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Parenting is a difficult job, especially when you have to work a lot and you have multiple children.

What would you do if, while growing up, you always felt like your parents were too busy for you and never paid you much attention at all?

That is what the woman in this story experienced, so after years of frustration, she told them that she didn’t really consider them her parents, and now they feel awful. She overheard her father saying he is a failure as a parent, so she feels bad about what she said.

It is possible that her parents really needed to hear this. Hopefully they can do better going forward. Read through the full details and see what you think.

AITA for telling my parents I don’t consider them my parents?

I (19f) let my mother and father know that while I was growing up, I never considered them my parents.

What a terrible feeling for a child to endure.

For context, my parents have never really been involved with me and my life. They were with my older siblings but not as much with me.

For as long as I can remember my parents were never really home, and when they were, they weren’t mentally or emotionally there.

It is hard to understand why parents have to work so much.

Don’t get me wrong, Im grateful that they worked as much as they could to make sure we were taken care of. Maybe I might sound immature when this is all said and done, but I don’t really feel a parent/child connection with them. I feel affection for them but that’s it.

My entire childhood we were tight on money, so I never saw my parents much because they worked overtime as much as they could.

She felt all alone.

When they were there, they still weren’t there, or they were too busy with my older siblings to pay me any attention; I had been in a relationship with someone who had left me traumatized, my parents had knew about him but didn’t really pay attention to what I tried to tell them about what he did.

When I got out of that relationship, I had no one by my side. My parents were still gone, my sister had moved out and was starting her own family, and my brother was so wrapped up in his own anger that I felt like I couldn’t go to him.

Things can feel so personal and dramatic when you are young.

So I ended up hanging out with people who weren’t good influences on me.

Up until just after Covid hit, I had stopped trying to connect with my parents, I stopped hoping that they’d come watch one of my volleyball matches. I stopped wishing that they’d just look my way.

And now things are going from bad to worse.

I gave up. Only for them to tell me that they were divorcing and I’d have to go back and forth between houses.

As time moved on, I started resenting both of them, as at one house I was left alone except for once or twice a month. At the other house, I wasn’t left alone, but I wasn’t really regarded either.

I can see why she felt frustrated with how she was raised.

Eventually it became worse. They started talking horribly about each other to me, or if I needed something, it became a ping pong match of “Why don’t you go ask [other parent]” between them both.

A few months ago I hit my breaking point, and blew up at my mother. I told her that I’ve never actually seen her or my father as parent figures. That yeah, they took care of us, but that was it.

Maybe they needed to hear it, even if it hurt.

That growing up it felt more like I was living with strangers. That they were so closed off that they closed their child out too. That I learned to cook, clean, and do laundry on my own. That I was the one who taught me, not them.

Eventually that came out to my father as well, and since then I have not talked to either of them about my thoughts or feelings. That night, I overheard him break down because in his words he was “A failure of a father”.

AITA?

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I can see why she feels bad based on her father’s reaction, but it seems like this was something that her parents needed to hear. Hopefully, they can change their ways and do better going forward.

Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say about this situation.

Yes, Dad needs to come to terms with his failures.

Her father is recognizing his failures. That is a good thing.

Their emotional problems shouldn’t stop them from being great parents.

It might have hurt him, but Dad really needed to hear this. Hopefully, her parents will take this to heart and do better going forward.

She should also give them a chance to improve and fix their relationship if they put in the effort.

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Author

Michael Levanduski