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downwithpants
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Post by downwithpants » Sun Jun 17, 2007 3:34 am

being that today is dedicated to one of two parental units... describe your relationship with your parents. what are your parents' personalities? how they treat you? how you get along together?

my parents fit the stereotype of bossy mom, hen-pecked dad. 99% of the time mom gets her way when decisions needs to be made. on the other hand, dad usually makes the decision if spending a large sum of money is involved (like buying a car, planning a vacation, etc.)... although this isn't because dad's the provider - both of them have a paycheck - but he's the more money-conscious one (there's also a stinginess stereotype of people from shanghai, where dad was born).

anyways mom has been supportive of most interests i have, though she tends to pick one to blame as the reason for problems like bad grades. at first it was watching too much television, then playing too many video games, then more recently editing amvs >_> (with my sister, it was going out with friends or talking on the phone too much) which leads me to believe it's not that she is opposed to these specific interests even though she says she is, but she is always just looking for something to blame.

overall, though, when she's not concerning herself about me or my sister, i have to admit she's level-headed and comes to good solutions. she is outgoing and driven to follow through on her decisions, which i admire.

however, she plans everything out ahead of time and gets pretty panicked when people (mainly me) don't go by the plans, which is completely the opposite of me, who goes by one day a time. i can see how planning ahead and organizing is often beneficial, but i'm too damn lazy and sometimes unmotivated i guess, and i like being flexible with my schedule.

dad, meanwhile, is... in some ways more dadlike - not so overbearing on my daily life, enjoys watching sports, playing bridge, drinking tea, playing the stock market. he's usually more laid back than mom, but he's got weird behaviors himself. he can be incredibly... stubborn... it's not that he's so fervently devoted to a belief, but it's like he doesn't perceive it when you refute his claim. i could spell out logically why something he said is wrong, and then have him repeat it to me and tell me that my reason is logically sound, and the next minute he'll go on about his original claim. he'll also pick up any gripe my mom has with me, taking mom's side.

sometimes he's not as reasonable as mom, he doesn't take as many risks and usually goes with what he's familiar with. he almost never enforces a decision he makes, so if i disagree with him, he'll continue to argue his case about it for about a few minutes, but then drops it... at least till later.

but all in all, we still usually get along. mom usually tries to be reasonable if we have disputes (which usually arises because she likes to plan and i don't), and dad (who mostly just picks up on my disputes with mom) just forgets about it after a little while.
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Post by Orwell » Sun Jun 17, 2007 9:40 am

I like my family so much (well, mother, IQless brother and autism sister, and grandparents next door) that I almost only come out of my room for work, food, or bathroom, and wear headphones at all times in my room regardless of whether I even have anything playing.


I'll probably expand on this later, but it covers it.
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Post by Otohiko » Sun Jun 17, 2007 9:49 am

My parents would probably fit well with the old patriarchal model of a household, but my dad is decidedly weirder than anything you could put under stereotype :roll:

My mother has the patience of a saint, for which I really admire her. She has this conviction that looking after the family (which includes both our household and her parents) is her duty and purpose in life, and that's what she's been doing for the past 20-odd years. That's not to say that she fits the 'housewife' model either since she's highly educated and is in large part responsible for my own success with education (well, both my parents started teaching me from a very early age, long before I got to school. I learned to read, write, count and all those other key skills at home, not school). My mom usually very reasonable, but ironically I probably argue with her more than my dad - but that's because she's more open to arguing and will change her mind if she's wrong. She will always seek compromise. She also never orders people around, but rather asks. I personally think I have a lot in common with my mom, starting with a relatively modest, private character, intellectual orientation, patience and pragmatic approach to solving problems, and a strong sense of attachment to people close to me.
Me and my mom's "favorite" conversation subject is complaining to each other about my dad and my brother, both of whom are difficult characters. I quite like spending time with her on the whole, and I can definitely say she knows me better than any other person in the world.

My dad is just nuts. A good description of his self-perception would be as some sort of a deity.
He's incredibly intelligent and talented (he is a professional musician after all), but with an absolutely rotten, egomaniacal character.
For starters, he never compromises, orders people around and always has his own priorities before everyone else's. He can randomly come up with some sort of plan, and everyone else will have to drop whatever they were doing and go along with him. If you don't, well... he has his own special ways of making everyone's life hell, usually by going into a sour mood and spoiling everyone else's. That may not sound like much, but if anyone can get on people's nerves, it's him. The amount of psychological pressure he can exert when he's in a bad mood is amazing.
All the while he's hyper-sensitive. I wasn't joking when a few weeks ago I mentioned how he complaints about my PC being on at night because he can "feel the electricity". He's sensitive to absolutely anything one can be sensitive to. This sensitivity occasionally borders on paranoia, and is often completely causeless.
While he may be concerned about other people, it's a complete opposite when it comes to mom as far as any sort of sense of duty. He feels that everyone owes him something, but he doesn't owe anyone anything. For that reason, since age 18, I've been paying to live with him (I needn't even mention anything like my parents paying for college - that just wouldn't happen), despite still being obliged to follow his commands.
As I said, he's incredibly smart and can exert an incredible amount of psychological pressure on people. On the other hand, that of course means that he'd never resort to anything physical.
On the other hand he has this whole other random fluffy side - he'll occasionally clown around and purposely look like a total idiot, he likes to play around with people, he's amazing to converse/debate with IF you don't attack any position that's identifyably his. He can be all... cuddly on occasion and while he may be egotistical, he depends totally on people keeping him company.
In other words he's a real lion.
I have a bunch of his traits, too, I won't deny - in particular my own sensitivity (but not hyper-) and my creative tendencies. Unlike my brother (who, by the way, is incredibly similar to his character), I rarely clash with him and usually get along with him fine, but it's hard to have a really close relationship with him because of his totally uncompromising, self-centred nature.

Both my parents think I'm lazy. My mom is somewhat more optimistic; my dad has several times muttered something along the lines of me being a failure. Perhaps because of the excellent intellectual upbringing and home-education that they provided me with, they have unrealistically high expectations of me (for example both of them are seriously ticked that I have not yet tried to write and publish a book, like that's something I totally could do if I played less computer games :roll: ). It's certainly gotten milder in the past few years though, for one because I've been doing better and better in school, for another thing because in comparison to my brother I've proven rather problem-free and easy to deal with lately.
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Post by godix » Sun Jun 17, 2007 1:54 pm

Take my father, add in some disgusting sexual references, and you have me. My intelligence, my interest in politics and social sciences, my over analysing the ridiculous, my sense of humor (minus the sex jokes), and sometimes my just plain weird topics of conversation all come directly from him. Neither of us does well at dumbing down our conversation without sounding condescending and as a result I never really got along with him until I was old enough to engage in adult conversations. I didn't dislike him as a kid or anything, it's just we had no common ground to work with.

Since I've become an adult we've had some fun conversations though. Shortly after 9/11 he and I had an hour discussion on what type of terrorist attack could cause the most harm to the US. We both treated this topic seriously although neither of us will ever be a terrorist. At other times we've discussed the how best to get away with murder, methods to rob a bank, how best to commit fraud, and other similar topics. We've also discussed the benefits and drawbacks of polygamy, the historical record of cannibalism, pirates as they REALLY were instead of the Johnny Depp thing, weird quirks of history, and other semi-esoteric topics like that. I now like talking with my dad, of everyone I've ever met he's the closest to almost always being interested in the same things I am.

He also has a weird and very dry sense of humor, the same as me but without being so vulgar. Once me and a couple friends went to visit him and as we were leaving his cat ran out of the house. So he stands at the door and goes 'Here kitty. Meow.' Note that the 'meow' isn't him making cat sounds, it was him actually saying the word 'meow' in a flat monotone voice. I barely noticed he was doing it much less found it unusual until my friends pointed it out when we were in the car. Then I just shrugged my shoulders and figured yeah, that's sounds like something he'd do. Sounds like something I'd do as well.

So basically as a kid he and I acted rather indifferent to each other. As an adult we get along very well.
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Post by Arigatomina » Sun Jun 17, 2007 4:08 pm

According to rumor, my dad was the provider in the family, liked to laugh and drink a lot, very apt to spoil his son and work extra hours if it meant buying more unnecessary "fun" things to lie around the house. My only memory of him is looking around a curtain in the doorway we used to keep heat in the livingroom, and watching my mom chase him out the front door and down the steps with a baseball bat. I remember thinking he looked scrawny and awkward. I've talked to him on the phone once and he struck me as needy and weak, like a dog that piddles on the carpet and then whines to get let back inside.

My mom alternates between being my ideal parent and my embarassing little sister. She's very smart and independent. She raised three kids, put herself through school, and runs her own accounting business (successful enough that she won't tell even me how much money she's really making now).

She used to be a very hands-on parent. She taught me to read and do math before I started school, but we got in trouble over that - teachers complaining that she was teaching me "wrong" or something. She stopped when it was my sister's turn, which is probably why my sister is a moron.

She was a good cook, but my brother took over the cooking when he was 12 and became the babysitter. Her boyfriend does all the cooking now because he's a spoiled rich boy who fancies himself a professional chef. His cooking is so fancy and good I can't even roll my eyes at him. He's right. He is really frickin good. I still miss my mom's cooking when Thanksgiving rolls around.

She was a very strict parent when it came to discipline. If my brother and I got into a fight we'd have to go outside and find switches - I'd pick the one for him and he'd pick the one for me. It was painful and it made us less likely to argue and break things when she was at home. By the time my sister was old enough for a belt, us older kids were well behaved so my mom stopped bothering with actual punishments, which is probably why my sister is a spoiled brat.

She used to be very good at handling money. When she had to save, she'd save. We didn't own a television or vcr until the Disney movie "Beauty and the Beast" came out. I still remember washing clothes with a hand-wringing machine that filled half the bathroom. I think it's in our garage now.

She's still good at saving money now, but the instant my brother or sister do something stupid, she dishes out most of her savings to rescue them. Every time. Every single time. She's an absolute doormat when it comes to saving her reckless kids, even though she's told me herself that she knows she's just encouraging that behavior. She doesn't know how to say no anymore. So when she's digging herself into a hole to save them, I have to be the responsible one and drag *her* out of it.

I look like my mom, and we think alike to the point where we can't be in the same place for more than an hour or two. A few hours and we get along great. Any longer than that and we're at each other's throats.

She's very messy. Us kids did all the cleaning growing up. It wasn't until I was 14 that I realized I was cleaning up our messes *and* her messes. I still don't think she notices that she's as lazy about picking up after herself as us kids were.

She's a project person. Thousands of mini projects started and dropped unfinished. Big projects she'll spend forever planning out and never get around to actually doing. Her boyfriend does the exact same thing, so they're perfect for each other. :lol: I get my short attention span 'project-starter' side from her.

She's a tomboy around the house. If something breaks, she fixes it herself. I remember one summer she was up on the roof every day. When the water froze, she'd be under the house all muddy and cold without a moment's hesitation. Part of that's because we couldn't afford to hire someone. Most of it's because if she can do it herself, she's going to do it herself. She likes to build things, too, doghouses, birdhouses, a garage, whatever she can think of. She puts most of that energy into habitat for humanity projects since they let her make houses. ^^;

I think she's lost her edge a lot. The way she raised me and my brother is the way I wish all parents would raise their kids. The way she raised my little sister is horrible and I wish I'd been at home to call her on it instead of away at college. I didn't even realize how bad it was till I came back home to find my little sister single, pregnant, pimpled from drug abuse, and spoiled rotten. She used to be nice. I don't know what the hell happened to her. Mom says she got tired and gave up. That's what it looks like. >.<;

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Post by CodeZTM » Sun Jun 17, 2007 4:17 pm

I have a step father, a biological father, two step mothers, my real mother, three brothers, and three sisters.

My step father might as well be my real father. He has always been there for me through thick and thin, and has got me through everything life has thrown at me. I admire him, but we don't really have a relationship at all. I've known him for 12 years, but we've really never connected. He's interested in cars, sports, and ESPN. While I like anime, reading, video editing. I really don't understand why he likes automobiles so much, and he doesn't understand while I like reading. While we aren't in constant bickering, we don't know each other that well either. So it's kind of a weird relationship. Yet, while we might be different, we still get along really well. While he may not be the most intelligent person in the world, he's still pretty well educated. He can do a rubix cube in 5 minutes. (Which I can't, to my frustration.)

My biological father is a self-centered male-shophanistic jerk that I wish didn't exist. He got my mother pregneant at 16, and left her when she turned 18. He never held me, never liked me, and rarely recognizes my existance. He's gotten two other women pregant (which accounts for 5 of my 6 siblings), and we have aboslutely nothing in common. Anytime I see him, I get sick. :evil:

My mother has a short temper, overanaylzes things into pessimistic views, has a loud voice, is so conservative that it's not even funny. She believes that associating with anybody other than a Christian is a sin, and is frowned upon. And I love her with my entire heart. :lol: Having such powerful beliefs, standing by them, and not letting anybody in the world get in her way makes me feel proud to be her son. I actually act the same way, just with different beliefs and different ways of expressing them. I love her. :lol:

My step mothers I really don't know that well. The first one was a drunk, and the second one is a respectable doctor that I really do admire for her inner strength.

Anyway, being 17 and having a good relationship with my parents is pretty rare for my area. Many kids my age talk about how they want to "run away". Ah well, they probably just "talk it up".

Or simply, I have a pretty good relationship.

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Post by Ileia » Sun Jun 17, 2007 5:19 pm

My parents got a divorce when I was only a couple years old, and so I spent most of my life with my dad. My dad is a very awkward, meek, introverted person, and so I learned early on that he was a pushover and I could basically do whatever I wanted. Any discipline he tried to administer was usually laughed off until he just gave up. It came down to my dad just kinda being there to pay the bills (usually working two jobs and sleeping, so we rarely saw him) and my brother and I making the rules for ourselves. Which didn't turn out so bad, because when we learned things we knew WHY we learned them, not just "because I said so."

I think that from working this much and supporting us, my dad slipped into sort of a depression. While he was generally a very quiet person, he also was tremendously talented, he wrote poetry, music (he could play any instrument you handed him, but especially the piano, guitar and violin), he painted, drew, and he also had an awesome sense of humor (which if I can attribute mine to anyone, it would be to him). However, these slowly drained away as he grew older and his responsibility weighed more on him.

When I was 16, I met my mother. I hadn't talked to or heard from her in about 14 years. Now, I had thought that perhaps when I met her, I might see where I picked up some of my own attributes, but I was way off. It's obvious that I would not have benefited from being raised by her. She's very immature despite her age and the fact that she had two more children since I'd seen her last. She is lazy, procrastinates, and shrugs off her responsibilities (ie her children). She can't hold down a job for more than a few months, and when she does have a job, she calls in about once a week. She spent the majority of her time at home in her room, watching TV, claiming she had a hard day and didn't want to be bothered. My brother and sister would be left without dinner unless I made something, or they managed to scrounge up something for themselves, because my mother simply did not care. The dishes would pile up, the house would be a mess, laundry everywhere, and my mother didn't seem to notice.

My mother quickly learned that she could take advantage of me being there, and from the time I moved in, I was required to have a job, and the large majority of my paycheck went to the bills, rent, clothes for my siblings, food and such. I worked a job throughout high school and two jobs as soon as I graduated. As far as I can tell, since she had my older brother when she was so young (15), she never got to finish maturing. My dad mostly took care of us, and my younger sibling's father took care of them, until he got sick of her. I moved out when I turned 18, and she was distraught about me making such a rash decision, in reality she just was going to miss the meal ticket, and she still holds it against me and tries to control me in various ways.

I also have a stepmother and a stepfather, the latter's not so bad, but the former I prefer not to even think about. :shudder:

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Post by Nessephanie » Sun Jun 17, 2007 6:06 pm

My mom is awesome. She's uber nice and stuff, always wanting to help all of us even when it becomes a detriment to her (especially financially). So I try and not be a burden. She's cute, she scrapbooks and she can take a joke :3 (and will smack me on the head when I'm being a smartass)

My dad died when I was 14, but I remember him being pretty passive and layed back person most of the time, and always being the 'go ask your mother' kinda dad :3

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Post by wurpess » Sun Jun 17, 2007 6:19 pm

Well, my mom had me when she was about 20. Not quite as bad as being a teen mom, but still young enough that she would still rather be out partying and going to college than trying to take care of and support a kid. She's become more serious about mothering since then, particularly when she divorced my dad and met my step dad, but she's still kinda has that partying free spirit thing going on. Always been really artsy too. But that doesn't mean she wasn't strict. At least with me. And then with my step bro when he moved in. But that was also when my grandmom was alive and helped raise me too. But yeah, kinda in the same boat as Ari. She was strict with my older step brother and I, and we both turned out fine. But then she had my younger brother when I was 9 1/2. Well, my older brother left eventually, then a couple years after him when I was 19 I left for the Army. So between my younger bro being the only one left, my mom getting older and more tired, and my step-dad getting major raises at work (i.e. more money laying around), my little bro is kinda a spoiled brat. He was the only one around, so he didn't have to share attention, and if he whined about something enough, my mom would usually be too tired to say no. My bf was raised similarly to me and when I brought him home, he was appalled at the way my bro, Jay, talked to and acted towards my mom. He's tried to bully him into being respectful, but I keep telling him, he's 16, this has been going on for at least 6 years. I think its a little too late to do anything about it now. So yeah, she's gone from wanting to party to uber strict to easy going. Maybe a bit too easy going, but eh.

Don't remember much about my biological dad. I know he was an alchoholic. Didn't see much of him at home. After the divorce, I got to see him on weekends for a couple years. That seemed fun. Then he ran off. And I haven't seen or talked to him since I was about 7 or 8.

My step dad is a bit of a workaholic, a bit of a temper, always has to be right, and probably the tech person of the house. I hated him growing up. He was alway anal about the state of the house and our rooms. My room was on the 3rd floor of the old house, and he would sometimes go all the way up there just to make sure my room was completely clean. He'd yell at me if there was any mess whatsoever. He's sort of mellowed out over the years, and now we get along great. (Well, that and he's not home enough to be like that anymore.) Actually, my mom jokes because for 2 people not related, we're a lot alike. lol. But he's become more wrapped up with work and less uptight about household stuff. (Like making sure every room in the house is spotless)

As far as the household goes, my step-dad and mom both work, be he makes most of the household's money. So he works and my mom handles the money. Which she's a bit of a shopaholic, so her in charge of the money isn't always the best, but then again, she keeps records of what she spends and always knows how much they have, he doesn't. And she's around the house more to know what needs to be done. Though sometimes I feel kinda bad for my step-dad, because he's constantly being left out of the loop.
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Post by jubjub2 » Sun Jun 17, 2007 6:57 pm

I am a total 'daddy's girl'. He told me once that out of the four of us kids (2 brothers, 1 sister), he related best to me. I can see that now as an adult.

Dad had a very tough upbringing, despite coming from a wealthy family and growing up in Hollywood. His main goal when he became a parent was to NOT be like his parents, and he stayed very true to that. He's a serious hard worker, and when times were tough, he worked two or three jobs to help us get by. Mom would work part-time, but was home most of the time for us kids. Dad's a geek in every sense of the term, and was very keen on teaching me hands-on skills. Our favorite thing to do together when I was a kid was to pick up broken electronics at the second-hand store and fix them. He was the same when it came to car and home repairs. When I had a leak in my radiator, he sat there with a bowl of popcorn and watched me sweat solder it. I also had to replace the hood, grill and front fender of the car after my first accident. He told me how to do it, and watched me fix things. I now do a lot of the home repairs from replacing toilets and faucets to painting and tiling. I'll always be grateful for that attitude of his. I learned that duct tape can fix just about anything, and if it can't, then a little creativity and frugality can. >:) He and I also have the same weird sense of humor, and love of science fiction. Granted, I have a lazier like of the genre, preferring Douglas Adams over Asimov, but we both agree on Bradbury and Herbert. I took him to a Star Trek convention once to meet Shatner and Nimoy for a Father's Day present. He still talks about that one. I couldn't get him to dress up for it, though. He looks a lot like Spock.

My mother and I are opposites. I hope I got a lot of her good qualities, and not the ones that drive me nuts. She is a serious biblioholic, and has packrat and neatness issues (*huge understatement*). My dad is a neat freak, and it really seems like I'm watching Felix Unger and Oscar Madison when I visit. Their polarity has caused some friction in the past, but they are going on 45 years of marriage, so I guess opposites can make it work. :)

Like others, as one of the older kids, I saw my younger brother become spoiled and lazy because of the life we older kids sucked out of my parents. I won't go into that too much, because this would become pages and pages of rant. A lot of the problem goes back to my mom and dad being opposites. I think dad just gave up at some point and let mom have her way in the parenting department.

I was going to write more, but think I will give my dad a call instead and just tell him what I was gonna type here.

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