Baby Boomer myths you might still believe

We can’t stop time, but we can learn for it. To say things have changed over the course of our lives is to say it lightly. If anyone had told me I would spend my morning colouring in with a friend over a latte, both of us single, still working, pushing 70 and feeling proud for overcoming a challenging yoga pose, I might not have believed them.

But then, as our generation has proved time and time again, just because it isn’t so doesn’t mean it’s so!

Here are just some of the things I believed at some point in my life that I now know are simply not true. I’d love to know if you believed these things once too!

1. If you sit on concrete or cast iron, you’ll get piles.
2. X-ray machines are completely safe.
3. Before I was an adult, I was a “juvenile delinquent”.
4. Cigarettes help you relax.
5. You must brush your hair 100 times a day.
6.  Can’t wash your hair when you’re menstruating.
7. Sports and games are only for young people.
8. If you have sex while standing up, you won’t get pregnant.
9. This pill will take all the risk out of sex.
10. Ladies wear gloves.
11. One day I will grow up to be a lady and wear tweed and respectable shoes.
12. Only prostitutes don’t wear tights.
13. You don’t eat or smoke in the street.
14. The man should always pay on a date.
15. Women will never be allowed to join the army or navy.
16. Once you get married, your career is over.
17. If I work hard all my life, the government will look after me when I’m old.
18. If you listen to that music, you’ll go to hell.
19. It’s illegal to be gay.
20. It’s wrong to go shopping on a Sunday.
21. Velcro is magic.
22. You mustn’t wear trousers to work or school.
23. Women aren’t cut out for politics.
24. Everyone has a right to free education.
25. When you get married, it’s for life.
26. Women become nurses; men become doctors.
27. Definitely no sex before marriage (ahem).
28. Fizzy drink and chips are party food.
29. Fish on a Friday; roast on Sunday; bubble and squeak on Monday.
30. Old age starts at 50.

Do any of these sound familiar? What did you once believe that you no longer hold true?