How much did you learn from your parents?...

[singledad]

So I had an interesting conversation last night about the influence our upbringing have on our own parenting styles. It touched a nerve with me, because I've always wondered how much easier parenting would have been if I had an example to follow. So, just for interests sake (its not like it would change anything) - how much did you learn about parenting from your own parents? Do you follow their example, perhaps changing the things you didn't like, or do you just figure it out as you go? Or, do you perhaps have other people whose examples you follow?

 

[Father_0f_7]

I'm on my phone right now so I'm not going to make this too long. I believe you and I had similar childhoods...meaning, it could have been A LOT better, I often think about how different my life would be if my step father had never been in my life. But I always try and turn it around and remember, no matter how horrible he was, he taught me how NOT to treat my children. And for that I believe I am a better father.

 

[superman]

taught me a lot of patience...made me more emotional something my mom never gave me but something i always wish i had and thought were impirtant. ive learned a lot NOT to do cus of my mom haha. i always wish i had someone who could actually be a parent lol

 

[stjohnjulie]

I was just thinking about something like this.... my sister is here visiting me right now and we are different in so many ways and I've been trying to figure out how people can be raised in the same environment and take away something completely different.

What I've come up with is that it really has to do with a persons emotional maturity. I've always been my own person, have challenged and examined what I've been told, and been fiercely independent. My sister on the other hand has always been 'needy' and very dependent on others. Now, as grown women with children of our own, she has a lot of resentment and uncertainty about herself and who she is independently of everyone else. In a lot of ways, I think she still sees herself as my parent's child and is always trying to live up to their expectations of her. It causes her a lot of grief in more ways than I can even write about.

The thing is, we were raise in an intact nuclear family. My parents are wealthy, but they were never every flashy so I had no idea how well off they were until we had all flown the nest. My dad worked (pretty much all the time) and my mom stayed home. They were very social and were always going out with friends and having parties. They were pretty good parents. They didn't fight, hit us, drink to much, or anything like that. I learned some things from them, and I learned some things not to do from them.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that although I do think it's very helpful to have a good example to follow, it really is up to us individually to commit to being a good parent on our own. My husband had a horrible childhood with his mom and he is an amazing father. His mother was a monster and he not only survived, he has persevered.

 

[lovebeingamum]

My parents took protecting me to the extreme. As a result I have had to learn how to be an adult by myself after leaving home.

I was only allowed to have one friend, and I could only play with her if she came to our house. I wasn't allowed to go to her house or go to the park with her. Definitely no sleepovers.

I was allowed to go to Brownies and Girl Guides, but that was because my mother could still watch over me there.

She would read my diary and question me about it which was embarrassing for me. I didn't really have friends to talk to all I had was my diary and then because she kept reading it I couldn't even have that.

I was only allowed to watch my mother baking, never allowed to try anything myself. Never trusted me to wash myself etc...

It left me very emotionally crippled. By the time I was 18 and finally escaped, I had no idea what to do. I had to learn how to be an adult later in life.

While it is good to protect your kids, you can go too far in the other direction and not do them any favours. My parents absolutely went too far in the other direction.

On the plus side, as an adult I made it my responsibility to change things for myself. I do feel sometimes though as if I had many wasted years of life.

I have learned from all of this that I need to have a balance in things. I let my children bake with me, they are allowed to go to sleepovers and such as long as I know who it is with and I can contact them while they are there.

I want my children to grow up and be able to take care of themselves because they won't always have a parent around to sort their problems out for them.

 

[singledad]

I guess what I'm trying to say is that although I do think it's very helpful to have a good example to follow, it really is up to us individually to commit to being a good parent on our own. My husband had a horrible childhood with his mom and he is an amazing father. His mother was a monster and he not only survived, he has persevered.

That is very well put... I guess in a way I'm a bit like your sister I've made some spectacularly stupid choices in my life, and so, somewhere in my twenties I reached a point where I basically abdicated all decision-making privileges to those who, I believed, were better equipped to do so. Regaining trust in my own judgement is an ongoing process for me. On the surface I'm very independent, but I guess deep down I still don't really trust myself. Add to that the fact that although, like others have said I've learnt a lot about what not to do, I don't have an example of what a good way is to do things, so I end up feeling very unsure of what to do.

Its getting better, though. With every decision I make based purely on my own judgement and gut-feeling that works out well (and most do), I gain a little more confidence. I guess that really isn't all that different from many other parents, is it? We will all make mistakes. Some will repeat their parents' mistakes. Some will learn from their parents' mistakes, but make others. Some, like me, will simply make mistakes all by themselves .

I just hope that I am right in believing that if I give my child unconditional love, and guide her to the best of my abilities, she will be OK.

 

[singledad]

My parents took protecting me to the extreme. As a result I have had to learn how to be an adult by myself after leaving home.

Stories like yours scare me a little. There was a young girl who posted about her mother's over-protectiveness on here too - and that also scared me a little. What scares me about it is the fact that I know I could very easily become that over-protective parent. When I think about letting my little girl go to someone I don't know's house, everything in my screams NO! NEVER!. When I think about her sleeping over at someone's house, I find it hard to breathe. And yet I know there will come a time that I will have to allow that. I can't protect her forever. The best I can do is to teach her to protect herself. I don't want her to be emotionally crippled as you were. I want her to become a strong, independent woman, like her mother.

LOL, I guess I've just learnt another important lesson

 

[mom2many]

I find this a little hard to answer, my circumstance is much different then my mom's. She was single and raising to girls on her own. I have the luxury to stay home and I am still married, although there was a period where we weren't together.

I think that you can the best parents out there and still find something wrong with their parenting. Or have the worst parents and still rise from the ashes. I believe that only we can make the choices about the paths we take and how we chose to parent is up to us. Do me and my mom have similarities...yes. But we also have things we do completely different, not cause what she did was bad but because my kids are completely different children then me or my sister.

 

[Jeremy+3]

I guess my wife and I have raised our children in the 'Welsh' way as our parents raised us, but still the majority of things we do are completely different.

Just as my own parents and my in laws we have never hit our children or shouted at them, however they used the Welsh knot which is something we haven't done, probably because it isn't quite so significant nowadays and they would probably use it as a missile anyway.

 

[NancyM]

Very interesting question and responses as well.

I was very lucky, as I've learned along the way, that I had two parents who loved their children very much. I learned my best parenting skills from both my parents, they were pretty similar in their beliefs and a little different as well.

For the most part and with the important parenting issues, I do follow in their foot steps. for instance I don't believe in hitting children, or physical punishment of any kind, I believe it's healthy to hug and kiss children often, and verbally tell them you love them everyday, this goes for dad's telling their son's that as well.

Like my parents, I'd rather smother Max to pieces, and never let him do anything dangerous, oh yeah, I wish I could just control that forever, but I can't, and this is where my parents and I differ. They both were afraid of the whole world so held us back a lot. I also encourage him to go to college and learn forever, another thing my parents weren't big on.

I rather he enjoy his young life, and take it slow without getting too serious with just one girl , because I know how fast those precious teen years flies by and you can't get them back, (I wouldn't say it to him) but I wish it. My parents were raised where you worked at a young age and married young.

Of course today every thing has changed since I was a kid, and as a good parent you have to change with the times so that YOU fit into the new world your child belongs to. I find that many of my older fashion beliefs don't really apply to this new generation. So, I must make the effort to learn the new ways and parent with new skills.

My DH has never had children in his family before Max came along, so he was totally inexperienced, and found some of my ways odd. He was raised in a colder environment but turned out to be a good father. We disagreed on just about every child rearing issue that ever came up.
It got in the way of some important decisions and I ended up making them on my own sooo
That was tough. :wacko:

 

[Paswerdz]

I wouldn't say so much from my parents as much as my siblings.

My mother raised all 8 of us by herself. She is an absolute saint and I will spend the rest of my life giving back to her what she gave to raise me and my brothers and sisters by herself, but with her being so busy providing for us, we leaned on each other a lot in her absence and I grew to understand the absolute importance of family. Thanks to that, she is very close to her cousins and aunts and uncles. Other than keeping the family close, I find myself kind of winging it in the parenting department.

Especially since a lot of my friends who have had children have relocated since and I don't have much time to hang out with them. Figure the best place I can relate to people is on parenting forums. =)

 

[Stephano]

My parents divorced when I was two. I spent equal time living with both. Both were strict (as I am now,) but they were strict for different reasons. My mother was strict because she wanted me to be responsible, trustworthy, and to take pride in what I do. My father was a brutal dictator. So I like to think that I learned how to parent from my mother, and how <I>not </I>to parent from my father.

 

[gibson_es]

my only child is still in my wifes belly (weird how we say that, givin that there not really in the belly....anyway) so im only going off how i feel.

alot of what i feel is right and wrong, and what we will and wont let your child do will/does stem from a combo of my parents and my wifes parents. but there are definently things i have already told my self that i would or wouldnt do that is of my own device. and very different from my parents and hers. i believe there are things that cant be learned from our parents. electronics for example. look at what there was 20 years ago, and what there is now.

i am very thankful that i can at least look back and see what i feel made me a better person, and what i feel my parents could have done better (they were great, but nobody is perfect) and that is the main think i will use as a guide to parenting.

 

[lifebythelesson]

Wow! I can only say it's a priviledge to read so many posts about so many bad experiences with parents who did not seem to do a very good job parenting. What impresses me the most is, well, actually two things:

1. The openness of the discussion is humbling and
2. the fact that so many of you have had horrible role models and yet come to places like this in a quest to grow and learn and develop as parents.

All so impressive!

Well, my dad too was much better equipt to be a chief of police (which he was), than a loving parent. He was the authoritarian, do what I say when I say it because I said it type. His favorite line seemed to be, "Stop crying or I'll give you a reason to cry!"

Still, I learned some invaluable things from the man. I learned to work hard because he worked us boys hard. I learned responsibility and self-sacrifice, will power and determination. While there are better ways to have taught us such traits, I agree with what others have said, that I am also a better man because of it. But I've also had to work hard to overcome other things.

Because I always knew I wanted kids, and lots of them, and since I also knew I knew next to nothing about being a good dad, my first jobs were working in preschools and daycare centers just so I could learn to be around small kids and figure out what to do.

That's what all of us are doing right now: learning from others on this parenting forum!

Well, my mom was the lifesaver floating in a turbulent sea of anger and fear. She taught me love and patience, compassion and kindness.

PS: Since my parents divorce, while I was in my very early 20s, my dad found religion and has since become a good, kind, honorbale man.

 

[Incogneato]

I learned many things from my parents, both good and bad. I tend to think of myself as very introspective and cautious, so I learned alot of things from mistakes my parents made. I learned how to take care of myself (not smoke, eat wrong foods, not exercise-- like my father did). I learned not to wish a baby's young life away (wishing each next stage in your childs life would hurry up and get here-- like my mother did). There are many other examples, but I also learned how to be a good person from them. I learned how to listen first and completely, and to try to understand and be empathetic. I learned how to take care of myself and think for myself and be a good person. I think my parents did great and hope I can be as good of a parent as they were.

 

[Eliza]

i definintly follow in their footsteps, but take some things from my dad and then others from mom. and then there's also the combination of the partners skills that he has learnt from both his parents

 

[Noclevername]

I come from a divorced family and I think I take qualities from both sets of parents. My dad and step-mother made me do things like chores around the house and try all different kinds of foods. I am thankful for that because my mother was a slob and let me eat (or not eat) whatever I wanted. So in my adult life, I am thinkful I've tried so many foods because now when I have to eat with colleages, I don't embarrass myself by being too picky.

But my mother taught me not to be prejudice against anyone else no matter what they looked like, what church they went to, etc. My dad and stepmother were always prejudice against other religions such as Catholic or Mormon. I had friends of each and they would not let me go to church with any of them.

 

[kathywhite]

For me the question brings me to how my parents taught me not by what they said, but by how they behaved - what they modeled for me.

Some of the modeling was not so helpful (anger, drinking, overwork)

Some of the modeling was great (having fun, importance of family holidays, reading)

Makes me wonder what am I modeling for my children, how do they experience me &amp; my husband - what impressions will they pick up and copy....

 

[Pwningbear]

I learned a lot from my mother, but not really from my father. I have found some old techniques (Like how to scare off monsters) that my mom use to use on my brothers, work with my child. Other things you just need to experience for yourself and find what works right for that person. My husbands father had very little patience, and his mother was overly sheltering with him. So he had to learn several things a long the way.