To change my opinion of my own parents since having kids

[Froggles1]

Just wondering if anyone has experienced similar as I feel guilty feeling like this but since becoming a parent, I feel really hurt and annoyed by the way my parents are.

There is probably too much to explain here but growing up they always had a volatile relqtionship (not abusive but argued a lot and mum would often leave with bags packed etc then return as if nothing happened). They dont discuss things ever & just continued this pattern (still together)

Both can be kind people but I feel like everything is on their terms. They live about 45 mins away so not far but theh very very rarely visit us. We work full time etc so we typically can only do the journey once a month. My mum comments that they never see our children a lot and insists on buying them things to make up for this. I confided once that I felt our son was missing them and her response was “well then he should come see us more”. 😒I think this is completely unfair to expect a 5 year old to maintain their relationship! They also see my sisters children a lot more & subsequently my kids are less comfortable there than them just due to familiarity.

throughout my life my parents, although I know loved me, very much put their social lives, friendships and wider family members before me. I was slso given silent treatment (mum) if i did something wrong or she would share too much with me regarding her life etc. Now, I feel they dont really listen to me or have much interest in me. Mum in particular talks over me and monologues about her life, ranting etc whereas Dad barely says a word

i have had a lot of counselling and have built a lovely family. I have a good job and a lot to be proud of but I feel so heartbroken that they dont ever acknowledge me, say they are proud etc

they have very different values to me and whereas i always felt we were close, over the last few years I have really noticed these things and feel a distance due to them.

aibu to be upset?

This is a great post.

I had a wonderful mother- strong, fun, clever, loving. I think the key was that she herself had a very secure, loving childhood- it's definitely cyclical, bit that doesn't mean people can't break their own cycle too.

My father loved us, but he had a hard, traditional upbringing and he never transcended that, bringing us up traditionally and having a stereotypically traditional narriage with mum (who was a bloody saint as she loved him). There are never excuses for behaviour, but always reasons. He was too set in his ways and could have changed if he'd had the emotional intelligence, but noone taught him that and he lived/ worked in a different world most of his life. I said as much at his funeral- I understood him and cared for him, but some of my siblings found it too hard.

I'm going through a tough time with a 2nd teenager too- who couldn't be more different than his brother, who has always been the easiest child imaginable and still is- so I've taken great comfort from your post that our relationship will survive and I look forward to the adult he'll become and will try even harder to be the voice of reason he needs, so thanks.

I am not convinced that parenting was so very different in the past. I was a child in the 70s and always felt loved and cared for, myself and my sibling were mostly put first within the family.
My grandparents had been good parents too and there was a lot of love.
I do my best with my children I have got a lot right but I am sure some wrong.
I work with young children and see a lot of good or good enough parents but also a fair number of really awful ones I don't agree that parents are better now, there are good an bad in all generations

Agree that there are good and bad in all generations. I see many poor parents, particularly those struggling with teens and the stresses teens/ parents of teens have in our modern society. Things were far simpler to navigate in the 80s when I was a young teen.

I think having children makes you think about what kind of parent you want to be. There are always things we didn't like about our own parents, so we take steps to not do that with our own. Smacking for example, I was smacked, I don't smack my children. My Dad was very much children should be seen and not heard, and as a result as an adult I struggle to understand and convey how I am feeling. I want my children to know that emotions are okay to feel and I hear what they are saying. But I wouldn't say my parents are bad parents by any means, they did the best they could given the information they had at the time and the example they were set by their own parents. And they are both excellent grandparents now.

YANBU.
When you are young, you think what your parents do is normal. Then you grow up and realise they have flaws, sometimes many.
My parents had and still have a very fucked up relationship. My dad also was violent to us all including my mum and mum used to alternate between saying she was leaving him to making excuses for his short temper. He now says it never happened and we imagined it. So does m
mum 🙄
I now know having children is very hard, but I don't think my dad ever wanted to have kids really. Whilst we never wanted for anything, we never did anything geared towards children as dad didn't like it, my mum didn't drive so we never went anywhere unless dad wanted to go. I wasn't allowed friends in the house or to sleepover. No suprise I left at 18 and have barely been back since 🤣
I used to blame my mum for me having no confidence, but I don't now.
It's depressing to admit my folks are very negative people.
However it's important to break the cycle.

So yes I too changed my opinion of my parents after I became a parent.

You learn how to be a parent and how not to be from your own.

I think both can be true - that parenting was different in the 60s and 70s - and that there are good and bad parents in every generation; it’s not an either-or!

The differences in parenting between the 70s and now, very generally, relate to: corporal punishment in school, smacking at home, far more lax health and safety practices, far fewer child-centric activities, less variety and availability of food, clothing, toys, and travel, more sahms, less geographical distance between family members, less sensitivity to, and awareness of, children’s emotional well-being and also a poorer understanding of potential SENs and neurodiversity, fewer teens going on to university.

Jesus! Why do you even bother to type such a nasty mean-minded reply? Uncalled for.