to think people with nice parents have no clue what toxic parents are like?

[pppaper]

I keep seeing people say things like “I wish I still had my mum or dad around” or “You’ll regret it when they’re gone” and honestly it really gets to me. It’s said like it is a set truth. Like if you don’t feel that way about your parents there’s something wrong with you.

But some of us didn’t get loving supportive parents. Some of us got toxic manipulative ones who made our lives miserable and who we’re still trying to recover from. I get that people who had decent relationships with their parents feel that loss and I’m not saying they shouldn’t. But it’s frustrating when they assume everyone had the same experience.

It feels like people with nice parents just can’t imagine anything else. It’s always family is everything and you’ll regret cutting them off and never any space to say actually no this person hurt me over and over and I have every right to protect myself.

I won’t miss them when they’re gone. Maybe I already spent years grieving the parents I never had.

Hard agree.

'But she's your Mum!' 'You've only got one Mum!'

Shit people can become parents- and giving birth doesn't just make you a decent person. I think it's that centuries old idea of Mum- protector, nurturer, loving, caring. Everyone knows the idea of 'Mummy Bear' who will die to defend her children. It's hard for people to consider that some parents who will happily push you into danger to save themselves; it goes against everything we value as a society. That's why although I find it so annoying, but I can see why some people are just unable to understand this.

"But she's your mum!"

She also humiliated me time and again throughout my entire teenage and adult life.

Omg yes this.

When I get a nasty text from my mum my OH suggests I just write "fuck off" and be done with it. He has no idea the days, weeks, months, of non-stop faux crying and then anger and rage I would have to endure, and she would continue to bring it up years later and tell everyone what a horrible daughter I am.

Those with nice parents can’t comprehend toxic parents. When my abusive father died I struggled not to be angry at the expressions of sympathy. I have grieved the fact that I don’t feel the way others do about their parents, been in therapy for years to come to term with this, as well as the damage he did to me, my siblings and my mum. But no, some people don’t get it, and often don’t even seem to believe or want to acknowledge that not all parents are lovely.

I think with parents the number of people that don't understand is way higher.

If you tell people you are divorcing your husband because he is toxic/manipulative/abusive, in general people cheer you on and want to support you. They don't tell you that you will regret it or that you will miss him or that the abuse can't really be that bad.
Swap out husband for "parents" (or particularly "mother") and suddenly the number of people who think you are exaggerating or that your parents are wonderful multiplies.

But honestly why would they understand?

The opposite is true too.

I have a very complicated relationship with my mother and I posted about a situation with her a few months ago, under a different name. One poster would not stop coming back to ask why I even cared what she thought and could I just not see her again as she is so horrible. This poster did not understand the years and years of manipulation, gaslightling and conditioning I have experienced and just kept coming back asking questions like 'but why do you even care?', and seemed genuinely baffled that I couldn't just switch off my emotions and go non contact when my mother was clearly so problematic. The whole exchange made a very difficult period all the more difficult and in the end I told her it was obvious she had never experienced what I had and she should just be grateful that she didn't understand the maze of fear, obligation and guilt that I was trying to navigate my way through.

Similarly, on another occasion, I was signposted to a well known mumsnet thread for people with toxic parents. I told my story and was told that my mother was a narcissist and my father was her enabler and I tried to give more context, to add the nuance that I was working through, the confusion of having warm memories and happy times, and family relationships that did have love and warmth in them but were tainted by some very deep wounds and trauma but this concept that 'I'm sorry to tell you that your mother is a narcissist and your father is her enabler l!' was parroted back to me to the point where I felt like I was screaming into the abyss and I still feel tears of anger prickling my eyes when I think about it.

It's not that I don't know my mother has narcissistic tendencies, that she had damaged me and that she has treated me badly through the years, or that my dad had his eyes on other priorities when I was growing up and didn't fully understand what was going on, but my parents are real people and not just labels. I love my mother but I hate being around her, most of the time. My father is my rock and if it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have a shred of self esteem, even if he was, in many way, absent emotionally in the past.

I am always worming my way through my childhood and adolescence, and my twenties and thirties like a cork screw, very slowly and sometimes painfully. I hate being rushed along that process by anyone who feels like they know better, by people who have never had to work it out or those who came out the other side of their trauma and want others to reach the finish line in the same way they have.

I certainly didn’t have perfect childhood and if I really wanted too ,I could analyse every mistake my parents made ,and go down a rabbit hole .

Fully understand that some people did have a hideous upbringing and feel awful for everyone where this was the case .

Generally my sister and I have good memories and miss our parents dearly.
As a parent I sincerely hope that my children will understand that no parent is perfect .My daughter is a social worker for child protection and obviously sees firsthand the worst case scenario’s.

I don’t think anyone is expecting perfect parents. That is really not the point. It is not about picking apart every mistake or holding grudges over normal parenting slip ups. Everyone gets it wrong sometimes.

The thing is, there is a big difference between the odd mistake and growing up in a toxic or damaging environment. It is not just one or two bad decisions. It is a constant pattern that can seriously mess with your sense of self and what you think is normal.

Your daughter probably sees the worst of it in her job but some stuff is more subtle and still causes real damage. Some families look fine on the outside but there is emotional control, manipulation or neglect going on behind closed doors.

I couldn't begin to understand the effects a toxic upbringing has on children having never experienced it or witnessed it close to hand, but every now and then I meet a really self centred and cruel adult who is vindictive and dam right nasty. Then I hear they have children and I only hope they are different with their children. But I don't deep down think they will be and can't really comprehend what damage they will be doing to their children.

“You only get one mum”

If only these people knew the abuse I had from that ‘one mum’. Literal abuse. Worse thing is people excuse all her evil (not bad - evil) because she was a teen mum too.

I think they often fail to appreciate how complex some families can be and how things are not always straightforward. In my case it goes back generations and my parents never really learned how to parent us. I lowered my expectations of one of my parents, now passed, and cut ties with the other as they were too disruptive to my life. I don't miss them although I do wish things had been different. I concentrated on parenting my own now adult children. So far (fingers crossed) it's going well but I don't tell many people know about my own family. As you say, it's just too alien to a lot of people.

When I was 15 my toxic drunk alcoholic mother lost her footing on the stairs and fell all the way down. I was secretly wishing she’d die as a result of this she’d caused sobmuch destruction. She didn’t - just got up and blamed everyone else! Classic narc!

I see you. I hear you. I’m listening.

Yeah I don’t think you understand how malicious some people are towards their children. It’s not being upset because their mum hurt their feelings that one time.

No need to read past @LightDrizzle at this point 😅👏

Agree OP . Apologies for my comment. No offence intended.You are 100% right that the families my daughter deals with are probably more protected than ‘ what goes on behind closed doors’ X

I used to wonder if they were right because so many people said you will miss them when they are gone.

one of my parents died last year and I wasn’t sad and I don’t miss them. I had a comment from someone I know very well who knows a lot of what I went through as a child tell me it was weird I didn’t cry at their funeral. It’s like a continuation of that judgement you describe op.

There is also the obligatory comments you get like “I’m so sorry” when people discover your parent is dead. It’s completely inappropriate to say anything but “thanks” so that’s what I say and it feels like a betrayal of myself like by accepting condolences I’m saying they were a good parent and denying my own experience. My parent wasn’t even abusive by the standards of the time- I was smacked as most children were of my generation but that wants consided abuse at all. Mainly they were cold, unavailable and disinterested in me with a clear preference for my siblings.

That said I do know of someone who used to say their mother (a family friend) was horrible and had been abusive. I couldn’t see that myself but obviously with my own experience I believed them. When their mother died they were devastated and bemoaned the loss of time they had with her. Despite spending a few years low/no contact. The mother had spent years desperately wanting a relationship with her child and been rebuffed and hurt by the rejection. So it is true that some people do regret it. Maybe the mum was abusive maybe not no one knows but them. I never said you will regret it when they are gone but I absolutely thought it.

This.

Although I absolutely hated my ex-Fi's mother and I certainly wouldn't grieve her death; that gave me some insight in to how it might feel.

No one voluntarily self-orphans unless they absolutely have to.

If adult children don't want anything to do with their parents, it will be for a good reason.

YABU. A lot of people with toxic parents end up equally toxic and have no recognition of out of bounds behaviour and it’s impact.

Fortunately for some people they never get to experience the resulting trauma from a whole life of carrying feelings of inadequacy, desperation, frustration, anger, heartbreak and emotional scarring caused by the very people who are meant to love and care for you. Mix in the sheer confusion of also feeling undying love, empathy and concern for those same shitty parents, and the resulting personality changes and distrust towards any future love interest limiting our capacity for real wholesome happiness because all weve ever been taught is to look out for oneself as part of our survival because we are totally unlovable.
On the contrary I will never get to know what its like to have good loving parents either, but i imagine its amazingly beautiful, something my heart will forever desire but will never get.

I have loving, not perfect parents. I don’t understand and won’t ever the trauma of abusive parents. I scroll past threads like that - why can’t more people do that.

I think PP is also correct that it is painful to hear someone else’s pain. It isn’t just not understanding, it is being powerless to change anything except that you can stop and listen. for me as far as my own MH allows.

It is tough. I woudn't describe my my parents as "toxic" but were hugely overwhelmed and underprepared for looking after the children that they ended up with. They are emotionally immature, even though were very responsible with money, employement and educational decisions for us. They are both average-above average intellengence, but had so much emotional baggage that was unresovled and ended up with us.

I am currently completely estranged, and its very hard even on a daily basis. I love my family, but their behaviour and motivations were causing me harm and now I have grown up, its very hard to interact and commuicate with them. I know the narrative from the other side will be that I am an angry and aggressive person, and I accept that.

It is incredibly difficult to explain to a majority of "intervenors" that its not all me. I get the "you will miss them when they are gone" etc.. and its so dis-ingenuous even if it is meant well. I accept that I chose to stop tolerating the harmful behaviour, which everyone else is managing in different ways for their own reasons, but it still hurts.

Even though its incredibly lonely and isolating, and a bit scary... in the way that things currently are I am actually doing much better, because I am not constantly trying to please or placate them.

I am still hopeful it will repair but I will be OK if it doesn't.

Agreed. I worked for a programme that helped at risk families prepare their children for school. It was hammered into us during training that all parents want the best for their children and just because some parents do things in a different way, we should not judge.

Total bullshit. It is a dangerous thing in society to believe this and allows for horrific abuse to slip under the radar. Some parents torment and hurt their children and they enjoy doing it. Not many but some.