Do you have a good relationship with your parents?

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Tery

Say hello to my fishy buddy
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Apr 12, 2006
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Bremerton, Washington, United States
I'm really close with my mom (I live with her and my stepdad) but I haven't seen or talked to my dad in 4 years, my stepmom won't let him have any contact with me.

That's too bad. I'd advise that you try to make some contact with him. Because there are no guarantees. I know whereof I speak as I used to be on very shaky grounds with my father until my Mom died. They were divorced and I do have a stepfather but have never got on with him at all. Now I talk more with my real Dad and seldom with my stepfather. Things like that open your eyes to see who really loves you.
 

Religiously_Unkind

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Aug 19, 2017
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That's too bad. I'd advise that you try to make some contact with him. Because there are no guarantees. I know whereof I speak as I used to be on very shaky grounds with my father until my Mom died. They were divorced and I do have a stepfather but have never got on with him at all. Now I talk more with my real Dad and seldom with my stepfather. Things like that open your eyes to see who really loves you.

The situation with my father is.....complicated; He and my mom got divorced right after I got out of high-school and I lived with him for a long time after that but then he met this woman and kind of started neglecting me, he would rarely come home, sometimes leaving me by myself at the house for a week or more (I don't drive and I have health problems) and then he married her but didn't tell me until two weeks after. I knew from the moment I met her that I wasn't going to like her, that she was trouble, and I was right. To make a long story short she tried to have me declared mentally unstable to draw a check off of me (she actually adopts kids so she can draw a check off of them and then kicks them out when they turn 18, that's why she has so much money), my mom found out and got me a lawyer, my dad and stepmom found out I had a lawyer, freaked out, and kicked me out of the house. My stepmom still calls my mom at work and harasses her, trying to put salt in the wound that she won't let my dad have contact with me. She's crazy, really really crazy, she'd have to be to spend so much time harassing my mom.
 

Tery

Say hello to my fishy buddy
Moderator
Apr 12, 2006
15,304
44,712
Bremerton, Washington, United States
The situation with my father is.....complicated; He and my mom got divorced right after I got out of high-school and I lived with him for a long time after that but then he met this woman and kind of started neglecting me, he would rarely come home, sometimes leaving me by myself at the house for a week or more (I don't drive and I have health problems) and then he married her but didn't tell me until two weeks after. I knew from the moment I met her that I wasn't going to like her, that she was trouble, and I was right. To make a long story short she tried to have me declared mentally unstable to draw a check off of me (she actually adopts kids so she can draw a check off of them and then kicks them out when they turn 18, that's why she has so much money), my mom found out and got me a lawyer, my dad and stepmom found out I had a lawyer, freaked out, and kicked me out of the house. My stepmom still calls my mom at work and harasses her, trying to put salt in the wound that she won't let my dad have contact with me. She's crazy, really really crazy, she'd have to be to spend so much time harassing my mom.

Holy cow! I guess you have tried, then. That's the best you can do. I'm sorry.
 

Religiously_Unkind

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Aug 19, 2017
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Holy cow! I guess you have tried, then. That's the best you can do. I'm sorry.

I don't think it's the end between my dad and I, my stepmom is in her 60's and is not healthy, so there's always the chance she'll reach the path at the end of the clearing and then he and I can start over. He's actually not my biological dad but he adopted me when I was 5 right after he married my mom, so I've always considered him my real dad. I don't think he hates me, I think he had a midlife crisis and made some bad choices that he now regrets.
 

recitador

Speed Reader
Sep 3, 2016
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my mom is gone, but i wouldn't say we were close unfortunately. she spent the last 10 or 11 years of her life across the country from me, initially to care for her ailing mother, and after she died, just sort of lacking the will to move back near us, partly due to not wanting to deal with starting over, and partly due to some issues with my sister and her boyfriend's family. although she talked about doing it in the near future before she had her car accident.

my dad, not so much either. my parents divorced before i was born, and my dad had a stroke when i was 7. he's never been able to communicate 100% effectively since then, so despite my parents giving it another go when i was 11 (and remembering why they gave it up a couple years later), i wasn't in any position to really get to know him well. he gets stuck in loops and tends to worry over the same subjects/conversations pretty much every time i see him. the good news for him is he remarried and got a whole new family to go with it (not in the sense that he abandoned his old, just got a few new grandkids in the bargain, among others), so while we're not what i'd call close, we make do and he's doing all right.
 

ghost19

"Have I run too far to get home?"
Sep 25, 2011
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Arkansas
Relationship with both parents is, at best, estranged. They raised me to be self-reliant and independent by having me do anything and everything on my own but now seem surprised and sometimes angry that I'm self-reliant and independent of them....it's weird..
 

Grandpa

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Mar 2, 2014
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Colorado
My dad was a good egg. Not a lot of energy level, but smart, sincere, and humorous. He died of a stroke after we got back from Ireland. I'd wanted to tell him all about that.

My mom had issues. We took care of her until I watched her die in a hospice room. The relationship was dutiful and too often unpleasant.

Hm. The post is sounding melancholy.
 

mjs9153

Peripherally known member..
Nov 21, 2014
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22,165
Loved them both,my dad died in '92,my mom,last month..was lucky in that they really lived for the their kids.
Sounds like your mom should tell your stepmom she has nothing to say to her,and stop calling,or she will notify the police.That is how it works in my state,you can't just go on harassing people like that.
 

Blake

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Feb 18, 2013
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I liked both my parents who are now dead. My mother was Catholic and when my father was away a sea(he was a Merchant Seaman) she started getting religious with me, making me pray, read the Bible, go to Church. If I was watching a television show and something rude came on she would get up and turn it off, same with the radio, if someone started singing stuff like 'Baby, I want you bad'. My father had a drink problem. He was never violent but just annoying saying America was the 'crookest country on Earth', Ronald Reagan was a crook, stuff like that. He had a problem with America because he got thrown out of there because he didn't have a green card and got in trouble with the law but still liked Americans because he had relatives over there and liked the ordinary American, not the crooks. My father and I sometimes got into a couple of fist fights and once when I played him at table tennis and beat him easily and I said 'your'e hopless' he threw the bat at me and it cut my head.
 

Kurben

The Fool on the Hill
Apr 12, 2014
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Had a very close relationship with both my parents. My dad was very shy and could never find it in him to say he loved me. No need really, he showed in his actions. Books he kept or bought because he knew i would like them or articles he read in a paper he cut out and mailed to me because he know they would interest me. A lot of little things. My mother was more open with her feelings and i loved them both back. They are dead now sadly and i still miss them. my father was 74 and my mother 81 when they passed. I gave orations and read fave poems of theirs at their funerals. No christian burial of course since neither they nor i are believers. But i think my speech was good. At least the guests said so.
 

doowopgirl

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Aug 7, 2009
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My Mom died 25 years ago and while we had moments where we didn't see eye to eye, we were never estranged. My Dad however is another kettle of fish. He was a bad husband and father. Selfish, he spent a lot of my and my siblings childhood how much better off he'd be without us. Bully, he would just intimidate you and tell you how much better other peoples kids were. Abusive, from the time I was 7 until I was 17 and finally told my mom. Then he would make up some offense and tell me if I didn't let him do stuff, or if I didn't do stuff he wouls tell my mom I did the offense anyway. He took off his belt and would hit all of us until someone 'confessed'. If you did do something good he would assume you cheated. And yet he could teach anyone to drive. Never lost his temper behind the wheel. Taught all of us to read before we went to school by picking words out of the newspaper. My mom never knew how to deal with him. So she just tried to keep the peace. I guess she came from a generation that put and shut up or she was just so mad in love with him or something. He is in a home now and while my sister makes a big deal about poor daddy and how she got over all that childhood stuff, as far as I'm concerned he no longer exists.
 

Baby Blue

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Aug 16, 2017
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Seattle, WA
My mom and I get along great as long as we remain two states apart. My dad and I have never been super close as he wasn't too involved in my childhood but I always look forward to seeing him and I'm overdue for a visit.