westernxer Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Mine is the most normal family I know, or maybe I'm just used to it. Link to post Share on other sites
HokeyReligions Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Curious and wondering how many people think they were reared in a normal family? What's Normal? How does your childhood effect your own family now? Same way everyone's does. Do you think you are raising your kids any different than you were raised or plan to do so differently? Yes and No. It takes two to parent and that means two different people who were raised differently and who both bring their ideas and unique parenting skills into the marriage. Link to post Share on other sites
Woggle Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Hell no. My mother hates men with a passion and took it out on me and my father is a weak shell of a man who never went to bat for me. Link to post Share on other sites
RecordProducer Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 IIt took me a long year to start to manage to get my head round his death. I questioned my decision to push him out of my life, but I did what I felt was right for me at the time, and you can't change that. I have to accept that. But it's still fairly painful, and I'm kinda welling up now... You didn't push away anything that was ever yours, honey. It was HIS choice to neglect his daughter, not yours. You'll have children some day and you'll go through all the pain again - this time with new feelings. When you experience how passionate love for your own kids can be, you will understand that you have to be totally screwed up, cold-blooded, and even mean to abandon and neglect your own children. Once you feel that kind of love, you'll never be able to forgive your father. You'll forgive yourself for pushing him away. Link to post Share on other sites
luvtoto Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Hell no. My mother hates men with a passion and took it out on me and my father is a weak shell of a man who never went to bat for me. You just don't have any good female experiences, do you? Sorry about what happened to you, Woggle. Link to post Share on other sites
2sunny Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Hell no. My mother hates men with a passion and took it out on me and my father is a weak shell of a man who never went to bat for me. You just need to find a gal like me who loves everything about men.... instead of the attitude like your mom. Lots of us out there, just figure out which one (hopefully it IS the one you plan to marry). Link to post Share on other sites
neek Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 Show me a mother who's not... Oh come on! That's uncalled for! Regardless of what your mother was like, you have no right to say that about all mothers. That really made me angry alphamale. Link to post Share on other sites
Woggle Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 You just don't have any good female experiences, do you? Sorry about what happened to you, Woggle. I don't know why but I really do think my fiance is different. I have good instincts and she gives me a good feeling. Link to post Share on other sites
luvtoto Posted April 8, 2006 Share Posted April 8, 2006 I don't know why but I really do think my fiance is different. I have good instincts and she gives me a good feeling. That's great. Link to post Share on other sites
littlekitty Posted April 10, 2006 Share Posted April 10, 2006 You didn't push away anything that was ever yours, honey. It was HIS choice to neglect his daughter, not yours. You'll have children some day and you'll go through all the pain again - this time with new feelings. When you experience how passionate love for your own kids can be, you will understand that you have to be totally screwed up, cold-blooded, and even mean to abandon and neglect your own children. Once you feel that kind of love, you'll never be able to forgive your father. You'll forgive yourself for pushing him away. Thanks RP. Strangely my SO is also helping to reinforce this, although it's painful at times. It's wonderful to see a real man, a real father, parent his child. He ALWAYS see's his son, every weekend without fail, and an extra day in the week when we can. He would never neglect his son, he is a good man. It makes me understand all the more how weak and wrong my father was for allowing me to slide out of his life. I guess it was his loss and not mine. Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted June 4, 2006 Share Posted June 4, 2006 No, I can't say a normal one. Dad went to jail for hitting my mother. Never had a normal relationship with the mother. In first grade, I messed up bigtime at a ballet recital and cried in the car on the way back. Mother got pissed and told me to get out...I got out and got left on the side of a major highway with my pink tutu on. I even crossed the intersection and found a house and knocked on some door. (She came back and got me 20 minutes later.) Confronted her years later and she refused to admit her fault stating that I was being stupid and crying because I didn't practice enough and it was my own fault. I've been called a whore several times by her. She got pissed at something trivial (not putting something back in place) and made me kneel in front of her while she kicked me and gave me a bruise. (I was 17 at this point.) Does the same thing to the sister as well. Major controlling, depression, etc. issues. Always got threatened to kick me out of the house. Got locked out once and had to apologize to baby sister through the door. Doesn't begin to describe the mother's insanities. Dad and mom are living separate lives but in the same house. Dad moved out several times but keeps coming back. Have to call my dad and mom separately eventhough they live in the same place. I knew when I was really little that I never wanted to be like either one of them. Link to post Share on other sites
hulali Posted June 8, 2006 Share Posted June 8, 2006 If by normal you mean a verbally, emotionally and physically abusive family, then my answer is a disgusted "Yes". I thought all families were like that until I moved out and saw that some people actually like their families. Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 Oh yeah. I forgot to add in my above post that one time my mom took my sis out somewhere and left the stove on while I was washing the dishes. Well, I didn't notice until the stove burst into flames and I couldn't put it out by putting water on it. I was in middle school, stupid and scared, so I ran to the neighbors and they called 911. She comes home and is pissed that she has to pay for the firemen to come and pissed that I embarassed her in front of all the neighbors. She yells at me and while I'm cowering in a corner, she beats me...all of her anger and frustrations taken out on me. I'm crying, backed into a corner getting beaten, so humiliated, and thought I had done something stupid by not putting out the fire myself. To her credit, she did apologize for that one later, but I still remember it and the hurt and emotional scar is still there when I think about it. Link to post Share on other sites
PuppyDogEyes Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 Curious and wondering how many people think they were reared in a normal family? I know I don't think it. My family is horrifically dysfunctional. My father is absent and has been since I was a year old, and my mother - well, let's say my mother was like Woggle's mother (more or less a femiNazi). I'm warped, and my brother's warped. When my grandmother died a few years back, our entire family unit (aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.) disintegrated. I have little to no contact with my family, and I've more or less mentally disowned them. How does your childhood effect your own family now? Well, if you can consider one person a family (I'm single and plan to stay that way), my childhood's more or less isolated me from the world. I feel like I walk around with a label on my forehead that screams "DIFFERENT!" I have no trust in most people, male or female - and it takes years for me to feel comfortable with only one person, never mind a whole group. I'm admittedly paranoid, and I may even have a touch of the antisocial in me. Aren't I just honest? Do you think you are raising your kids any different than you were raised or plan to do so differently? I'm afraid to have children, because I know that I'll unintentionally pass on whatever's wrong with me to them. And I wouldn't do that to my children, I would have more love and respect for them than that. (And yes, I'm in therapy. Not that it's doing a hell of a lot of good at present.) - pde. Link to post Share on other sites
ronnieromance Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 Nope. Single mom. Only Child. -R- Link to post Share on other sites
kitten chick Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 I can't believe I missed this thread. I'm going back to read about all of your families muahaha. Ok, I still have to kill 2 hours at work. My family was insanely normal. Two parents still completely in love. One sibling. Upper middle class. Wooden picket fences around the back yard. And of course, kitties. I have no idea how I got this screwed up. Link to post Share on other sites
jerbear Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 Curious and wondering how many people think they were reared in a normal family? How does your childhood effect your own family now? Do you think you are raising your kids any different than you were raised or plan to do so differently? I'm curious about yours in more detail. Normal family if you consider my mom divorcing my dad, kept her last name, took me with her, and got chased by my grandmother with a meat cleaver. Even today I do not have a bond with my father. I think I turned out ok w/o a father figure. I grew up in the projects in NYC, went to public schools, and now I'm about to enter the "upper middle class" according to meritocracy by education and future 2nd career path. How has it affected my own family? I'm the red herring, unmarried, Ivy educated professional male with a pretty cushy job. My background includes accounting, finance, IT, HR, CIS, and govt admin/non-profit vs. my parents as "clerks." How I would raise my kids well my side of the equation different than my parents is to be able to answer their questions w/o BS up to college. I can teach them, guide them, train them to better understand the world, their homework, and provide them answers. My parents have no clue what the 1st derivative of X^3+Y^3 is let the 2nd derivative or risk models in iinsurance. Include subjects like why the Sforza and Visconti's fought in Milan. To who was Cosimo de Medici was, origin of the word bank, what it feels like to have a loaded gun pointed at you, being choked, being bullied (and I kicked their ass) to what Carl Orf, and Puccini's music sound like. Differences between an Armani suit vs. an super 100 suit. Last but not least make them dress up in a penguin suit (tux) to escort mom to a party because I am trying to find a parking spot due to disliking the valet. Now if I get daughters, I'll have a lady in each arm and forget the car to the valet! Now how the other side, what my wife would do it is another story. I'll ask her when I find her as a single woman then promoting her from gf to finance to wife, when the time comes! :lmao: Link to post Share on other sites
shaunablain Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 hmmm normal lol okay i was a love child, my Dad was married with four children, and there were 8 brothers and sisters in my family....5 dads. Before anyone feels to criticise my mother she lost a child from cot death in her first marriage and never come to terms with it. She then went on to lose another child (she had the same dad as me) later on also from cot death. my elder brother and sister raised us because no dads took responsibility and my mum had to go out to work with no skills (long hours and crap pay) and bring up six children. and she was always in abusive relationships. Yes unfortuantely this did effect me, i grew with no confidence of self esteem. left skool with no qualifications and had an abusive 7 yr relationship and four kids. i have to point out im 24. now you may say what a stupid girl...and i would agree with you. but now i have been out of my relationship for a year (i left for my childrens sanity) we are living at my mothers house and we are slowly recovering. Even though i had a crap childhood and even tho it probably led to my s*** life, i don't regret it. im lucky i don't live in sudan or was one of them orphans in brazil rummaging through rubbish to eat!!!!! i mean in all serious my life is good and lucky because i have oppourtunities. LOL My kids believe or not are really happy. They no that i love them and every chance i get i tell them they are great and i love them!!!! i mean really life is crap, as long as your kids no your are there that is all that matters:) Link to post Share on other sites
shaunablain Posted June 9, 2006 Share Posted June 9, 2006 opportunities*....... to think im a post graduate in psychology!!! Link to post Share on other sites
Mary3 Posted June 24, 2006 Share Posted June 24, 2006 Among teenagers, peer pressure plays a large part in drug/alcohol use and abuse... While my friends got into drugs and alcohol , I never really did. However , they smoked and so did I. Still do today...sigh.... Link to post Share on other sites
belayakoshka Posted June 30, 2006 Share Posted June 30, 2006 most of the people don't like to talk about their f..ed up families and most of the families f..ed up: alcoholists, abusing, stuped and their combinations many people just don't have right to bring a new child to the world, but unfortunally it is very easy to become parents Link to post Share on other sites
collegegirl23 Posted July 1, 2006 Share Posted July 1, 2006 i've been very blessed! i've got no room for complaints! and i plan to pass on the principles and values they (parents) taught me to my own family as well. Link to post Share on other sites
This_Too_Shall_Pass Posted July 2, 2006 Share Posted July 2, 2006 I grew up in a good family. Sure, there are always times when you're growing up and think you have the worst deal in the world and feel that nobody understands you... But looking back, I wouldn't change anything. My brother and I were raised with fairly strict groundrules, and were almost terrified of getting on the wrong side of my Dad. In retrospect, that has been a very good thing indeed in terms of maturity and responsibility. In fact, my Dad became my confidante and dearest buddy when I was "grown up" enough to make my own decisions. a verbally, emotionally and physically abusive family, Just took the first half of the sentence here - I think that's a good description of an "abnormal" family. Most other stuff - "Raised by single mom/dad", "dad/mom ran off", "Parents didn't appreciate me enough" etc. isn't really abnormal. Families are rarely perfect, and some have more difficulties than the others. But, IMO, unless you're raised in an environment that is actually dysfunctional and affects your emotional and mental well-being, you're well within the normality limit. Link to post Share on other sites
dgiirl Posted July 6, 2006 Share Posted July 6, 2006 When I went into therapy, my therapist told me "Most families are dysfuntional... but yours... your's is _really_ dysfunctional". Link to post Share on other sites
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