OP, I recommend thinking more constructively about the values you want to instill in your kids, and not thinking of it in terms of the circumstances that taught you particular values. You don't want to raise poor or rich kids, you want to raise kids who act and think a certain way no matter how new their things are. Know what I mean? My mom is from a backgroun dlike yours and I know there is a lot of anxiety (you alluded to therapy) around going from having little to having enough. You don't want to pass on that anxiety, you want to pass on the lessons you learned from it.

Anonymous wrote:If your 7 year old kid is already asking about 1st class to Disney because other friends talk about 1st class and you want to instill some sort of respect for the poor and working hard, I'd get out of the neighborhood and school you're living in. First class is way beyond a typical middle class lifestyle at any time and nothing a 7 year old should be bringing up unless they're on a plane to visit family and happen to notice the first class seats.

I am the poster who wrote this, and this is almost what happened. My 7 year old is familiar with first class because, on one of the few times he has been on an airplane (with his dad on a short business trip), they got bumped up to first class, thanks to my DH's high standing with the airline. But the effect is the same. He flew "first class." What he didn't get is that he flew first class that one time, because my DH, in working his tail off traveling for years, had earned the status.

This, in a nutshell, describes OP's problem, I think. Our kids are reaping so many benefits of other people's hard work (parents, grandparents, etc.) that it becomes an expectation to them.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Maybe I should not have used the examples about gratitude. Everyone has sort of focused on just that and the hard work thing. Yes, I mean those things too. But there is more to it than that. I can't quite put it into words, but the pps who posted about the differences between class cultures were getting at it. I want my DC to be comfortable in poor neighborhoods and with poor people; to be able to go anywhere and fit in. Plus, middle class people can be so stiff and serious and judgmental/entitled (and not just about material things). I'm not sure I will understand how to parent a child who is entitled.

Could this be coming from the part of you that remembers being a child and being embarassed about being poor and/or assuming that kids from families with money were either "better" than you or that those kids saw themselves as "better" than you? Sounds a little like you are projecting a bit onto your kids beause you don't want them to become like the kids who were better than you, taking you back to that feeling all over again?

Feelings like that are hard to shake in adulthood.

No! Poverty sucks. There's nothing idyllic about it. Constant anxiety from insecurity about housing, food, education, transportation, employment, health care, neighborhood violence, etc, etc. Middle class is fine with me!

I grew up middle class in Soviet Union(well, we were all middle class).My childhood was awesome-the village was the playground, and every toy was special since they were hard to come by and often handed down to other relatives.The shortage of stuff really let us concentrate on doing things rather than having things.
But I can still remember the fuzzy feeling I got when I received a toy or two.
I have stopped buying stuff for my American kid, I stopped when I noticed he is overwhelmed and doesn't care about them.I don't think he has even noticed that his mom hasn't got him anything in last 3 years.When he does ask for something I tell him the sad story how in "Russia" we didn't have this and that.Boy can't believe his mother still trying to pull the "Russian" story while she is from Estonia.
Shortly, just fund the 529 plan, they'll thank you later.

OP here. Maybe I should not have used the examples about gratitude. Everyone has sort of focused on just that and the hard work thing. Yes, I mean those things too. But there is more to it than that. I can't quite put it into words, but the pps who posted about the differences between class cultures were getting at it. I want my DC to be comfortable in poor neighborhoods and with poor people; to be able to go anywhere and fit in. Plus, middle class people can be so stiff and serious and judgmental/entitled (and not just about material things). I'm not sure I will understand how to parent a child who is entitled.

Even if you are middle class or well off you can still raise kids to be thankful for what they have and not give them too much stuff.

Anonymous wrote:A child can be well-off without being spoiled and materialistic.

We are upper-middle class. My children say please and thank you without being prompted, are appreciative of gifts, and I don't worry about it at all.

This.

I just want to respond to the post on Mick Jagger. The man cheated on his wife and still hasn't adopted the four children he's had. I think they at least deserve the home they grew up in. He seems to be obsessed with himself and money. You can be stingy with money to a point to teach good life lessons, but children also realize easily when parents are overly obsessed with money, ungenerous, and just use it to spend on themselves. You want to instill in your children the value and importance of working to earn money and the need to live humbly. You don't need to instill how to be greedy with it.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2295015/Jagger-Jerry-war-10m-mansion-calls-home.html