For parents who disliked parenthood, how are your adult relationships now?

[BrownWoodenChair]

If you never enjoyed parenthood how did your relationship with your kids end up? I wonder all the time about this. My mum didn't like it but is close to my sibling and not me. I think as the youngest I pushed her over the edge !

I think my mum found it difficult. Not that she didn’t enjoy it, but she was poorly equipped to cope with being a parent. She was never hugely positive about me having children. Not negative, but very much, are you sure that’s what you want? Oh, don’t have a second, you’ll never cope! (I coped just fine, thank you 😂). I think she got a lot of self worth from caregiving, but not in a way that made her happy, more in a way that helped her manage her anxiety.

As an adult, I am NC with her. Not because she struggled as a parent, but because she has a dysfunctional and chaotic life and it wasn’t something I was willing to subject my children to. I didn’t feel like I could properly safeguard them even in a supervised way.

I did enjoy very much when my children were younger but navigating the adult relationships is hard and different with each child. We should be kind to oarents in my opinion - they are trying.

Curious at your choice of language 'pushing her over the edge'.. even if you wrote it in jest...

You were a child - you couldn't push your parent anywhere - it was her responsibility to love, care and relate to you, and if that didn't happen it's her fault, the parent's fault, not yours.

I disagree here, you have clearly never had a really difficult child who repeatedly refused to listen or to do as they were asked or told, or who was wilfully rude and insulting to you on a regular basis, no matter how hard you tried to make them
happy, give them everything they need and parent them well.

It is really, really hard and thankless to parent a child like this, we are all human and we all give up and snap sometimes.

While in theory I agree that the child is the child so the parent should always adapt to their needs, children who simply won’t behave and be civil and take part in family life have a negative impact on their parents, especially as it gets to teenage years.

It really isn’t all the parents’ fault as the kids get older, they can be really unpleasant and make your life really unhappy.

My DM clearly didn’t like it as she buggered off when I was a teen. Needless to say my relationship with her isn’t great now.