When we’re born, we rely completely on the adults around us to keep us safe. They’re the ones expected to notice when something’s wrong and ensure our needs are taken seriously. But not everyone receives that kind of attention.
In one Reddit thread, people shared what it was like to have parents who ignored or brushed off their medical issues. Many now find themselves dealing with conditions that should have been treated earlier, and they often struggle with anxiety, mistrust, or even a deep discomfort around asking for help at all.
Below, you’ll find their stories and the long-lasting impact that early neglect can leave behind.
#1
I was often ill as a child and would get tonsillitis several times a year. I quickly learned that being ill meant being, at best, an inconvenience, and at worst the cause of all our family problems
My nmother would often get mad and shout at me for “getting ill on purpose” and “being an attention-seeker yet again”. I now don’t go to the doctors or dentists unless absolutely truly necessary because I expect to get shouted at.
Image source: Charlotte1902, Getty Images
#2
As a teen, I was told I wasn’t sick, I was just trying to skip school! When I was still in bed 4 days later, through the entire weekend, Nmom begrudgingly commented, maybe you are sick…. Severe bronchitis with the onset of pneumonia. Thanks Nmom.
Now, when I’m sick, I’m terrified that my boss will accuse me of faking it just so I can skip work. Which is ridiculous because I’m one of the most non-absent people I know!
I have a hard time accepting that I’m sick or injured.
Image source: Longjumping_Lynx_460, New Africa
#3
I was just last year, at age 37, diagnosed with ADHD inattentive type. I have always been absent minded and get hyper-focused on my interests. But because I never caused trouble, had excellent grades, and stellar standardized test scores, I “didn’t need the help.” I also struggled a lot with anxiety and sometimes depression.
Last year I started Stratera, and it was a giant help with the anxiety and depression. Didn’t help with the focus much so I started a low dose of adderall this spring.
Holy hell it feels like I’m suddenly running my life on Easy mode.
#4
This was way before Obama care or even public insurance. Infertile by my 20’s and diabetes by 32. PCOS. I got diagnosed the same year that public health insurance came out. I had to go to the ER when I was 12 for a cyst the size of a golf ball. I couldn’t make a follow up appointment because I was a minor and dad would just whine and complain when I asked him to do it. He said that prayer should work but it didn’t so no grandchildren for him.
Image source: anon, carlesmiro
#5
My teeth are totally messed up.
Image source: JuniorPomegranate9, Anna Shvets
#6
Permeant scaring down my left leg from knee to ankle. Mom screaming at me for thinking I needed to go to ER for 6 deep gashes running down my leg after hooking myself on a fence. We’re talking past muscle to bone. She wanted to watch her “shows” and it was “no big deal”. My legs and clothes were covered in blood and I could barely walk. Angrily she brought paper towels and taped them on my leg, called me stupid and walked away. No antibacterial prevention whatsoever.
I only lived half a mile from the hospital and was a teen so normally would’ve walked but could only crawl. Left those paper towels on my leg for a few days because mom wouldn’t help and I couldn’t get them off. Thank God my HS friend at the time was a new medic in the army because when I told him about it he rushed over and properly changed my bandages. The paper towels were beginning to heal with flesh that should’ve been stitched to begin with and was terrible to clean out + repair. He used what he could and got me antibiotics since I didn’t get the help I should’ve had.
The affect? Permanent, ugly scaring. A ton of anger/resentment. Mom’s refusal to take responsibility to date. The embarrassment of having to expose my neglect to a fairly new friend who immediately asked me w*f was wrong with my mom. Oh and as an adult? I ignore EVERY pain and health concern regarding my body because my entire childhood was made up of situations where my illness + injuries were non-existent or “not that bad” so I’m so far disassociated from my body it’s hard to believe I live in one at times.
And the real kicker? NPD mom has munchausen syndrome. She’s been dying of every made up thing on a daily basis my entire life. I NEVER was allowed to be ill, that was her spotlight, not mine ever. Even if I was really sick or ya know, I was seriously injured and should’ve got stitches.
Image source: VegetableHour6712, volodymyr-t
#7
Autoimmune diseases probably due to stress and trauma.
#8
Daily pain from a neglected orthopedic issue that could have been fixed in childhood. That is what the doc now says, so it’s pain for life for my because ndad couldn’t be bothered for a doc appointment for me. GC sis got as much as she wanted of everything. Just I wasn’t allowed to go.
Image source: randomusername1919, Getty Images
#9
Never taught how to brush our teeth. Never taken to a pediatrician…..didn’t receive all vaccinations.
Image source: Estudiier, Getty Images
#10
I was born with bilateral clubbed feet. Apparently, it was quite a severe case. Mom said my big toes touched the insides of my knees.
For over a hundred years now, the treatment has been tried and true: castings and braces.
When my nephew was 7 months old Mom had some sort of attack of remorse and took me out to lunch to admit to me that my braces at that age had been set too far apart and I’d howled in pain for hours and hours. She didn’t take me to hospital. She didn’t remove the braces. She didn’t call the doctor. She beat me semiconscious.
It was actually here on reddit that I figured out the longer term consequences of her shame. A lady came on and talked about her son, who had a clubbed foot and the treatment of braces and castings and how long they’re meant to be done. Which was clearly not done for me since I have NO memory of braces or casts. Mom stopped doing it. So, instead, I have a memory of a surgery I had to try and correct my feet.
It didn’t work. I have foot deformities now, and I have pain. I have always had pain. I was taught not to express it because it makes people uncomfortable. Especially Mom.
Don’t worry, folks, we are fully NC, and between the foot deformities and the spinal and hip issues they caused, I’m now solidly on what one might call “The Good Stuff.”
Image source: kifferella, Getty Images
#11
My ND has a fear of needles, so he never went to the dentist. Because he never went to the densit, I never went for regular dental cleanings as a kid either. I had braces, but no cleanings in between, and didn’t get the retainer after. When I first became an “adult”, and I picked a dentist, he (the dentist) talked smack to me for not going regularly and needing a deep cleaning, etc done so of course I didn’t go back again. A few years later, I was having some issues and found a different dentist. He (that dentist) had a conversation with me and simply asked me why I didn’t go and what my fear was. I explained, he was very kind, talked to me about what needed to be done and why, and we got the work done that I needed. Now I go every 3 months for a cleaning (2 through insurance, and I pay 2 OOP) to avoid needing to have any additional work done. I’ve been doing this like clockwork with this one dentist since 2017/2018.
I also make sure to go for my annual medical exam once a year and have my blood panels ran just to make sure I’m staying healthy. I only went to the doctors as a kid for chicken pox, casts, and stitches.
Image source: tdybr07, Cedric Fauntleroy
#12
She never took me to a doctor but for some reason loved taking me to the dentist. The guy smoked and didn’t wear gloves. I could taste the nicotine on his fingers. I am in my 50s now and I still hate going to the dentist.
Image source: IbelieveIcanWiFi
#13
All my teeth are rotting and my jaw clicks when i chew.
Image source: Fuzzy_Toe_9936, engin akyurt
#14
My mom was told by multiple teachers, my direct teachers and just other teachers, told her to get me diagnosed for something cause I was excelling in academics but I was socially messed up (spoiler: it was autism) and she just ignored them cause she was embarrassed to have an autistic kid. And when my siblings started (also autistic) and they noticed a pattern but no diagnosis for any of us they just shuttled us into the “gifted” program so we had something I guess. They could have like called cps but I digress.
Image source: Swimming_Olive_7021, freepik
#15
I was honest with my doctors. I didn’t see a gynecologist til my mid 20s because family didn’t do birth control, I was expected to be a virgin then given to a man in an arranged marriage, so it’s not like I’d ever have STDs right? 😑
When I finally went I was like look, I’m really nervous, I’m had a lot of medical neglect and this is actually my first time here. I feel stupid having never been to do this stuff before so please be patient with me. They understood completely.
However, generally speaking, I’m like almost dying before I’ll seek help for anything. My brain keeps telling me I’m stupid and this is like some weakness in me to be sick, not anything real. It’s horrible.
Image source: Scheissekase, Meg Aghamyan
#16
I got diagnosed with gluten intolerance at age 26, after a lifetime of relentless stomach cramps, diarrhea, headaches, eczema, and pain in my joints. Yes, even as an 8 year old I had joint pain. She never once considered it might be caused by a dietary intolerance, or had me tested for any allergies (it wouldn’t have shown up in an allergy test, but she didn’t even try it) or did elimination diets.
And every symptom my mother told me I was making up, except my eczema. My eczema was concentrated on my scalp behind my ears and the ditches of my elbows and knees. My mother – who knew it was eczema because the doctor said it was and prescribed me a steroid cream – made me feel horrible by forcing me to use dandruff shampoo which did nothing for my eczema or the flakes it causes, and told me I got it in my elbow and knee ditches from being sweaty and not washing properly. I was *obsessed* with taking showers for years because I thought I was somehow dirty and that’s why I had these afflictions (that were eczema).
I’d constantly have debilitating pain in my intestines and ask to stay home from school. She said I was making it up and just didn’t want to go to school. She knew all of my bowel movements were diarrhea for my entire life, but never showed any concern or took me to the doctor about it. My need to run to the bathroom right after I ate never concerned her.
I thought my joint pain was normal and everyone had it until I got to college. I thought it was normal to just be in pain all the time because of my mother. At 39, I still struggle with pain management; I’m willing to get used to pain rather than going to a doctor because in my mind I’m just imaging it/making it up.
Image source: howisaraven
#17
I wish I had any but my mom ignored my need for jaw surgery, didn’t “notice” when I relapsed, didn’t do (m)any follow ups, kind of overall left me in a lurch roughly a year post op. I tried the other day to recall how often I even saw a dentist or doctor and it’s a blank – after a certain while it wasn’t a regular thing, like I remember seeing my orthodontist leading up to the shocking surgery I received but not a doctor or dentist. I remember I broke a tooth during lunch, this was after jaw surgery, because I had a cavity.
When I turned 30 I started to get over extreme anxiety to fix whatever happened after my surgery and it’s when I learned about how to brush and floss (I never learned, I don’t think I was seeing a dentist even while in braces) and then I also learned about how much my jaw impacted my other issues. Like my family bullied me because I was always tired and struggled to get out of bed so I was the end of a ton of jokes. My first doctor as an adult immediately requested I do a sleep test, turns out my jaw issues caused sleep apnea my whole life. Another thing is I didn’t have a period like most of my teens and 20s. Literally a doctor would have inquired about that issue if I ever saw one but I didn’t, nor did I like, receive any information. Neither did my sister. That has had maybe I guess the worst impact. I don’t know about me – I never wanted kids but I think the whole no period thing is a huge medical issue. I’m currently just not thinking about it. Seeing doctors as an adult has opened a whole host of I can’t afford this medical stuff.
Image source: anonymous_opinions
#18
I suffered medical neglect, I was not taken to the doctor from age 10 on. Which is crazy considering both of my parents have mental and physical disabilities. I think their own fear of the doctor made them just not want to take me in unless something was wrong, but even when there was something wrong they didn’t take me. I was told to “rub some dirt on it” or that I was “young, you’ll feel better tomorrow” and my personal favorite “oh you’re sore? Imagine how I feel, you don’t have the right to complain about pain because you don’t know real pain like I do”. I remember I broke my wrist skateboarding and all they did was buy a cheap wrist brace. My wrist now clicks when I move it because it healed improperly, X-rays have confirmed this and there’s nothing the doctors can do about it.
As an adult, I finally went to the doctor, explained that I hadn’t had any vaccines or physicals for a decade, and we started running tests. I have scoliosis, endometriosis, anemia, and fibromyalgia. That’s not even mentioning my mental health. Like… f**k them for all their “suck it up, you’re young” talk. Right now, my doctor is starting to think I might have MS, which is absolutely hilarious because my stepmom has MS and that was always the reason she told me to shut up and deal with the pain.
Image source: GalacticGoku, JSB Co.
#19
I started experiencing symptoms of fibromyalgia at 11. I didn’t get a diagnosis or start treatment until I was 23 despite being in pain and fatigued pretty much every day of my life.
I wasn’t allowed to be sick as a kid. I last took a sick day in middle school, even in college I only missed class when I was exposed to COVID.
I have now been diagnosed with like 8 chronic illnesses, not counting the mental ones. They’re all caused by the stress of living with my nparents, I’m certain. My parents won’t help me at all, even when I’m in agony and nearly bed bound they just mock me, yell at me, and demand I do more chores. They don’t believe I even have any diagnoses! I keep having to push myself way further than I should be with my conditions because they demand it.
Image source: golden-ink-132
#20
Disabled. Joints don’t work, stomach doesn’t work, brain doesn’t work.
Had tonsillitis 8-12x/year, every year since I was 6, mom refused to remove tonsils, stayed sick, antibiotics needed everytime, got them out at 21 but damage was done. My immune system was shot.
Joints would dislocate as a kid, said I was lying and being dramatic. Now can barely walk.
Had stomach issues a ton as a kid, doc told my fam I was faking, now I can’t eat anything without getting sick.
Everytime I get a flare up I get angry because if they had cared enough I wouldn’t be suffering but ya know. What can ya do.
Image source: RingofFaya
#21
I may have Ehler’s Danlos, just found out at 32. I also have a horrible spine (kyphoscoliosis) because therapy was not given early enough for my condition. I was malnourished and have body covering acne from that. Oh! And I may also be AuDHD but it’s too late for a formal diagnosis on THAT in my area. So my mental health is bad and my life is built on literal physical and emotional coping mechanisms.
Image source: Intrepid_Talk_8416
#22
My teeth are so crooked. I was always told “they will settle after your jaw grows.” They could afford it. They didn’t prioritize it.
Image source: blackcatspat
#23
I’ve started the process of getting diagnosed for hEDS and POTS. One doc I said my case is so clear and bad that it’s a miracle I wasn’t diagnosed much younger. Which I’m sure would be true for any child who was actually taken to the hospital after randomly fainting and breaking bones like they’re glass. It was so validating but also infuriating.
Image source: More_Rise
#24
My ankles crack and pop really badly. They get really sore when it is storming out. Sometimes one of them freezes up and won’t move until I crack it. All due to never going to the hospital after a car accident.
I also have skin picking disorder that got really bad after I got a spider bite that turned into a huge abscess and my mother squeezed out the poison herself. It was such horrific pain that lasted days. Ever since then any small bump in my skin and I feel I need to squeeze out the poison before it gets really bad.
Which, mixed with the constant lice and rashes I had, due to living in a hoarders house, making me always itchy scratchy, turned into a whole OCD. Where stress makes me itchy and I feel like there bumps on my skin I need to get off immediately.
Speaking of the hoard, I also have a terrible sense of taste and smell and horribly scared ears, which also get painful when it is cold or stormy out, due to the constant sinus and ear infections I had as a child.
And all of these issues doctors are constantly dismissing me about and not providing me treatment for because I’m “too young to have those sorts of issues.”.
Image source: RedoftheEvilDead
#25
Not neglected per se, but basically told at age 10 that if I were to open up about what was happening at home I would be in trouble. When I reached out for psychological help in my 20s, my mother snapped at me that I was merely jabbering to my psych.
Gee, complex trauma *and* not easily being able to talk about it, thanks mom!
Edit: interestingly, and I almost forgot to mention this: in between age 10 and my 20s I was “diagnosed” with autism. I say “diagnosed” because in order to diagnose someone with autism you really should be excluding other causes of them not being able to communicate with you first…like you know, being told not to open up about home under penalty of violence.
I’m 42-going-on-43 and I’m still having problems trusting my own judgement.
Image source: hildy-j
#26
Right there with you I’m sorry. All of my siblings too. Besides the dental and medical neglect the main thing is just how it all affected me.
My biggest issue is my anxiety. I feel like because of all of the chaos I’ve had to endure I always think something is wrong or wrong with me. The constant fight or flight damage to my nervous system. Or that I’m going to be judged for things that were out of my control or for not really having a family.
I’m in my 20’s fixing my teeth and I just feel like they knew and were happy for me. Complete strangers, I know it’s their job, but still they seemed genuinely happy for me it meant a lot. They probably see it all the time sadly.
Image source: Tough-Video-4297
#27
I don’t take care of myself because I downplay things until the last minute.
Image source: Anxious_Cricket1989
#28
Sorry you were neglected. Unfortunately, insisting on too much medical intervention is also a narc thing.
I currently have a serious eye problem, severe foot and leg pain, and lost several teeth in my teens and twenties due to experimental treatments. My nm had to have everything about me “fixed” asap. Couldn’t bear to have a “defective” child as she so kindly phrased it.
On the other hand, my complaints of pain were always denied. I was expected to feel no pain from any “treatment”. To this day, I have trouble assessing my pain, rating it, and tend to ignore important symptoms.
Image source: shiplauncherscousin
#29
My teeth are all jacked up. my lungs are scarred from pneumonia and untreated asthma. I could go on.
Image source: anon
#30
My teeth aren’t too great. I should have had jaw surgery but nmom said we couldn’t afford it and if I had the surgery I would “bankrupt” them. Now I’m too old to have the surgery. I did have to have my appendix removed when I was 11. I remember my nmom standing over me while I was on the floor in the fetal position and crying in pain. She had her arms crossed and was furious that they were going to have to pay to take me to the emergency room. When I was 13 or 14, I horribly jammed my knee, it was so painful I really think I tore something. I just had to walk it off and now every time I bend that knee, it makes a clicking/snapping sound. My nmom refused to take me to a doctor for that one, she said there was nothing they could do to help me. Then there’s the adhd, anxiety, depression….
Image source: rabbimindtrick
#31
I don’t go to the doctor until things are so bad I wind up hospitalised. I also have a tbi, there are badly healed fractures in my jaw, I have scarred lungs, and my hip is permanently damaged from when she threw me down the stairs and it dislocated and was never replaced properly.
Too much trauma to recount without getting upset.
Image source: nunyaranunculus
#32
I’m disabled, and I truly believe I wouldn’t be if I had received proper medical care. I would still have medical issues because they’re hereditary, but I don’t think it would have destroyed my life the way it has.
Image source: princess-cottongrass
#33
My mother was extremely selective about what she felt was necessary pay attention to medically. She would defend herself from allegations of neglect by asserting that she is a nurse. As I was growing up, dental appointments were few and far between (my teeth are terrible). I have several broken bones, two of which I had to beg to be taken to a hospital for. The worst act of medical neglect was when I became so sick that I was ill with a really bad cold for 2+ weeks and was never seen by a doctor. I began having epileptic seizures not long after that.
Image source: TimeConfusion0
#34
I went to the dentist once at 8yrs old. Got fillings, they fell out, never got replaced. Now I had to get a root canal on one and probably soon the other.
Image source: Cars_and_guns_gal
#35
I was rarely if ever, taken to a doctor. Dentist? Sure. Eye doctor? Definitely. But a regular doctor? Nope. Not even a obgyn as a teen. I finally went to an obgyn as an adult though.
But I’m currently without health insurance so I can’t afford any doctors.
Image source: ClockworkMinds_18
#36
I tend to assume I’m just faking it or being melodramatic. To the point that when I was pregnant with my first I struggled to believe it was real and that I wasn’t just pretending for attention.
Image source: claaaaaaaah
#37
I’ve got celiac. Had digestive and bowel problems my whole childhood. Also suffered some mental issues because of the undiagnosed celiac….here we are 49 and severely broken as a human.
Image source: Van-Halentine75
#38
My parents are the best at ignoring something long enough that it seemingly goes away. Trying to untangle that bad habit in my adulthood. Not because I want to ignore these things but because my parents always did I don’t know how to take action.
Image source: professional-star456
#39
I’m not taking aging well. I don’t know what’s happening I finally realized and am trying to accept that this is another stage of aging but it feels like my life just started and now that I’m ready my body is already on low fuel and changing for the worse. I have to be forced to realize I need to go to the doctor I tend to feel it’ll get better until things get so bad I end up at the ER. Then I end up googling everything under the sun but I do it properly but I get judged for googling about medical stuff I mean. Simply restarting or starting but at very late stage. I think this will always be like this. Buuttt: better late than never! We rock.
Image source: TrappedDervesh
#40
I am extremely sick and fragile. Can’t work. Done to me via constant cortisol overload.
Image source: featherblackjack
Follow Us
