So I'm going down tonight to spend quality time with my parents, as described in my latest journal entry, and I'd be lying if I said I was looking forward to it (mainly because of circumstances beyond my parents' control).

Do you get along with your parents? Love 'em to death? See them whenever possible? Cherish the amount of distance you've put between you and them? Do you find your relationship with your parents has changed as you've gotten older? Or do you just wish you were another daughter of JoLo?

Spill it here, including advice for someone whose relationship with her parents is, well, not as good as it should be.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Answers

Man, I'm going home to see mine this weekend too. As usual, not expecting it to be a totally pleasant time, with plenty of sick dad parental stress galore. He fell down again and broke more vertebrae again, and has two kidney stones they might operate on, etc, etc. *sigh*

Anyway. My parents are of the smothery overprotective not too trusting sort, and I'm an only child. They don't exactly have lives of their own beyond dealing with Dad's various illnesses, so being around them these days isn't so much fun. I haven't seen them since July, and figured I'd better go home and do my duty. I used to have to go home every single month, minimum, or they'd be complaining and miserable; they've gotten more used to my not being home as much, but they still complain if I don't come home or find something else to do instead of seeing them. Basically I'm always wanting more distance so I can avoid the fights; and they want me to be closer and closer to them. My mom keeps begging me to call her every single day "like Oprah does with her best friend," but I can't handle that. Especially since phone calls with her are expensive, long-distance and minimum an hour long (which is why I was packing late at night last night).

It's definitely gotten worse as I got older; they have problems with my being out of their control on some level and desperately want me home; yet in some respects it's "Haven't you grown up YET?" I don't really have advice because I can't manage to have things go well with my parents either. But they've always been difficult if things don't go EXACTLY THEIR WAY WITH NO OBJECTIONS.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Um, I sort of feel weird saying this because I don't want to be "that girl" but uh, I get along famously with my parents.

Now, granted, it hasn't always been like this. Judy and I used to fight like tornados, uprooting each other and with debris from past arguments flying by and cutting you. But as I get older, we get along better and better. Mostly, I think that took ME growing up. As soon as I stopped letting her affect me the way she did when I was a "rebellious" teenager, she stopped treating me like one. Now she treats me like a grown-up but I treat her, and respect her, like my mother. Which is key. She's still my MOTHER, not a shopping partner or a gossip cohort, you know? So I can ask her advice and she'll freely give it, but she trusts me to make the right choices even if i disregard her advice. She's okay with that. I'm okay with that.

Did that make ANY sense?

WG - when I was 23 my mom and I were still fighting to find a balance, although it was better at 23 than it was at 21 than it was at 17 (when it was probably at an all time low).

My dad is my dad. We have great times together and can talk for hours because all you have to do is say "WWII Aviation - Go!" and he'll talk till it's time to pay the bill and leave. I love him, insanely, but it's a lot less dimensional than my relationship with my mother. A LOT.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

I'm in the "we get along great" camp, too, although that certainly wasn't the case (with my mom, especially) until I was about to graduate from college.

After she passed away, my dad remarried, and lawzy if I wasn't lucky as hell in his choice for my stepmom (sounds weird to have a stepmom at age 30, but whatever). She's the bees knees, and they're WONDERFULLY suited for each other. We're all very close, although I think sometimes she has a hard time believing that my brother and I really think she's as great as we do.

I'm going to see them at their ranch outside College Station this weekend. In fact, I better get my shit together here pretty soon so I can leave work early and avoid (I hope) the worst of the traffic.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Or do you just wish you were another daughter of JoLo?

Ain't a one of you strong enough.

My parents and I get along fine and always have. They want the best for me, and I have to remember that when I want to run away and change my name. The problem comes that they want what THEY think is best for me, and now that I'm old enough to decide that, it's hard to get them to see the difference.

WG, I don't remember if you have any siblings, but I think it's different if you are the only one upon which the very intense limelight is shining.

I get really pissed off sometimes, though, and so do they.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Al, I have a younger brother, but as I discussed ad nauseum (sp? AB, did I get that right?) in the Sinnah! thread, he gets away with a lot more shit than I do.

I know my folks want the best for me ... it's just that I feel sometimes that I could be the Best. Daughter. Ever. and that still wouldn't be enough to excuse my dating The Smoker.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

My parents are so great. They [i]want[/i] what they want for me, but they try not to push it too much. And believe me, there's been enough shit that's gone on in my life that it must have taken incredible strength for them to close their mouths and just hug me. I truly appreciate and admire them for that! Having said that, I can also say that Mom is volatile and insists on getting her way most of the time. Dad is a brilliant absent minded professor. He's great, and loving, but generally has not a clue. I love them, though, and I accept them with all their difficulties, because that's what family is all about.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

HA! Snork...Heee...Which parent do I get along with? The biological father who abandoned me when I was 7, and then re-appeared when I was 18 (and not as much of a burden)? Or my mom, the one who ran away to Hawaii 3 years ago, ostensibly to become a Hawaiian healing art practioner? (Sees my Dad---the adopted one---7 or 8 weeks out of the year). Or my Dad, the one who without fail brings up how he and my mom decided to move me out when I was 2 months out of high school. He keeps trying to convince me their decision was right---um, hmm...Sure, it worked for him and mom, but I promptly had a nervous breakdown. I wasn't ready for it, and if I have children, I'll try and make sure that I tailor the kicking-out age to the child. Rather than just figure since I did it, they should.

Mom is currently bugging me to visit HI. I know, such a trauma.

However, my husband and I are saving up for a house, and it looks like I might be returning to school much earlier than I'd thought before. (Northwestern U, ho, maybe). The tickets are VERY pricey and my parents would never pay for them. If I went by myself, my mom wouldn't take any vacation time (she saves it for Dad, understandably) and I'd be stuck on her acerage by myself and a pair of crazy dogs. And she refuses to think that any of those facts are valid.

So, hmm...Yeah, I love my parents (except for the biological father), but I can't be in the same room with my mom for very long. But it could have been a hell of a lot worse.

They could have been cannibals. Instead of hippies.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001