Thoughts on parenting

These days I've been struggling my aging parents, and it has made me deeply reconsider the relationship I've had with them over my lifetime.

I always felt unconditionally loved. It's a wonderful way to grow up, and I truly wish every person on earth had that joyous, safe experience in life. I feel like it set me up for a lot of success and stability. I didn't have to do a lot of work to feel confident and proud of myself. In fact, it took me years to understand why a lot of other people struggled. I had to get to really know a number of adults really well in order to start understanding the impact of a parent not loving their child unconditionally. 

But, after two decades of marinating their brains in the 24 hour news cycle of Fox News and other conservative outlets, my parents have become rather politically obnoxious. They express strong opinions about various Republican talking points. They are concerned about "wokeness" in education. They are concerned about trans women/girls participating in sports. They deny that climate-change is man-made and insist that it is just natural weather fluctuations.

My parents have asked their grandchildren in they are "woke".

My father, particularly, has developed odd ideas--he even seems to have created what I believe are false memories. One odd one is a story of a band of "gypsies" (his term, not mine) who robbed his store. In his telling, these people entered the store, and the women created a distraction by arguing with the store staff, and waving around their scarves and skirts and loud, clattering jewelry. While they did this, other members of the group stole pricey equipment from outside.

This supposed event would have taken place in Northern New England in the late 1980's. Perhaps this did happen, but I find it improbable that a caravan was roaming about, behaving in such a way, at that place and time.

So...what does all this have to do with parenting?

Their statements about the LGBTQ+ community has made me start to wonder if their love really ever was unconditional. Perhaps I just conveniently didn't challenge their beliefs. If I had been queer, or trans, I wonder if they would have turned me out, or treated me with some sort of tight-lipped "tolerance" while gritting their teeth.

Even though nothing "happened" per se, it's not a good feeling. I'm questioning the depth of the love I felt. I also wonder if I was always aware of this, and just complied in advance to satisfy the limitations and expectations that were placed on me. My life is happy--I have a wonderful partner, wonderful children (who I truly do love unconditionally) and an interesting career. I have good friends and creative outlets. I live in safety and relative comfort. But I wonder--would I have made different choices if they hadn't been judgement of so many things? Or is all this judgement and ugliness truly new and simply a laminate placed over the real parents who did raise me with love?

I've wished for years that they had never gotten cable. But I can't parse out who they were versus who they have become, and honestly I don't know if my youthful perception of joy and safety was ever accurate.