one because the Managing Director of said company was a friend!

oh, MG I could write a book about foot in mouth disease! This is going to sound very harsh of me (and a bit off topic) but my partner's grandmother died a couple years ago. We never saw her, I'd only met her once, it wasn't a huge deal at the time of her death as she was very elderly and my partner hadn't seen her for a long time himself. So a few months ago I open my mouth wide enough for both feet in a moment of total stupidity and ask him how she was doing. Felt soooo small when he reminded me.

I've thought of another one, positive this time though, as though learning the actual lesson was hard, the lesson gained was valuable. That is, it's never important to keep a perfect record in anything. It's an artificial and unnecessary value.
So many people like I was originally are proud of never failing an exam or breaking a bone/having a certain illness/doing something on the 'most embarrassing thing list' or whatever your personal favourite 'clean sheet' may be.
Well I can tell you, in this case, pride can only lead to a fall, as time itself will usually make sure the longer you keep said clean sheet, and raises you higher and higher, the further you will fall when it breaks the sequence. In reality, these are imaginary competitions we create, and what really counts is what good things we have, not whether you've lost a particular one that's probably unimportant except for the fact it's stayed away for so long. Does anyone really care whether you've never broken a bone or not? As long as if you do it's OK now, that's what counts.

I've learnt this a few times until I no longer try and look around to see what areas I've still kept perfect records as it's really down to luck, and means little either way. So take a load off your minds and take one more thing from your worry list.

The easiest thing I ever did was leave home. I went off to college and then my first job was traveling. Getting out of a family that I was the scapegoat for was the best thing that ever happened. But the hardest thing has been to really learn my own strength. Somehow when you do things because you HAVE to, they don't feel like strengthes. The fact I could travel the country and be by myself all the time has felt like I've invited lonilness to be my best friend. And I still live far away, although I am not traveling anymore. It's hard to be alone and I am working on changing that!

I just got home from taking two brothers, 5 yr old twins from my day care to see a magician in a town about 45 miles away. It was so fun to be with them and to take care of them for the afternoon. It was great to be their support during this and to see their excitment.

Now, if I could magically find a little family of my own, I'd be realllll happy! And joyful!!!

My hardest thing was to grow up, I still feel like a kid. I have trouble adapting to adulthood.