Anyone else got really bitchy parents?

[Heyprawn]

And if so, how do you deal with them?

Mine are great with our kids and often babysit/very invovled which I appreciate, but I’m starting to notice how incredibly bitchy they are about other people and wondering if this is normal? I think of friends’ parents and I just can’t envision them being bitchy (commenting on people’s clothes/looks/weigjt - normally strangers but sometimes people we know) and it’s starting to make me resent mine.

I think my parents have gotten worse with age. Although I suspect they may have always been this bad but just kept it clean when I was younger.

These days my mother will insult the style of an elderly lady in front of her in the supermarket and my dad is just racist. Thank god they no longer work for the NHS.

I only have one parent and she's not bitchy, but she can't just say something without tacking something on the end of it.

A recent example was her describing one of her friendship group. The woman's daughter was my age at school.

Mum said something like 'You know Eileen, she boasts that her DD is a teacher but she's a TA. And she has terrible frizzy perm. Who has a perm these days?'

The daughter has naturally curly hair that was lovely at school. and my Mum lies about what I do for a living.

Do not allow them to babysit your kids. They need emotionally healthy role models and they do not fit the bill. If they are too toxic/difficult/batshit for YOU to deal with it’s the same deal for the kids too.

And no their behaviour is not normal at all.

They’re actually surprisingly great with my kids and are very aware of their wording/actions around them. So I know they’re capable of it, it’s as if when around other adults they turn negative

Yes! Absolutely amazing parents. But heck can they be nasty about others.
Worlds worst hobby. They actively enjoy it. So negative. It is draining.

This sounds like another relative of ours. It’s a bit like, what’s the point? Even if you think negatively about someone/something - saying it out loud is you purposefully inciting more negativity. Such an ugly trait

This relative of ours tends to focus on weight. I’ve banned them from speaking about anything weight related around my children, I don’t want them to think this is normal. People shouldn’t be defined by how they look

Oh 😔 Do you ever express this to them? Or is it pointless?

Mine are incredibly bitchy and judgmental and always have been. It took me a long time to realise this is no way to behave and doing so results in zero self esteem. How you project to the world is reflected back at you. I now ignore them and do everything in my power to not be like that - a lot of inner work and self reflection to get to this point. Consequently, I have high self esteem and self confidence - I actually like myself. Which is more than they can say.

Of course they've continued to talk shit about people (including me) but now I just ignore / grey rock.

Totally agree with you, OP, it is the ugliest trait. I struggle to think of anything worse than a constant negative mindset and actively bringing people down as a pastime. It's actually despicable.

It could be just a matter of time before you kids pick up on all this from your parents and start to repeat such attitudes themselves.

Mum also comes out with comments like 'I saw Rachel, Darren's wife in town the other day. She looked rough, terrible split ends.'
I couldn't care less that she'd seen Rachel, or where, and I doubt that she has split ends. Rachel's nice.

If she's describing me, she'll say 'This is my daughter Emanwenym, she lives in [big city]'. I don't live there.

What does she gain from saying it?

Mine are like this .. nice to people’s face .. mean and spiteful behind backs

hardworking people .. tight with money

even if you are a good decent person .. they will find some flaw

My mother is awful about other people. She thinks everyone is sneaky and out to get her. She also hates certain famous people. Usually women. Her most hated famous woman right now is Debbie McGee. She doesn’t like her sisters (loves her brothers though), didn’t like her next door neighbour, her doctors are all useless. I remember her being really awful to some of my friends as a child.

My Dad was the complete opposite. Laid back and got on with everyone. Never said a bad word about anyone. Never understood how they were a couple!

Your parents sound exactly like mine @ClaireEclair Everyone loved my Dad, he was totally genuine and could talk to anyone. My Mum was completely the opposite; she was filled with hate. She loved her own family but loathed my Dads and had nasty names/comments for everyone she had an issue with; my aunt was "very bovine" and her friend was "panface" . She was always horribly jealous of anyone who had a nice house, hated the neighbours, critical of vicar, doctor, vet because they were useless and she was going to report them/make a complaint. She also despised a number of famous women (most notably Vanessa Redgrave and Judi Dench), and would hurl the most vile insults: things like "ooh, I bet she smells" "she's so ugly" "oh, she's looking old". She was just toxic, vicious and nasty and had been no different when I was a child so I can't really put it down to old age. My husband always referred to her as Hyacinth Bucket because her public face was charming, but not everyone was fooled by it...
I suspect there are a lot of these toxic parents around.

Edit for punctuation.

Your mother lies about where you live and what you do for a living?

Why not correct her / tell people the truth. Maybe that will make her think again.

Absolutely, I’m very concious of this. Although they seem to be quite good with not doing it around them, which they absolutely didn’t do when I was a child. Also, I don’t adopt this kind of behaviour so with both of the above, I’d say my children have a much better advantage than I did growing up. And I still grew up to be very self-aware/aware that what they do is negative. Hopefully with the way my children have been brought, they’ll be able to understand right from wrong, and if my parents ever displayed this negativity around them then they’d be able to question it

@Crushed23 , I don't think she knows what I do. It's fairly niche and not the sort of job that people have heard of (e.g. teacher, nurse, doctor, accountant, solicitor) or they glaze over when I tell them.
I live somewhere with a bit of a bad reputation, and it is fairly close to the city (not the actual places but something like Cardiff if I lived in Merthyr Tydfil, apologies to anyone in Merthyr).

I do find it strange that my relatives had no interest in what I do, when they are so proud of my sibling's career, and I get to hear what my cousins do.

I have asked her why she 'misleads people' but she just says 'What would I know' or 'It sounds better'.

But how big is the lie? Are you a strategy consultant and she says you're a midwife? That kind of thing?

I couldn't live with people in my life believing lies about me, but it wouldn't matter so much if they're relatives you don't spend much time with, I suppose. (I don't imagine relatives I hardly see even know what I do for a living or where I live.)

I stopped caring whether my parents and relatives were 'proud' of me or not years ago when I realised many of them had a very narrow minded view of what a successful life looks like. When well-informed, like-minded people give me praise / feedback, it means so much more.

I wouldn’t use the word “bitchy” in this case, but MIL thrives on complaining about / putting down others, whether it’s her relatives, her friends or her neighbours. There will be one particular target she will obsess over each time we meet, different every time (each of her children take turns in being the subject of her vitriol). But it’s not bitchy as in just being snide, it’s like she justifies her own existence by taking chunks out of other people. She is a very unhappy and troubled person.
FIL can also be a bit of a grumpy git, but his is usually dressed up in snobbery. He can be lovely though, so he is not all bad.

So maybe not ‘bitchy’ per se but pass completely uncalled for judgement on others, and I often think they are wrong.

So much of the conversation is about other people who I don’t know, and seems like they barely know, eg a childhood neighbour, someone they went to school with etc.

’Oh she has been so unlucky in life, she married a drunk, I guess karma serves her parents right, her mum was always up herself’

’His parents moved abroad and now his children can’t get a British passport, poor thing’

’She married him for money, obviously, not like it’ll make her happy’

’Her son is a terrible person, he has gone NC with his parents’

A lot of judgement on looks and clothing as well, judging the character of someone in the public eye based on what their random distant cousin was like etc. Very judgy about good-looking and high achieving people.

I can’t stand it. It’s constant. I’ve just started calling them out, along the lines of ‘oh so you’re close are you, did she confide in you?’ Or ‘when did you last meet up again?’

Everyone has stuff, they could be perfectly happy and don’t need random strangers’ judgement.

That’s a good strategy! I read somewhere that saying “what an odd thing to say out loud?” Is a good way to call it out too. Were your parents like this growing up or just as they have got older?

@Crushed23 , probably nearer strategy consultant but she says chartered accountant.
I'm not that bothered but when I speak to people, it looks like I've been lying.

Also they thought being a chartered accountant was an inferior occupation. God knows why, and I never wanted to be one anyway.

Strangely enough, BIL is a management accountant and PILs rave about him being a chartered accountant. He's CIMA not chartered, which is pretty obvious given what he does.

My M hasn't got a good word to say about ANYONE. It's draining. Awful to listen to , but I think it makes me a better person as I would hate to be thought of in the same light so really make a conscious effort to be the complete opposite.

Haha love it! Are you going to say it?

Mum just seems overly invested in other people’s lives but in a weird way. Eg let’s say someone has cancer or can’t have kids, for my mum as a distant observer it’s a huge tragedy, whereas the person might be perfectly okay with it. She just has issues and a sad outlook on everything and everyone, everything is a tragedy.

I couldn’t be any more different.

I think growing I saw that as normal although I couldn’t relate to what she said. Imagine how I felt when I left home!

It has affected me though, in the sense that I wouldn’t share even the most basic personal information with her or other family, and also generally I don’t want to be a part of family life or wouldn’t bring my partner into this.