I think that’s a completely universal feeling.
It’s not weird. I would affirm yourself that they did not do everything right, and the things you’re angry about you have good reason to be. But let the anger and hate fade. They were probably trying their best. And the older you get the more you realize that we are all winging it. Now that you are an adult you can set healthy boundaries and interact with them on your own terms.
There’s some stockholm syndrome between children and parents and I think it’s natural to get angry as you move past that. But as an adult you can have a relationship with them where you see them more as flawed peers than omnipotent parents. Of course not everyone will want to have that relationship, but if you can and want to then I think it’s worth it.
Uncontextualized, but your post made me remember about this comic.
If you’d like the full context of the image: The Élan School (the focus of this comic is not a relationship with parents, though it is important in some chapters)As I have said at least a couple of times in the past, I love my parents but I can’t live with them. Small doses are fine, even pleasant. Heck, I visit most weeks, but long term? Nope.
Yes.
I think its very complex. You have imperfect parents and you are kids wanting them to be different. So any relationship is not gonna be so easy, until you understand eachother better. That happens at maybe… 20…
Its very common that you wont understand your parents at all until you get your own kids. Then you will know how it feels like.
Not weird at all. It’s frustrating, though. I want a father who actually gives a shit instead of the sperm donor I got. I love the idea of a father and the 5% of the time he was decent. I hate the human I got.
If it’s weird, then I’m very weird and sonare a bunch if people I know.
That’s just family.
Not really I don’t think. I appreciate everything my parents have done for me and continue to do for me but there’s also a lot about them that I don’t like. They’re not the type of people I aspire to be and I’m probably going to be dealing with the consequences of some of their bad decisions for a very long time.
Its normal to feel a mix of emotions in all sorts of scenarios. My mother when looked at one way was incredibly competent and impressive but also aweful and petty. There is an ethical framework called the ethics of least harm but to take it one step further its best to strive for least harm and maximum benefit. Why this is needed is because all of us are to some degree good and bad and we can work to minimize the bad we do and maximize the good. The situation of life makes being zero bad or 100% good likely impossible.
I’d say so. I love my dad so long as he keeps his fuckin mouth shut about anything related to politics, for example.
This has been my experience. Before I got old enough to develop my own political beliefs, my dad barely if ever talked about politics and he was a very supportive and loving father. Then I started developing my political beliefs and coincidentally that was around when Trump was running for his first term and it started going downhill from there. He was still a loving and supportive father, but his politics and mine did not align and that started creating a lot of division between us. Neither of us can handle talking about politics around each other, but it is becoming harder and harder to avoid.
It was the same for me. It was becoming especially problematic when I still lived with him during the pandemic, but I moved out and it became much more tolerable. I visit once a week and he’s thankfully capable of holding it in for a couple hours
I only managed to move out recently. Unfortunately there was a lot of damage done to our relationship prior to me moving out, and its damage I don’t believe he is aware is there. Even if it is, neither of us are eager to confront it. I still visit, and try to do it about bi-weekly (distance being the main factor), but it always feels awkward and I don’t think that will go away until the current state of America improves or we take the effort to fix the issues. Further unfortunately, I worry that he won’t change and that is a huge barrier to mending our relationship.
Our relationship is in a really difficult spot. If we don’t try and work through it and just keep skirting around things and avoiding the problem things will never improve and it will always be awkward around him. But if we confront things, there is a good likelyhood things will end up worse than they already are
Not at all. As babies they were the first people we tried bonding with and that connection doesn’t fade away. That innate feeling competes with hatred if they’re bad/abusive people.
I love humanity but I hate humans.
I would say the reverse but I think we’re expressing the same sentiment
I actually went back and forth. I think maybe it’s “I love humanity but hate society.”
Absolutely not. I know they love me and they never hide it. But they’re shit at it. Also, they knowingly brought me into this shit-show.
