This weekend poll comes from one of our readers.
My wife and I had a conversation about parenting. She was complaining that she was a worse parent than her parents were. Her parents were patient, and always knew how to handle the kids.
I, on the other hand, feel that I am a much better parent. My father had an angry temper, and used intimidation to parent. Unfortunately, he has passed that parenting style to me, but I am a big improvement. I help with the kids more than my dad did (and more than her dad did), I am more involved, I am more patient (although I could do better.)
[poll id = 497]
[poll id = 498]
Wheat & Tares 
I think it’s hard to categorize both parents the same way. When I was growing up, mom was the “good cop” while dad was the “bad cop.” I can remember hearing, “just wait until your father comes home” with great dread. On the other hand, with my sister’s inlaws , dad was the good cop, and mom was the bad cop.
My kids would say I’m pretty dreadful I’m sure, but they don’t know they’re born compared to my childhood, which was violent and verbally abusive on a daily basis. I don’t do that to my kids.
But I guess that’s like comparing apples to pears, our times are very different, and my parents did well by their lights, but they were completely unable to see their children as separate creations with minds other then their own- a common mistake even now.
So, it doesn’t take too much to better my parents example, but ther is no way my kids can understand that. I guess that’s an accomplishment.
It will take my kids a long time to forgive me for my inadequacies,that’s tough, but I’m pleased that I didn’t altogether hand on the damage.
My two cents: the fact that she is sensitive enough to compare herself to her parents in an effort to be better suggests she is probably a much better parent than she thinks she is.
I think as a society, each generation is a bit better than the last, because we are progressing as a society. But I think my parents did their best, and their parents did their best, and on and on. So I wouldn’t want to say who is better and who is worse, they did they best they could in their respective circumstances.
# 2
My circumstances are similar, handlewithcare. It make me really sad to know how short I’ve fallen from my ambitions to be a much better parent but it also warms my heart to see what great parents my kids are.
I guess that means that I did pretty much OK given my background. And it also makes me happy for my parents who haven’t lived to see it because I know they wanted to be better parents than they were.
There wasn’t much in the way of parenting manuals for them. They had a lot of stress in their lives from The Depression and WWII and I think my dad got out of that with PTSD. It wasn’t identified then, of course, but that man who tried so hard and could be so much fun to be with also had rages that came out of nowhere and scared us half to death. It would give him so much pleasure and redemption to see how loved and confident my grandkids are.
I had miserable parents. As in objectively lousy parents, but that comes with the territory when your mom is mentally ill. Dad and I have made up over the years and he’s been very open (and apologetic) about his shortcomings, but he’s also been generous and patient as he grew older.
I, on the other hand, am a pretty stellar parent and I can point to specific strengths and traits my kids have because of how I’ve raised them. (Frankly it’s been pretty easy: I just think of what my parents would have done or said, then do the opposite.) It’s one of my few genuine successes as an adult and it really gets me through the day.
My parents were pretty laid back. Not affectionate or sentimental, but they trusted us a lot and gave us a lot of latitude. Although I say that as a youngest. I believe the older ones had different parents! That’s probably true with my own kids, too. I think we sometimes mellow with experience.
My parents would have had CPS called on them b/c they believed very much in ‘spare the rod, spoil the child’. Yet they both fiercely cared about us and were ENGAGED. Though I never employed corporal punishment on my kids, I’d rather see a kid get a ‘whoopin’ by a parent who is interested in his/her child’s well-being and consistent in attention, versus those self-indulgent nitwits that are too busy on their second or third adolescence to actually supervise their brats.
It doesn’t have to be one or the other. I would prefer engaged parents who don’t use corporal punishment.
Hawkgrrrl, as the eldest I can certainly say I had different parents to my youngest siblings.
I wouldn’t say I am particularly better at parenting than my parents, but I fail in different ways. There are parts of my own personality that negatively impact my parenting, but on the other hand I specifically strive to not make what I perceive as the mistakes my parents made. Mostly this comes down to asking myself, before scolding my kids for something, “Was that really bad, or did it just strike me that way in the moment?”
Hawk and Hedgehog,
My oldest brother is 13 years older than me, so I definitely feel that we had different parents. I think this is a common sentiment with large age gaps between siblings. But what is really interesting is that I have talked to twins who feel like their parents were totally different with each of them, and obviously, this difference cannot be explained by an age gap. I think this speaks to perception, which is interesting and scary. Some kids with bad parents might focus on and remember the few times their mom/dad was nice to them. Some kids with good parents might focus on and remember the few times their mom/dad was mean to them. You never know how they are perceiving things and what they will remember. Let’s hope they don’t just remember when mistakes are made.
Dexter,
I agree that it is a lot about perception. My oldest sister (7 years older than me) feels that our parents did some permanent damage to her because my mom worked more than full time (she’s a doctor) and my Dad was not active in the church. She saw these two things as short comings.
I, on the other hand, felt that these two things about my parents made me a better person. Because my mom worked, I was the most independent of any of my friends (I grew up in a suburb of Salt Lake in a wealthy area where almost every single person was Mormon, and there were fewer than a handful of working mothers). I also felt like my Dad’s inactivity helped me realize that you don’t have to be Mormon to be a good, honest person. Both of these things made me much more open to people who didn’t fit the norm and my life has been richer for it.
As far as being better or worse than my parents, I think I’m better at some things. They were both workaholics and I try really hard to be home as much as I can to spend time with my kids. They also were yellers. I try not to yell so much. On the other hand, they taught us how to work hard and I’m not sure I’m so good at that. They led by powerful example, and I fall short there too. I don’t think I’m better or worse, just different.