Anonymous
Post 07/22/2025 00:00     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Gratitude and caring aren’t the same thing.

Expecting children to be “grateful” is pretty toxic— they don’t ask to be born, and what you retroactively deem to have been “all you can” may be woefully inadequate.

Caring comes down to personality and parenting. If they were raised to show emotion in a healthy and constructive way they will probably appear caring.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 23:58     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
I might be considered ungrateful. I never wanted to be born and spent most of my life wondering why my parents kept me alive once they had the son they wanted. They should have murdered me at 18 months when they got the child with the penis like they wanted.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 23:56     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Today, my mom cannot recall calling me a see you next Tuesday by the time I was 12. She forgets the daily screaming fights with her husband.

My brother and I were raised by babysitters. When she needs help one day, she can call a babysitter.


What did you do when you were 12 to deserve it? There’s two sides to every story.


She was a child!! No one deserves that.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 23:46     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Well 2 things come to mind.

1. If you're on the outside looking in, you have no idea what things were like behind closed doors
2. If you're the parent, your kid may not have viewed their childhood the same way.

I'm sure my mom would describe herself as a dedicated parent who provided all she could. And she was. She was also a control freak who was prone to overreacting and manipulating and guilt tripping us. We walked on eggshells with her being afraid to say or do something that would unintentionally set her off. As I got older and tried to talk to her about this, she accepted no criticism and waffled between everything was my fault or I was making it all up. But I know on the outside, we presented as such a perfect UMC family with a SAHM who was active in the community.


You come across as immature to me. The measuring stick for a parent is what choices they made given who they were. My dad was raised very poor (to the point of food insecurity) and has carried the resulting trama his whole life even though I grew up MC. You would likely call many of his parenting choices controlling. I didn’t like them at the time and haven’t done the same to my kids, but based on the life he’d lived to that point. Though as an adult I’ve never doubted he was trying to do the best he could for me seeing life through a very different lens.


Pp here. There were things my mom did that at the time I thought were controlling but as an adult/parent I completely have rethought. I still think she was more strict than most but I at least understand her reasoning. There is nothing I can think of that will make me understand why she would threaten to send me to an adoption agency because I didn't want to pick up my room (I was probably 6) or telling me I had made her so upset I was going to give her a heart attack and then I could explain to my dad and brother that I had killed her (said while feeling her pulse and saying she had chest pain and palpitations). I could write a novel about everything she did. So while it's great that you understand why your dad was strict and can understand us, not all of us are that fortunate. Some of us truly do have strict, controlling, and emotionally manipulative parents.


PP, I’m sorry this happened to you. Don’t waste your breath explaining yourself to this person or others. She’s clearly just trying to rile things up or she has royally messed things up with her own children and wants to place blame on the adult children. Of course, sometimes it’s the adult child’s fault, if we are talking about new issues where adults are responsible for their actions and decisions. But often it’s leftover childhood trauma. You don’t need to show gratitude for that. Or maybe you can separate the gratitude from the trauma. Depends on the level I guess. In any case, you don’t owe anyone anything except to go to sleep feeling good about whatever decisions you take each day.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 20:07     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Well 2 things come to mind.

1. If you're on the outside looking in, you have no idea what things were like behind closed doors
2. If you're the parent, your kid may not have viewed their childhood the same way.

I'm sure my mom would describe herself as a dedicated parent who provided all she could. And she was. She was also a control freak who was prone to overreacting and manipulating and guilt tripping us. We walked on eggshells with her being afraid to say or do something that would unintentionally set her off. As I got older and tried to talk to her about this, she accepted no criticism and waffled between everything was my fault or I was making it all up. But I know on the outside, we presented as such a perfect UMC family with a SAHM who was active in the community.


You come across as immature to me. The measuring stick for a parent is what choices they made given who they were. My dad was raised very poor (to the point of food insecurity) and has carried the resulting trama his whole life even though I grew up MC. You would likely call many of his parenting choices controlling. I didn’t like them at the time and haven’t done the same to my kids, but based on the life he’d lived to that point. Though as an adult I’ve never doubted he was trying to do the best he could for me seeing life through a very different lens.


Pp here. There were things my mom did that at the time I thought were controlling but as an adult/parent I completely have rethought. I still think she was more strict than most but I at least understand her reasoning. There is nothing I can think of that will make me understand why she would threaten to send me to an adoption agency because I didn't want to pick up my room (I was probably 6) or telling me I had made her so upset I was going to give her a heart attack and then I could explain to my dad and brother that I had killed her (said while feeling her pulse and saying she had chest pain and palpitations). I could write a novel about everything she did. So while it's great that you understand why your dad was strict and can understand us, not all of us are that fortunate. Some of us truly do have strict, controlling, and emotionally manipulative parents.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 20:07     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Today, my mom cannot recall calling me a see you next Tuesday by the time I was 12. She forgets the daily screaming fights with her husband.

My brother and I were raised by babysitters. When she needs help one day, she can call a babysitter.


What did you do when you were 12 to deserve it? There’s two sides to every story.


DP. Lol no child deserves to be called names, but especially not that name. If a child is misbehaving, it is your job as a parent to figure out why and TEACH them a better way to handle the situation. Any parent calling their kid a see you next Tuesday has abdicated one of the core obligations of parenthood in favor of blaming and shaming. Weak sauce.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 20:06     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:Sometimes providing too much leaves the kids feeling emotionally empty yet also entitled to material goods at the same time.

This.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 20:02     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:Obviously, not talking about families where any abuse, trauma etc was involved. Just regular intact upper middle class families with dedicated parents providing all they can even after kids are grown.

Spoiled children usually = ungrateful children.

Please do NOT provide “all you can”.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 20:01     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:Today, my mom cannot recall calling me a see you next Tuesday by the time I was 12. She forgets the daily screaming fights with her husband.

My brother and I were raised by babysitters. When she needs help one day, she can call a babysitter.


What did you do when you were 12 to deserve it? There’s two sides to every story.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 19:57     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Today, my mom cannot recall calling me a see you next Tuesday by the time I was 12. She forgets the daily screaming fights with her husband.

My brother and I were raised by babysitters. When she needs help one day, she can call a babysitter.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 19:26     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:No one asks to be born, and experiences and outcomes vary wildly. If you expect gratitude from your children, you have to be willing to accept some blame as a parent. It was ultimately your decision.


That's exactly what Ai was asking. You give blame and resent for what they did wrong and credit for what they did right and margin for their own upbringing and circumstances. No?
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 19:23     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Anonymous wrote:You can't see the emotional abuse that may have been there OP. My parents loved me, but tried to control me even into adulthood, after I did everything they asked me to do as a child / teenager / college student.

Made good grades, went to the college they picked out, didn't do drugs, didn't sleep around. Once I graduated and wanted to do what I wanted to do: move to another city for a good job, marry the guy I had fallen in love with, they freaked out. I kept a distance after that.


Ironically you don't see that how you got to the point where you could do what you wanted to do, move where you wanted to move and marry whom you wanted to marry. Did you see getting good education, not doing drugs or not sleeping around as a favor to them, not to yourself?

Did you face any consequences of moving or marrying? Were they being protective to save you? Yes, they shouldn't have tried to stop you but what was the intention?
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 18:02     Subject: Re:Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Children take the lead from their parents. If they grow up in a household where the parents are grateful and caring the odds are pretty good they will be the same. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 13:56     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
It’s parenting. They may have educated themselves, but to what?
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 13:55     Subject: Why some kids are grateful and caring and others arent?
Empathy needs to be consciously taught. It’s a skill.