Getting rid of old diaries

[DawnM]

I am 50.  I just got rid of about 10 of my old college and just post college diaries.

 

The "this is what I did today" was fine and interesting to look back and see what I have done/what I did, etc...

 

But the STUPID STUFF!  Holy cow.....could I have talked about boys any more than I did?  I don't think so.

 

Today's reading???  
 

I was probably 24.

 

"Eric and I went out and met such and such group for dinner.  He offered to pay for my meal and I thought that meant he finally wanted to start something more than a friendship, but then on the way home he told me he didn't want to date white women.  Why would he do that?  I wish I could stop liking him so much."

 

(Eric was Asian and I was infatuated to say the least.)

 

That was one of the least sappy posts about various guys.  STUPID STUPID STUPID.  

 

I finally decided that if I died tomorrow I would be MORTIFIED if anyone read these things.

 

That is all.  Not sure why I shared, but there ya go.

[Miss Peregrine]

Yea. I took mine to an open air mall and deposited torn pieces in every trashcan until they were gone. I was afraid if I threw it away whole it could end up on Lifetime. :lol:

[Hilltopmom]

Woodstove :)

[DesertBlossom]

I think I ripped out pages of one of my college journals that talked too much about boys I was infatuated with at the time. It's funny how at the time it felt SO IMPORTANT but now any guys prior to DH are really irrelevant. I mean, I learned some things along the way. But my posterity sure as heck doesn't need to know the details. 

[heartlikealion]

:lol:

 

I read some of my old entries not long ago. I think I just have one hardcopy journal.

 

I have a livejournal online I haven't touched in ... years? I'm pretty sure my facebook is just another boring account of my life lol.

Edited April 11, 2017 by heartlikealion

[SKL]

LOL I think I still have mine, though I have gone back and forth on whether to destroy them.  They aren't "that bad" (I wouldn't have put the really bad stuff in writing), but I am sure they are super immature.  I had originally kept them thinking my kids would find them interesting someday.  Now I'm thinking, do I really want my kids to know how dumb I was?  There are pros and cons, LOL.

[Guest]

Yeah I tore mine up, put them in a trash bag and poured bleach inside.

 

They did come in handy once though. My best friend and I shared a journal that we'd pass back and forth for notes. When she got engaged I rifled through one of them and found a page where she described THE PERFECT GUY and read it at the party.

 

Luckily her fiance fit the bill lol.

 

Then, bleach buh bye.

[Guest]

Mine all got ripped up and put in the garbage. I really didn't need to leave my angst-ridden pseudo-literary diaries around for posterity.

 

I actually feel a physical aversion to the memory of all those diaries. Ugh. Who wants to remember one's complete dumbness ?

I'm glad it's not just me. I shredded my diaries early in high school and stopped keeping them then. I struggle with even keeping Bullet Journals now. Physical aversion is a great description.

 

The only thing I may have left is some angst ridden poetry, but it's not about anyone specific and not too over the top so for some reason it survived the purge. It's so buried in my cedar chest at some point pitching it became too much work.

[MotherGoose]

I have mine. I used to not worry about it because kids couldn't read, then they couldn't read cursive. Now they can....I should probably do some housekeeping. However, my dear high school friend, with whom I shared them, as well as many handwritten notes of stupidness, died a year ago. So I don't want to get rid of all that but am thinking of sharing the non stupid ones with her daughter. 💕💕

[Spryte]

Aaagh! I have three huge boxes of these to go through, sitting in the closet.

 

All pre-college diaries are gone.

 

The only possible interest I can see in these is combing through for the bits about DH. We had a long history prior to getting married and we have a cool story. Kids might like that part, someday? But all the bits about the in between... ugh!

 

I might just burn them in the fire pit.

[Guest]

I gave all mine from more than 10 years ago to a friend to burn in his burn pit.  I called it The Bonfire of the Vanities.

 

I held back one--it was the book where I kept quotations I liked...a commonplace book, if you will.  But the rest--gone.

 

[cintinative]

oh boy I think I need to dig mine out and start shredding

[UmMusa]

So glad to read this thread!!!

[DawnM]

Thanks for making me feel not so alone.

 

I do hope that Eric is now happily married.  I lost touch with him.

[Ravin]

I have always been lousy at keeping a diary/journal. What I have are occasional snippets, interspersed with science fiction and fantasy stories of varying quality and degrees of completion. A very large tote full of notebooks like that, starting from age 9 or so, going all the way through until I finally started almost exclusively writing on the computer instead, when DD was small.

[heartlikealion]

Thanks for making me feel not so alone.

 

I do hope that Eric is now happily married.  I lost touch with him.

 

That's nice of you to say. He sounded kinda jerky at the time.

[DawnM]

That's nice of you to say. He sounded kinda jerky at the time.

 

 

:laugh:    I think he was immature really.  Just like I was.

[MotherGoose]

I also have my grandmothers diaries from the 1950s in which she recorded the farm events, like how many eggs the hens laid etc.

[Guest]

I threw away my high school and middle school journals at some point around 18yo. I do have several baskets full of other journals though, from my twenties on, though I vacillated in how much I journalled. I do love my journals of how my first and second children were developing. Yes, there's a loy of mundane stuff in there about what they won't eat or how terrible their napping habits are, but I love where I wrote down their spoken vocabularies or when they understood different colors or whatever. I remember once being amazed that DD could tell that these two animals were both called "dogs," even though they looked nothing alike, for example, seeing a picture of a Great Dane and a pucture of a Yorkie and yet knowing that those are both "dogs." That was fascinating.

 

But there is a lot of griping as I worked through certain things with my family members or friends or faith. I do kinds want to burn those just because they are not my finer moments and I'm not sure *this* is what I want to leave for posterity. It is mortifying though to realize I sound so immature.

[LucyStoner]

Pitched them into a bonfire at the beach. Now I no longer have to worry about my kids finding them if I die. :P

[Momto6inIN]

Pitched them into a bonfire at the beach. Now I no longer have to worry about my kids finding them if I die. :P

This is why I burned mine too. Angst and bad poetry is not how I want them to remember me lol

 

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[Spryte]

I used to keep dream journals too. Weird. Got rid of them also. As fascinating as that dream where the lecturer was mocking me at a cheese tasting party was to me, it's not really necessary to keep a written record :)

:)

 

Ok, this reminded me of a guy I knew in high school. His dad not only kept dream journals, he indexed them by subject and date and had them in a card catalogue, like at a library. A wall full of catalogued dreams, dating back something like twenty years. It was ... strange yet fascinating.

[Guest]

My step-mother inherited her mother's calendars. Most of the time it was boring day to day stuff, but she also put in important events. Those made it worth keeping. It also made her start putting notes in her wall calendars and keeping them. 

 

I kept a lot of journals; but against all that is orderly within me, I ripped out a lot of pages, as well.  The rest, I kept for this OTHER thing I am doing.  

 

I got a 3-ring notebook and a pack of notebook paper (from my bottomless supply from homeschooling leftovers).  On top of each page, I wrote a year.  There are about 60 pages.  :0)  To start with..

 

As I go through journals, I am noting the events that took place in that year, and if there is something funny or worth remembering, tearing it out of the journal and taping it to the notebook page.  

 

I'm finding that I have a lot of memories but I can't put them in their proper years anymore, so this is helping to get those things in place.  And when I find a theater ticket for seeing Les Miserable in London, I know what year I saw that, and put it on the proper year page.  The months don't matter...it's just getting it into years at this point.

 

It's been a lot of fun to put my life back together like a puzzle without worrying about whether it is a Beautiful Scrapbook or even in exactly perfect order.  

[HSmomof2]

Pitched them into a bonfire at the beach. Now I no longer have to worry about my kids finding them if I die. :P

Yep, I kept journals through high school and college. Burned them all. I would definitely not want my kids to read them.

[SKL]

Well now I'm curious - does anyone actually let their kids read their old diaries?  I think I will start a spin-off thread.  :)

 

I think it's kind of sad that I stopped writing before the really interesting part of my life happened.  I mean the part that could be turned into an award-winning sitcom.  I always thought I'd remember all those things, but now a lot of it is either gone or faded.  [And it's still too early to actually publish it, because obnoxious people from my past are still alive.  Though, someone recently pointed out that those people will not recognize themselves as "that obnoxious character" anyway.  :P  A little aside there ....]

[Malory]

Never thought I had company.  I bagged all of mine and threw everything in the trash can shortly after the first kid was born.  And this was years after the time I ripped out all the pages containing the most personal, intimate, embarrassing thoughts.

[Onceuponatime]

Too bad you can't burn stuff you put on the internet. When my kids start getting online we have multiple discussions about the permanence of words once they are cast out into the web, a fitting word.

 

I've gotten rid of a lot of stuff I wrote, even as an adult, because I've changed. Now it is cringeworthy to me. When I read about historians being disappointed and dismayed that certain famous people burned some of their own past writings, I think "that's why they burnt them." The stuff that didn't get burnt is still often cause for speculation and not so flattering interpretation.

Edited April 12, 2017 by Onceuponatime

[Guest]

I kept a lot of journals; but against all that is orderly within me, I ripped out a lot of pages, as well. The rest, I kept for this OTHER thing I am doing.

 

I got a 3-ring notebook and a pack of notebook paper (from my bottomless supply from homeschooling leftovers). On top of each page, I wrote a year. There are about 60 pages. :0) To start with..

 

As I go through journals, I am noting the events that took place in that year, and if there is something funny or worth remembering, tearing it out of the journal and taping it to the notebook page.

 

I'm finding that I have a lot of memories but I can't put them in their proper years anymore, so this is helping to get those things in place. And when I find a theater ticket for seeing Les Miserable in London, I know what year I saw that, and put it on the proper year page. The months don't matter...it's just getting it into years at this point.

 

It's been a lot of fun to put my life back together like a puzzle without worrying about whether it is a Beautiful Scrapbook or even in exactly perfect order.

That is a great project! Thanks so much for sharing it!

[Beth S]

Now I'm "scared" we'll run across my in-laws' journals while emptying out their house. :)

Thank you for the tip.  Definitely NOT wanting to have our kids stumble upon mine.

(I always wrote in it when I was VERY upset--it's not an accurate summary of my life at all.)

[Penguin]

I kept a lot of journals; but against all that is orderly within me, I ripped out a lot of pages, as well.  The rest, I kept for this OTHER thing I am doing.  

 

I got a 3-ring notebook and a pack of notebook paper (from my bottomless supply from homeschooling leftovers).  On top of each page, I wrote a year.  There are about 60 pages.  :0)  To start with..

 

As I go through journals, I am noting the events that took place in that year, and if there is something funny or worth remembering, tearing it out of the journal and taping it to the notebook page.  

 

I'm finding that I have a lot of memories but I can't put them in their proper years anymore, so this is helping to get those things in place.  And when I find a theater ticket for seeing Les Miserable in London, I know what year I saw that, and put it on the proper year page.  The months don't matter...it's just getting it into years at this point.

 

It's been a lot of fun to put my life back together like a puzzle without worrying about whether it is a Beautiful Scrapbook or even in exactly perfect order.  

Patty Joanna, what a brilliant idea. And one that I am going to steal :)

 

--

I got rid of my old, old diaries long ago. I am on the fence about the ones that I wrote after having children. By definition, these diaries are also now old :)

 

I want to do both some shredding and some preserving. There is certainly nothing scandalous in them, but there is indeed far too much mundane drivel about young-mom-me needing to lose weight and get organized. Blech.

 

As one who believes in the value of preserving our life stories, I really like Patty Joanna's approach. 

Edited April 12, 2017 by Penguin

[Serenade]

I love this thread!

[mumto2]

All I can think of is when my mom died last year all I told my brothers to keep for me is the diaries because I wasn't able to go instantly. Everything else could be given to grandchildren who wanted whatever. When I was able to look at what was left I ended up adding my mom's baby book and some other personal items along that line.

 

I will also admit I have never kept extensive diaries mainly because my mom did. I can look in hers and see my life. My "diaries" tend to be calendars with notes scribbled all over. Some more detailed than others. I have kept those. My kids are welcome to them although I suspect dh and I may be the only people who can interpret mine. I also hope that they hang on to their grandma's diaries....

[Guest]

Now I'm "scared" we'll run across my in-laws' journals while emptying out their house. :)

Thank you for the tip. Definitely NOT wanting to have our kids stumble upon mine.

(I always wrote in it when I was VERY upset--it's not an accurate summary of my life at all.)

This last sentence is exactly why I pitched most of mine. Most of what I wrote was either incredibly impersonal and BORING (like sermon or reading notes) or written in periods of great anger or distress. A lot of spew that could be hurtful to other people.

 

Burned that stuff up.

[DawnM]

I guess I am weird.   I seem a lot smarter in my diaries.  I wrote about dating hubby and we were serious.  I was going to make sure that I had my own life and that he wouldn't be the sun my universe hung around.  I talked about marriage being for the long haul and not what you could personally get out of it.  I talked about keeping up with my friends because he didn't need to be my only social outlet nor should he be responsible for making me happy....    Honestly, in a lot of what I wrote, I was wiser than I turned out to be if that makes sense.  But my dad used to say I was born old.    So yes, they can read them.  

 

 

It is funny because I was the opposite.  I wrote like these guys were the center of what I thought about, but I think my journals were my venting.

 

In my real life, I did spend a lot of time with friends, but I focused on my career goals, including working full time and going to school at night full time for 3 graduate degrees.

 

My real life was quite a bit more serious than my writing life, apparently.

[Janie Grace]

Okay, this thread has convinced me that it's okay to get rid of my stupid teen/college journals. But what about childhood ones? I started keeping one when I was in first grade (it was a "Judy Blume Diary"! LOL). It seems kind of sad to throw out my little kid writing... I think I'll keep those. There are no boys in them! Oh gosh, I just remembered one from 8th grade that has a detailed plan for my personal makeover. Hahaha

[DawnM]

Okay, this thread has convinced me that it's okay to get rid of my stupid teen/college journals. But what about childhood ones? I started keeping one when I was in first grade (it was a "Judy Blume Diary"! LOL). It seems kind of sad to throw out my little kid writing... I think I'll keep those. There are no boys in them! Oh gosh, I just remembered one from 8th grade that has a detailed plan for my personal makeover. Hahaha

 

If they don't embarrass you, don't get rid of them!

[Guest]

I kept a few...mostly the ones that had things stuck in them, like quotes I cut out of the paper and all.  Even some "boy" stuff in some of them.  I also saved my report cards.  When I was homeschooling my son, I was so *aggravated* at his behavior at times and also very worried about his math ability.  We ran across my dh's report cards and it was *so* helpful--he got "Needs improvement" on every single card re: "Citizenship" (behavior) and he was wayyyyy behind in math. 

 

Well, turns out, he is a really decent human being and he majored in math in college out of the sheer love of it.  That turned me around, and I focused on getting my kid to LOVE math and wow, things changed.  So I figure knowing a little bit more about the acorn of my oak helped me understand my little acorn a little better.

 

[Jaybee]

You all are making me a little stressed! I know I have some journals boxed up in a storage unit, and I definitely want to get rid of them. Even at the time I wrote them, I tried to be conscious of "what if someone found them or I died or something." However, the immaturity shines through, for sure! But I don't know what box they are in, or how long it will be before I can get them out.  :scared:  I really, really, really hope that I don't die before I can take care of that!  :tongue_smilie:

[cintinative]

Went through and shredded the awful "love" poetry from the early 1990s.

 

I am ambivalent about some of my other journals. They are mostly prayer journals.  I did shred about two years worth from the six months or so I dated an old friend and it majorly trainwrecked and led me to journal about my heartbreak for about another year.  I guess it may have been educational for my kids to know you can screw things up that badly but I don't want to discuss it.  =)

 

 

[prairiewindmomma]

I inherited some very old diaries (1850s). Fascinating reading.

 

Some of my great-great-grandmother's diaries from the early 1900s near the end of her life explain some family dynamics that have reverberated through to the generations to now.

 

I personally burned a lot of the boy craziness journals but I love my journals from my travels and I plan at some point to sit and write down some family history that was given to me orally. Family didn't want to commit their thoughts to paper, iykwim.

 

I love my grandmother's old calendars. Uncle got measles, mumps, chicken pox, and other childhood diseases back to back. Mom had weekly ballet lessons. Etc.

[theelfqueen]

I recently listed to the audio book of Carrie Fisher's The Princess Diarist which included selections from her diaries... and they were PAINFUL to listen to.... So PAINFUL.

 

[Penguin]

You all are making me a little stressed! I know I have some journals boxed up in a storage unit, and I definitely want to get rid of them. Even at the time I wrote them, I tried to be conscious of "what if someone found them or I died or something." However, the immaturity shines through, for sure! But I don't know what box they are in, or how long it will be before I can get them out.  :scared:  I really, really, really hope that I don't die before I can take care of that!  :tongue_smilie:

Me too! I have had this on my mind for some time. Some of the ones I want to go through are in storage in another state (long story). . I won't be able to touch them until summer, and that has been eating at me a bit.

[Guest]

I inherited some very old diaries (1850s). Fascinating reading.

 

Some of my great-great-grandmother's diaries from the early 1900s near the end of her life explain some family dynamics that have reverberated through to the generations to now.

 

I personally burned a lot of the boy craziness journals but I love my journals from my travels and I plan at some point to sit and write down some family history that was given to me orally. Family didn't want to commit their thoughts to paper, iykwim.

 

I love my grandmother's old calendars. Uncle got measles, mumps, chicken pox, and other childhood diseases back to back. Mom had weekly ballet lessons. Etc.

 

Old diaries and journals can be very interesting.  I just want everyone I know to be dead before mine are read.  LOL. :0)

[StephanieZ]

A basement flood last year gave me the excuse to throw away all that stuff . . . I burned it in the brush pile, lol. And I watched while it was burning to make sure it was all really gone. LOLOLOL Diaries are overrated, IMHO.

[ScoutTN]

Bonfire! Make s'mores!

[UmMusa]

Just burned mine... thanks for helping me get over the mental block!! Definitely didn't want my kids reading those.

[Janeway]

I burn things or shred that must go and never be seen.