Reply to Do your parents consider your choices to be judgments against them?

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[quote=Anonymous]My parents had a very traditional family structure.  My dad worked.  My mom SAH and did all childcare, cooking and cleaning.

As an adult, I chose to get a degree and a job and work.  My mother is super defensive that I choose to be a working mom.  She very much acts like I'm judging her and her choices by just living my life.  Loads of defensive comments.  She's also super defensive that my husband cooks, cleans and helps with the kids, either accusing me of being a bad mom or putting too much on my DH, as "he has to work to support the family and needs his downtime."  (As if I don't work too.)

My dad is similar, but with finances.  We were always stretched growing up on one income, while my husband and I have more cushion with two salaries.  He's very defensive about money, constantly explaining how we could improve our finances.

It's the same thing with our parenting too.  At one point my mother bought me baby blankets to use because "[grandchild's] crib looks too bare and not cozy." I explained that you're not supposed to put blankets in with infants because of the risk of SIDS, but thanked her stating I'd use them for the stroller and tummy time.  She got supper defensive and the retorted, "Well you survived my parenting."  Rinse and repeat with car seat usage.  I insist my kids ride in car seats and refused to bring my infant home from my hospital in my arms.  Apparently I survived that too.

Now that my kids are older it's just shifted and I hear how sad my mom is that my kids don't get to spend the whole summer at home with their mom.  Instead, they were perfectly happy doing interesting camps that they picked.  Any mention of the camp the kids are doing that week and she gets defensive, possibly recalling how I begged and begged to go to camp as a kid.

According to my parents, I must think they're bad parents because I'm not making the same choices they did.  Is this just my parents?  Any suggestions for making my very existence and normal parenting choices appear to be less of a judgment on their choices?  I really don't think of it that way--I'm just making the best choices I can for me and my family--so their comments often catch me off guard.[/quote]

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