Can You Love and Respect Your Parents and Not Have A Close Relationship With Them?

SeaBreeze

SeaBreeze

Endlessly Groovin'
Location
USA
I had a good childhood, we weren't rich, but my parents saw to it that we had everything we needed and some of the things we wanted. We were never physically or mentally abused at all, and there was love and calm in the home.

Regardless of all that, when I got into my teens, my relationship with my mother and father weakened, I was more concerned with my friends. I did attend any family events or holiday dinners when needed, and acted appropriately. As I got older, especially after moving out of state and getting married, my contact with my parents became less and less. Reduced to an occasional phone call, birthday or Christmas card or gift, etc.

I loved both my parents and respected them, but didn't have a close relationship with them. They both passed on a long time ago, I'll always miss them and love them. RIP.

Did you love and respect your mom and dad, but didn't have a close relationship with them in your adult years? Or do you feel that if you loved them, you would make sure to be with them a lot and have a close relationship?
 

Sometimes people get along better if they are apart. I think a person could love and respect their parents, even though they didn’t interact with them on a continual basis. The relationship may work best that way.

Do you have any regrets? If they were alive today would you have a tighter relationship?

Maybe Shalimar could add something to this question. Interesting, to say the least.
 
I didn't have a particularly close relationship with my parents, and I didn't really respect them either. I maybe loved them as my parents, but not as people and after I got married and we moved away, I saw less and less of them. I sometimes regret not having had a more constructive relationship with them, but we were very different people.
 

I don’t think there is a stock answer. Love and respect are not predicated on close contact. Distance can certainly be a factor and a limitation. SeaBreeze, your parents may have had their own personal lives to live, focused primarily on each other,
not everyone requires constant contact with family. Also, they had the option of contacting you. It is the type of contact with our loved ones which matters most, not the frequency. Rest easy.💕
 
Shalimar said:
I don’t think there is a stock answer. Love and respect are not predicated on close contact. Distance can certainly be a factor and a limitation. SeaBreeze, your parents may have had their own personal lives to live, focused primarily on each other,
not everyone requires constant contact with family. Also, they had the option of contacting you. It is the type of contact with our loved ones which matters most, not the frequency. Rest easy.💕
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I agree Shalimar, my contact did not take away from my love for them, or their love for me. They divorced when I was in my mid-teens, so they really didn't have a life together either, they were both in their mid 50s at the time. I know my mother would have wanted to be with me more, and I did get to apologize to her when visiting her before she became so sickly that she passed on. She was okay with it, and knew the love was there. The contact we did have was mutual, not just one-sided.

I just asked the question because today on a radio show they were talking about remaining close to your parents once you leave home. They discussed loving and honoring them without having to be with them all the time.
 
911 said:
Sometimes people get along better if they are apart. I think a person could love and respect their parents, even though they didn’t interact with them on a continual basis. The relationship may work best that way.

Do you have any regrets? If they were alive today would you have a tighter relationship?
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Thanks for your input 911, I really have no regrets, just maybe felt a little guilt when my mother was elderly toward the end. If they were alive today, I don't think the relationship would be any tighter. As I said to Shalimar, it was the topic on the radio today, so I thought I'd pose the question and throw in my personal experience. :)
 
Capt Lightning said:
I didn't have a particularly close relationship with my parents, and I didn't really respect them either. I maybe loved them as my parents, but not as people and after I got married and we moved away, I saw less and less of them. I sometimes regret not having had a more constructive relationship with them, but we were very different people.
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Thanks for your reply Capt. I can definitely see where you love your parents but may not really respect them or have much in common with them. Simply because we were born as a result of two people getting married, doesn't guarantee that we would even like them or have any common opinions or values. We're all very much individuals, entering and leaving this world on our own.
 
I did not respect my parents. Respect is earned; not something people get because of their title.
My mother was an abusive witch. None of her 4 kids attended her funeral, we had better things to do - like celebrate her passing.
My father was a better person than my mother because he wasn't abusive, but he allowed his wife to abuse her kids so as not to make her angry at him - which is why I had more pity for him than respect. The worst thing my father did was have kids with a psycho.
 
I loved and respected my parents but none of us were easy to get along with.

During my teenage years, I avoided conflict with them and quietly did pretty much as I pleased.

When they got older I did what I could to help them with transportation, errands, etc... and IMO we actually became closer and more understanding of each other as people.

I have to add that my entire family is not demonstrative when it comes to expressing our feelings. You will never see us holding up banners to welcome someone at the airport or doing group hugs, we are the people that pull up to the curb long enough for someone to jump in or out of the car.
 
Lc jones said:
I loved my mom and feared my father, strangely though I respected his many talents and fearlessness. I do not miss him now that he has died (sadly) but I miss my mom terribly. Love always triumphs over fear.
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I've found that many parents confuse "Respect" with "Fear." They mistakenly think they are one and the same. Sometimes an abusive parent will brag about how their kids obey them, as proof that their kids respect them. They are wrong, as well as ignorant.
My mother was one of those parents. She was under the delusion that her kids respected her. No....they feared her - until they got big enough to hit her back. They never respected her.
 
win231 said:
I've found that many parents confuse "Respect" with "Fear." They mistakenly think they are one and the same. Sometimes an abusive parent will brag about how their kids obey them, as proof that their kids respect them. They are wrong, as well as ignorant.
My mother was one of those parents. She was under the delusion that her kids respected her. No....they feared her - until they got big enough to hit her back. They never respected her.
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That's sad but true Win, and I'm sorry that you had to experience that personally. You're right, being obedient out of fear has nothing to do with respect.
 
win231 said:
I've found that many parents confuse "Respect" with "Fear." They mistakenly think they are one and the same. Sometimes an abusive parent will brag about how their kids obey them, as proof that their kids respect them. They are wrong, as well as ignorant.
My mother was one of those parents. She was under the delusion that her kids respected her. No....they feared her - until they got big enough to hit her back. They never respected her.
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My father never hit my sister or I but he was so angry about his relationship with my mother that he would have these outbursts of anger he also had a severe drinking problem so that was a large part of it. I’m sure that if he had hit my sister I my mother would’ve been out the door
 
And, parents who pass the abuse along into their own families (under the guise of "discipline" or "being strict") fail to realize the type of kids they're bringing up & what type of adults they will become.
I dated several women who had such parents - always expecting me to hurt them, always expecting the worst from me, regardless of how well I treated them or how much I respected them. My ex wife fit that perfectly - always accusing me or cheating, "looking," etc. Funny - SHE's the one who cheated & destroyed the marriage. And such women frequently choose men who are like their abusive parents because that's what they're accustomed to & abuse becomes "normal" in their minds. And an abusive childhood usually results in adults with low self esteem, so when their boyfriend/husband is abusive, they feel they deserve it....after all, they've had many years of thinking, "If I wasn't such a bad kid, my parents wouldn't have to be so mean to me."
 
Aunt Bea said:
I have to add that my entire family is not demonstrative when it comes to expressing our feelings. You will never see us holding up banners to welcome someone at the airport or doing group hugs, we are the people that pull up to the curb long enough for someone to jump in or out of the car.
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I can relate to that, AB!! My family is not demonstrative, either. (And no complaints from me.)

SeaBreeze--I do believe that a person can love and respect their parents without a close relationship with them. My upbringing was similar to yours; a very loving family. But I think the "unspoken rule" was that children were being prepared to go out on their own as adults, so that's what we did.

Shortly after I married at 18, we lived across country from my family. I missed my parents and always loved them, but understood that building our own life and family meant changes in relationships and family dynamics. Also, my brother and sister are 5 and 10 years older than me, so we weren't particularly close even when growing up.

So now it has come full circle for me. Our children have grown up and flown the coop; all productive and successful young people (if I do say so!) We hear from them often thanks to technology, but don't get to see them very often. I feel that they all love us as much as ever but they are busy building their own lives and families.
 
SeaBreeze said:
Did you love and respect your mom and dad, but didn't have a close relationship with them in your adult years?
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My folks were not the lovey huggy kind
There was none a that, ever
Can’t say as I missed anything

But now?
I’m catchin’ up

No complaints on how I was raised
I still have huge respect and admiration for both Dad and Mom

None of us ever lived close to each other once us kids were on our own

Still, there was family gatherings, thanksgiving, stuff like that

A reunion or two
Riots damn near broke out at those

Oh, and later, just funerals

Now?
Most everbody my senior is dead

Guess our next gathering will be mine
 
SeaBreeze said:
I had a good childhood, we weren't rich, but my parents saw to it that we had everything we needed and some of the things we wanted. We were never physically or mentally abused at all, and there was love and calm in the home.

Regardless of all that, when I got into my teens, my relationship with my mother and father weakened, I was more concerned with my friends. I did attend any family events or holiday dinners when needed, and acted appropriately. As I got older, especially after moving out of state and getting married, my contact with my parents became less and less. Reduced to an occasional phone call, birthday or Christmas card or gift, etc.
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Emotionally moving away from your parents is necessary to grow into an independent adult. It sounds as if the transition went smoothly, which means your parents knew you needed to become your own person. Congratulations to all of you.

Once out of the house, married, kids, jobs, so many priorities that belong to the future you are building for your own primary family. Your parents are outside of that, normally. I think things went pretty much as they should.
 
While they had a number of admirable qualities, my parents were racists and homophobes, and I struggled throughout their lives to reconcile their belief systems with a sense of responsibility and love towards them, in the end compartmentalizing those feelings. My mother was also a malignant narcissist frequently abusive towards her husband and children, and I had to maintain a certain amount of distance from her once independent to avoid her toxic attempts to run and control my life.
 
My parents were emotionally distant but I loved and respected them as best I could. There was a time when I wished we had closer relationships but it was never in the stars for us. I had a lot of contact with them before they passed on as they lived not far from me. Yet, that closeness was not there.
 
Patio Life said:
Emotionally moving away from your parents is necessary to grow into an independent adult. It sounds as if the transition went smoothly, which means your parents knew you needed to become your own person. Congratulations to all of you.

Once out of the house, married, kids, jobs, so many priorities that belong to the future you are building for your own primary family. Your parents are outside of that, normally. I think things went pretty much as they should.
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I completely agree with this, PL.

I developed a much better relationship with my mother as an adult than I had as a child. We became quite close from my mid-20s until she died a few years ago.
Like some others here, I mostly feared my father and eventually estranged myself from him for my own mental health.
 
Fyrefox said:
While they had a number of admirable qualities, my parents were racists and homophobes, and I struggled throughout their lives to reconcile their belief systems with a sense of responsibility and love towards them, in the end compartmentalizing those feelings. My mother was also a malignant narcissist frequently abusive towards her husband and children, and I had to maintain a certain amount of distance from her once independent to avoid her toxic attempts to run and control my life.
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Yep. Sounds similar to mine.
Have to keep distance to protect self so the warm and cuddly just isn’t there.
I’ll always love my parents but respect is something I’m not sure i can do or that they deserve.
 
The answer to this question for me focuses on the word "respect". For me the two go hand in hand regarding my love for an adult, if I don't respect you as a person, I can't love you. I do not respect either of my parents so the answer for me is no.

After reading the posts in this thread and other threads on here about what seems to be mostly dysfunctional upbringings (including my own), one thing seems most consistent, that the stereotypical lovey dovey families we watched on tv while growing up were far from the norm and perhaps total bs.
 

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