Parents?

I am very close to both of my parents! I am happy for everyday that I have with them. I used to live right by them, but we moved a few years ago and we're now about 5 hours away!

I could never say enough about how great my parents are and how much love and respect I have for them. They have helped me through some very hard times and are always there for me. My whole family is close like that. I could'nt imagine it being any other way.
 
Me and my family are a bunch of freaks who spend as much time together as possible. My parents (married for 36 years) live about 2 miles away from us (we used to live 4 blocks from them). My mom and I are SUPER close although sometimes we clash because she gets a little "too" involved in my marriage and parenting, etc. But we talk on the phone throughout the day and see each other almost every day. My dad is fantatsic, but we're not as close as me and my mom. He wasn't a great dad when we were little (not bad, just not around much) but he is seriously an AMAZING grandpa to my boys. And my mom, who was/is the world's best mom, is an even better grandma.
My sister and I are best friends and we live about 15 miles apart. But she is my son's kindergarten teacher, so I see her every day and we hang out at least once or twice a week.
And my extended family (mom's side) is all within 10 miles of us and we get together all the time for family b-days, dinners, and just to hang out. I've only just realized in the last 10 or so years that this is NOT the norm for most families. :)
We just really dig each other a lot. :)
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LIVE SEX
 
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Jenny, our family is the same way. :)

I would be lost w/o my parents, seriously. My mom picks the kids up every day from daycare, and my dad watches them all day on Fridays. They babysit when we need it and we do things together all the time.

Extended family here is my aunt, uncle and my two cousins and we are together for every holiday/birthday.
 
ZaCola3 said:
I am best friends with my mom, FOR REAL!
I love her so much. I love my dad too they are the best grandparents in the world!
And although I still fight with them occassionally, my mom tends to want to micro manage all aspects of my life, it never lasts long and we always make up!
Did I mention that they are the BEST GRANDPARENTS in the world?
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total ditto! My parents live just a couple miles away, and I seriously don't know how we would make it without them. They are always there when we need help with the kids or any odd request we have. Its great.
 
kscwgirl said:
Jenny, our family is the same way. :)

I would be lost w/o my parents, seriously. My mom picks the kids up every day from daycare, and my dad watches them all day on Fridays. They babysit when we need it and we do things together all the time.

Extended family here is my aunt, uncle and my two cousins and we are together for every holiday/birthday.
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Our extended family here is my mom's family.... my grandma, aunt, two cousins, great aunt and uncle, and a couple misc. "strays" we've taken in over the years. :)
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CANNABIS SEEDS
 
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Leila said:
There are moments, few and far between mind you, where I can almost believe that my mother is actually a human and not some Borg-like creature with no emotions or tact. I love my mother, she's my mother, yk? I just don't like her very much. ........................................The worst part of it is that she has no clue that she's so awful.
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Leila you said what I didn't have the guts to. I feel the same. I have tried for so many years to connect with her but it just won't work. She is incapable of emotion. Really. She doesn't hold my daughter's hand crossing parking lots and stuff, she holds her arm. I pointed that out to her and she acted like it was no big deal and shrugged it off. It breaks my heart, for her mainly. I can't see how someone can choose to live only feeling the emotion of anger. There are reason....she didn't know her father, lived with an alcoholic, etc... but you would think that as an adult when you have your own family and a grandchild you'd want to work through those things or at least try for their sake if not your own. Not so with her.
We are so very different. I'm a big ball of emotion and cannot stand to go to bed angry at someone. She will hold a grudge for life. I have offended quite a few people I didn't know but I try to watch my words really carefully with the people I love- my mom will talk stone trash to us but you should hear her at church or at work. Jekyl and Hyde for real. It turns my stomach. I have tried to reach out to her but she just gets meaner.
She would not babysit until dd was 2, not overnight until she was 4. She always has more important things to do, like cleaning or some stupid church activity and not time for my daughter. (don't get me wrong, I am a very devout bible believing christian and have nothing against church- it's just her ways KWIM?)Kassi has spent the night with her twice in a year and they live 30 minutes away. It hurts my dad- he always calls to talk to Kassi, asks when she's coming to see him. But we both know how my mother is, so he comes up here a lot without her.
She's like a tornado. Rips stuff apart with no apologies, but occasionally leaves a lucky home untouched.
I've stopped letting that run my life and ruin my own emotional health- I had to for my daughter's sake.
Another reason my daddy and me are so close- misery loves company I suppose. LOL.
I feel better getting that out of my system. sorry to bore you and give TMI :confused:
 
i live at home still, so i'd say my parents are pretty close by. hehe.
i'm closer to my mom than to my dad. but that's typical. i mean, mom was the one who was home with us. but even though i'm close to her, it doesn't mean i get along perfectly with her. there are days that i really don't like her.
 
Y'all're so lucky.

My parents live 2.5 hours from here. My mom and I get along well enough, but it's mostly me parenting her as her mother is still learning how to feel again and be maternal after spending 50 years with a horrible tyrannical husband who has now been dead 3-4 years. She puts up with a lot of crap from my father and sister, who lives with my parents still, but feels powerless to do anything abt it. Sigh.

We would be closer, but she allows my father to spoil my sister to the detriment of my relationship with them both. I'm grateful to have witnesses to some of the stories and outside opinions that it's not me who's messed up. I spend holidays with them when I can and email my mom a couple times a week.

Although it is 'better' now that I am no longer dependent on my parents for anything, my father and I still don't have much of a relationship. I hug him hello and goodbye, politely ask him abt work, and sit with him on the couch while he watches TV, and that's enough for him.

Jeff's parents, on the other hand, live abt 20 minutes from here & have the same kind of relationship with him that my sister has with my parents. Jeff's parents come to all of his son's games and have him spend the night a few times a month in addition to babysitting him if the daycare is closed and Jeff has to work. Jeff is very close with his mother and talks to her on the phone 2-3x a week. The joke is that he's the daughter she never had as his birth was so physically traumatic for her that she was unable to have children after him.

I always point out how lucky Jeff is that there is a person in the world who thinks the sun rises and sets when he gets up and goes to sleep, but he just doesn't get it since that's all he's ever known.
 
My dad passed away 6 1/2 years ago and we always had problems. He was a mean man and very harsh with us. My mom lives clear across the country from me and we have a good relationship. I just get so frustrated with her cause she does things now that are well, stupid. She had a stroke a few years ago and has not been the same since. I am very close to my inlaws and they feel more like parents to me than my own parents, in fact they are coming to visit for the whole summer and I can't wait!! :thumbup:
 
My parents are on the other side of the earth. They live in the Philippines. We always lived close to each other, 75 miles away at the most. But due to my dad's biz, they sold their place in San Francisco and moved to Manila. Mom and I didn't get along for the longest time. She drove me crazy and I did the same to her. We're getting along better now that she's far away, partly due to distance, but mostly it's because she's on anti-depressants. She still has her quirks but is more pleasant to be around now.

I worry about them because they're in their 70s and I only see them 2x a year when they come here for a visit. They seem to slow down more and more when I see them. Mom quit dying her hair and it's all gray and Dad's lost most of his hair. They get tired easily. If anything happens to them, I'm not there to help out. It's scarry not being near them.
 
It's so interesting to read about the different kinds of relationships we all have or had with our parents.

Mine are about 10 hours away from me, and that is the closest we've lived since I was 19 and I moved to Alaska from California!! I was a rebellious child. I've never gotten along with my mom very well...I was adopted, and I was not the daughter she thought she would be getting. She wanted a quiet, meek and mild child who wanted to cook, clean and wait on men!! Well...that certainly wasn't going to happen!!! LOL!!

Her and my dad have been dealing with my younger brother (who has mental/emotional/drug problems, and have completely enabled him. He left his family (wife and two kids) and got back into drugs quite heavily. My parents let him move back in with them and he has a job now. My mom is so happy and thrilled he is doing so well, and when I ask her if he is paying child support and she says no...she doesn't understand why I won't have anything to do with him. I am actually going up to visit my sil (who lives an hour from them) in June, and I'll go see my parents when my brother is not there, but I can't go and stay with them. I think that would be a slap in my sil's face...and that of my niece and nephew. My mom's main concern is for her youngest child (and her only biological child). My older brother and I call her occasionally, but do NOT want to discuss anything about my brother (unless she wants to tell me where he works so I can turn him in to child support services!!).

It is hard...they are both getting older, my mom has early stages of alzheimers, can't cook anymore, and I wish they lived closer so I could help them...but they won't move. They won't change their will so their grandchildren (my brothers kids) will be taken care of, because they don't want to hurt my brothers feelings. Sure...give him all that money and he'll go blow it all on drugs!! That will make everything all right!

Ok...sorry for unloading all of this on you guys!!
 
I'm very close to my mom, my dad died when I was 3. But we're far away, I'm in Alaska & she's in New Mexico. DH is very close to his parents, they're great, also far away though, Michigan.
 
So interesting to read everyone's stories!

My parents and I are pretty close - although far apart in distance - me in Japan, they are in WI. We skype or e-mail several times a week and of course, now that they have a grandchild the want to know every detail about him. We are moving back to the States in part to be close to family.

We haven't always been close - I think going away to college, being out of the country for the past 7 years, getting married and having a baby has all taken our relationship to a new level.

I was a little relieved to know I was having a boy when I was pregnant with Graham. I know my sisters and I were mean to my mom and I didn't want to have to deal with that. And as far as trying to have a wonderful relationship with my children - I'm too new to know what works. Consistency and love I guess.

My in-laws are great as well, although my fil intimidates me (he is a very wise and observant man with high standards - of which I always feel I fall short) my mil is the sweetest lady.

We're pretty blessed.
 
When my parents were alive, we were pretty close. We had some arguments and such, but not real bad. My Dad has been gone since 1988 and my Mom passed away last August.

I am getting closer to Roger's Mom though... she is a wonderful lady!
 
This is a fascinating thread and so timely for me. When DH and I got married his folks lived in Wisconsin and my folks lived in Oklahoma. A few years ago the in-laws moved back to town and live about 20 minutes away. Just this past week my parents moved to town and live about 10 minutes away.

This is the first time in my adult life that my folks and I have lived in the same town. I'm looking forward to getting to know them better. When we lived together, times were tough. When we lived far apart and only got together for holiday weekends and such, times were also tough. My father and I get on each other's nerves really badly after about 3 days of togetherness. My parents tend to bicker and snipe at each other in a really annoying way. I'm so hoping that this new phase will bring about better relationships. I've always wanted to do "girlfriend" things with my mom and now I actually get a chance. My dad needs to be entertained quite a bit. Now that we have kids he can take them outside to play while mom and I sit and scrap or go shopping.

My in-laws have been the greatest blessing ever. I'm actually disappointed when we don't hear from them for a couple days. We love to hang out with them and they help us out all the time with child care and household tasks.

Even better, our parents get along really well with eachother. Now that my folks are back in town, we don't have to choose one pair over the other. We can just all get together and have a good time.

--Pam in Missouri
 
While I don't know if I would call my parents my best friends or say we are extremely close I do love them to pieces!! They are both such interesting and different people from each other which has always fascinated me. They have been married for almost 40 years! When I say we are not close it is only because they were older when they had me -- took them 10 years to get pg -- and were told they would never have a baby. I am living proof "they" were wrong. That said, I just grew up liking things they just don't understand... like rock music... my dad listend to classical music and my mom like anything that is not rock. BUT it is just the generation gap too I think. We had our fare share of arguments and still do but I think that is totally normal.

Right now my hubby, my daughter and I live with them since we moved back to NJ from Atlanta. I have my moments but they love Gabby so much and they love having her here. AND they treat Tim just like a son! I am very blessed to have them as my parents because they have taught me a lot... more than I probably know!
 
My parents live 5 blocks away! My brother, sister, and I all go back for dinner once a week. After DD1 was born...my father (retired) was at our place EVERY DAY! He also cooked a couple of times for us for the 1st 6 weeks. Our parents have keys to our place and they would just come in when they decided to visit. It was crazy in the beginning b/c my father would call every day after DD1 was born to see if it was a 'good' time to come over...but of course, whenever he called it just so happened to be when I was putting DD to sleep or I was trying to nap. It got better when DD1 was a little older and had more of a routine so it was easier just to tell him the window of awake time that he could come over every morning.

But...sometime after DD2 was born...probably not until her 2nd year of life, I finally had to be honest and tell him that it would be easier for me if he didn't come over everyday. Which was a relief for me and made it easier for me as when my girls were older we went out a lot more earlier in the morning. But I felt okay saying that because we see my parents at least once a week.

My sister DOES NOT KNOW how I could've put up with those daily visits for SO LONG lol.

But, we aren't close close with my parents. I'm very close to my sister and have a good relationship with my brother. But my parents...eh...there's just a wall between us. I can't speak for my brother, but my sister and I just got fed up about the way communication works in this family with them. We are civil and just tell them things on a need-to-know basis.
 
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