Mom reveals how she got over the trauma of being forced to move out after turning 18

Not everybody is lucky enough to experience a healthy and happy childhood with a positive environment in the family. Sometimes the rules imposed by the parents on their kids also harm them in the long run and they are never held accountable for it. Vicki Lemons—who goes by @vicki.lemons on TikTok—made a couple of videos on the platform to share how her mother had an absurd and strict rule laid down for her and her siblings which made Lemons' life a lot harder.

Fortunately, she was able to break free from the childhood trauma and set off on her healing journey. Lemons shared how her mom's 18/30 rule was something that made her initial years rocky. The 18/30 rule according to her was that all the kids had to move out of the house within 30 days of turning 18. “The rule in my mom’s house was 18 and 30,” Lemons explained. “Once you turned 18, you had 30 days to get out.”

Lemons' brother went to serve in the military when he was 17 whereas Lemons herself managed to graduate high school at 17, then she somehow got herself an apartment soon after turning 18. “It was so hard to go to work every day and pay for my place and all my utilities with no guidance. My mother was horrible with money,” she recalled in her video. “I attempted at the same time to go to college; that didn’t work out at that time. It was too much. I was going from being in an abusive survival mode to lonely survival mode and it was traumatizing.”

She continued about how a lot of people don't realize that the way they treat their kids makes a lot of difference in their lives while they are growing up. In a second video, while answering questions from her curious followers, Lemons described how her mother had a mentality that created an unsuitable environment for her and her siblings to grow up in. “She had this mentality like, ‘I’m gonna do it all on my own, I don’t need him’ kind of thing,” she shared about her parents' separation. “So she never even got child support, but she also never filed for it.”

“At 16, I was working two jobs, and I graduated high school at 17,” she said, explaining that her mom never asked for money. "She just wanted us to get out. I never felt like my mom’s house was home. We grew up in a very abusive family home life and we didn’t feel comfortable there. It wasn’t home. It was the house we lived in." Now that she has her own kids, she wants to break the cycle of trauma for them. “My children have a home. I’m so thankful that my husband and I get to give that to our children,” she added. 

Fellow TikTok creators were amazed at how brave Lemon has been in her young years and is now creating a safe environment for her children to grow up in. @thecuratedcottage wrote: "Same at 17 I couldn’t go to college because I was paying rent. This adult life is nothing to rush into. My son can take his time." @pennycoco50 commented: "Baby it sounds like your mom never grew up I'm sorry she did that to you I have one daughter she has grown but I could never do that to my child." @twokoifish shared: "I know a girl who came home from school on her 18th birthday to the locks being changed. They threw all her stuff to the curb. She's happy now, but she never spoke to them again."