Do you blame your parents?

yep, know the feeling....

 

I don't blame my parents but that's mainly because it's a childish thing to do. Am I an adult, and I want to be better. Which means moving on and improving myself.

Most days I like who I am.

Though. Just because I don't blame them doesn't mean I like them. And if I found out they died. I'd probably not care enough to grieve or otherwise alter my schedule. Though in the case of my mother. I owe her a dance over her grave lol but I suppose the people actually grieving may prefer I do that a different day.

 

Just a couple tweaks and that'll fit in "Share your first three sentences." I'd keep reading the rest of the book.

 

I blame my older siblings though.
And I know that is not a mature , forgiving stance but still.
Instead of showing me the way, they made fun of my attempts to be taken seriously. I was a sensitive kid.......and still am

 

I try not to be too angry with the parents. I don't blame them for the failure that is my life, no.
But I am resentful of them that they hadn't taught me much of anything. (If I go into any specifics, it will take way too long to long to cover, and I am telling you that I am not writing a damn autobiography.)
Everything I learned, I had to learn the hard way.
I am still in the process of figuring it all out.
They ultimately failed as parents, and even as people, but I know that, however stuck I still am in the process of detangling myself from what is lifelong trauma (my increasing collection of self-help books are a testament to my honest attempt), I can take pride in the fact that I am a much better person than either of those toxic people.
In fact, that's my ultimate victory over them.

 

This thread got me thinking... There are many reasons that I don't want to have children, but a main one is that I know I'd be a terrible parent. It seems to me so many people would realise the same thing if they stopped to think, but because we grow up with this expectation that life goes childhood > get a job > get married > have kids, millions of people are doing it without even considering an alternative. Hopefully the growing numbers of childfree people will change that.

 

Don't you just love it when people say, "Oh, but you'll feel differently if the children are your own!"

Aye, right. So what if I don't?

 

Yep! Or "You'll never regret having children." Well, sure, once they're here then I'm sure very few parents actively wish their children gone from the world. But that doesn't mean the parent (or child) is happy, or that his/her life wouldn't have been better without children. It just means it's not really in our biology to wish our own children weren't alive.

I lurk on Mumsnet and I've seen there that, when women are truly honest, a frightening number of them can see that they probably shouldn't have had children. Nearly all of them will caveat that with "I wouldn't give my children back for the world."

 

I don't blame my parents though I know my mom's depression and not seeking help early on has led me to have anxiety-like reactions to situations to where that any amount of screaming will make me want to retreat. I also don't know if I want a relationship because I saw how theirs played out, and is playing out, and I simply don't like they react at times. But I'm an adult and, overall, I get along just fine with my parents. I'm also aware of my issues and trying to care of them as I go along so my adulthood isn't such a mess; I'm in control of my life and no one else.

That being said, if I hadn't been born or if I was to pass away quietly in some fashion, that'd be just fine. I'm in no way a danger to myself or others, but Iain's post is sums up my thoughts nicely, too.

 

Yeah. I recognised quite a while ago (as, thankfully, did my husband) that we didn't really want to have children. I like kids, to a certain extent, but I want to be able to give them back to their mummies after a couple of hours. It's the 24/7 aspect I don't think I could handle. I value my own time and space, and dislike being pestered and at somebody else's beck and call. That, more than anything else, put me off the idea.

 

"You'll never regret having children."
Yeah. Whatever. I know that I got a lot of crap growing up once it dawned on them that I wasn't some miracle child who would save them from their problems.
That's one reason why I am already that much better than these people: I know that nothing good can come out of me having children. I don't in any way want theoretical children to go through any of the same hell that I did.
So... all I can do is hope that my siblings will also allow this family tree to die down.
As far as I'm concerned, one less scummy family in the world.

My ultimate move: Family Tree Extinction Wave!
The only requirement for this fell attack... is to wait. For a long time. I'm already thirty years old...

 

I don't blame them. They did what they could with what they knew and considering they had to raise a half-deaf/half-blind child with severe, chronic illnesses I say they did a damned good job. Do they have flaws? Of course they do -- we all do. Overall, though, I couldn't have asked for better parents.

 

I do actually know a few people with perfect parents—or, rather, perfect relationships with their parents. Once the kids grow up, the parents evolve into best friends. It's really nice to see. It's lovely to be in company with a family like that. No awkward moments, no little grinches and grumples. Just a bunch of great people having a great time being together. It's nice. Rare, probably, but nice.

 

Lemmee see, that was a long time ago and I've been through many changes since then.

My parents were married twice and divorced twice, confusing to a little kid. Then, to compound matters, there was an abusive stepdad in there somewhere. Altogether, I hardly knew my real father in my earlier years, up through my teens. During that period I lived with my mother, two sisters, a brother, and that thrice-damned stepfather.

Physically, I take after my father, mentally my mother. I have no doubt about my lineage since I can trace most of my attributes to one or the other of them.

My father didn't care for sports and only took me to one high school ballgame during my childhood. I think that's why I've never been competitive in life, tending to let it flow around me. I blame him for that. He was highly bigoted, which I've managed to avoid, probably because of my time in the army.

As I said, mostly I lived with my mother. He'd visit occasionally. My early memories are of him ordering me around like he did her. He was very dominating but not violent, the cause of her having bleeding ulcers, twice. Back then mental cruelty was not a reason for a divorce in our state.

He was the same with us kids, until I bought my first pistol at a pawn shop, even though underage. Once he saw that his attitude toward me changed drastically. Basically, he was a coward, afraid of firearms and damned near anything else. That incident made me into a gun collector. I soon accumulated a dozen or so used firearms and he left me alone.

The major problem caused by him was that I spent ten or fifteen years trying to prove to myself that I wasn't a coward. I won't tell you all the stupid things I was involved in during that period. One day, though, in my early thirties I was drinking and it occured to me that I wasn't a coward. By that time I'd spent many years in the US Army, including two tours in Vietnam and had risked my life many times over. I rejected his bigotry, but that last attribute damned near got me killed.

My mother, looking back at it, was basically a normal housewife and an avid reader. I credit her with my intelligence and love for reading. She was a strong woman to put up with my father and stepfather though also, in retrospect, a masochist for marrying my father twice and that abusive stepfather.

I'll finish with my stepfather. He was a drunk that often spanked and mistreated us kids. I did get back at him. When, probably 18 or 19, he stole and sold several of my pistols for drinking money I hit the roof. At the time my mother had divorced the guy. I found him in a boarding house where he was drunk, as usual, kicked the shit out of him, poured him into my car, and drove him to a city about fifty miles away where he had relatives. Throwing him out of the car I told him that the next time I saw him I'd kill him. Eventually he moved to a nearby town but avoided me until drinking himself to death.

Charlie -- hvysmker.

 

I'm still a teenager, so I don't really get to blame my parents for the next 3-5 years. I don't even know how to feel about them to be quite honest, so I'm just trying to be patient and do my best to behave and listen to their needs for me.

Yeah, they're people. My mother is quite good. I should probably be grateful that a specific pair of people brought me up and attempted to invest in me emotionally and economically, but then, my family does act quite dysfunctional.

Maybe I'll laugh at myself when I'm older. Oh, saxon, you understand the struggles now, you silly. Or maybe I'll be a bitter disconnected adult.

Whatever I feel about my parents, it's still up to me to behave in the way I deem right. Putting my family in a binary "good or bad" decision makes the morality of it overly simple and distracts me from the fact I still have a choice, no matter what people think of me, to be principled.

I could have it worse, but then, tell that to anyone with stress or misfortune. Tell them at least they're not dead. I'm not even bothered, just neutrally unsure.

 

That’s exactly what my Mom said! She said that when you raise a child, you hope to raise someone who will eventually see you as a best friend who calls you ‘mom’/‘dad’.

I agree with this sentiment. I hope that one day, if I ever raise a child, he/she will see me as his/her best friend. Or A best friend.

 

Blame is a strange word. That's not how I'd phrase it, but I don't know what word I'd use.

My dad was an alcoholic who I never knew sober, aside from two brief periods when he stopped drinking. My mother was an angry, abusive person who wanted a boy, not a girl, and who blamed me for her life not being what she'd dreamed.

Have their actions impacted my life? Yes. Are there things I've inherited that can be directly traced to their abusive behaviors? Yes. Is there some resentment that they didn't take opportunities to change things for the better? Yes. Or that they put me in dangerous situations as a child? Yes.

Did all these things make me a stronger person? Yes,. But if they don't get the blame, they don't get the credit for my surviving and, later, thriving.

 

Curious. How many of these people are Americans?

 

Half and half. Ish.

There is a general tendency here in Scotland, for family groups to operate together. Lots of parties, ceilidhs, etc, are for all age groups within a family, and families are often seen socialising together—parents and adult offspring out together for a shopping trip or a 'night out' is quite common. I think it develops the 'parent-as-best-friend' scenario, and I like seeing it. However, it can also encourage people to defend family, no matter what the cost, so it can be a two-edged sword, if the family is borderline dysfunctional, or if dependency issues are never resolved, or if grandparents are expected to raise a second family so the parents can work. The latter has become very VERY common here. Go out during the day to the town centre, and there will be vast numbers of older people pushing strollers and prams, and shepherding preschool children around. How much of this is totally voluntary, and how much of it is succumbing to the pressures of 'family comes first' I can't say for sure.

I think Americans, in general, tend to split off into peer groups for socialising more often than not. It's what's expected, isn't it? So maybe the 'friend' thing between parent and offspring, when it happens, is more genuine (less of an assumption?) In the USA there isn't so much pressure to BE pally-type friends with your parents or hang out with them, so when it happens, it stands out more? Dunno. I've been away from the USA for 33 years now, and much has probably changed in that time.

 

Funny coincidence that I stumbled into this thread and read this post right after thinking to myself, man I feel so alone with my thoughts regarding not wanting a kid.

I'm turning 30 this year and my God are my friends, colleagues, and family eager to find out when we're gonna have a kid OR why we aren't gonna have a kid and what the fuck's wrong with us if we don't want one!!??

So idk, I'm just really happy that I read your post.

Anyway, I digress... Do I blame my parents for something? No, at the end of the day, I only feel thankful. They divorced when I was 5 and things got kinda fragmented after that, but I suppose they did their best under the circumstances. In hindsight, the grievances I had when I was younger were pretty small.

 

I feel a little better reading that a 74 year old feels that way. There's no handbook on what your life should be and you don't know it's wrong until you find out. Then, the more wrong you realise it is the harder it is to put right... I'd describe my life as being blindfolded and put on a down escalotor while being forced to walk up. Then they blame me for being stuck on the spot when the reality is I'm the only one taking steps to get anywhere. When i got to a point of total fatigue and collapsed they called me weak because they no longer had the satisfaction of watching me suffer... Thats the shortest explanation i can give, the long version is a book that I'm still writing.

 

My parents were an odd couple. I don't believe they married for love, though I think they each did that in their first marriages (to different people). My mother was somewhat impatient, and very proud. My father was emotionally withdrawn (I think at least partly caused by his mother), and I think that he didn't understand how to relate to children-especially girls, though he improved with age. He died when I was a teenager, and I chose a hymn for his funeral. We were never a proper family after he died; at least not in my mind. My mother passed on a lot of herself to me, though I think my physicality is 50/50. I have my mother's pride, and my father's stubbornness, which causes me no end of problems...depression being one of them; which my father also suffered. I have only today forgiven my mother for something I now believe I was wrong to assume was her fault. It took me over 10 years to get past my father's death (I was on strong antidepressants when he died).
What I learnt from my parents was undoubtedly perseverance and hope; even in the face of foes. That is why I am still alive to this day.

 

(for grandparents) Do you blame your grandchildren?