don't my parents love me at all?

i think one of the reasons why i lack self-esteem and confidence is because my parents have never treated me like they loved me or needed me. they think putting food on the table is enough, and if ever i tried to tell them about my feelings, they'd either tell me that they're irrelevant, because when they were growing up there was no such thing as sadness or depression or loneliness because everyone was starving, and you either forgot or ignored your feelings and worked and worked and worked or else starve; OR they would laugh at me, yell at me, swear at me, call me pathetic, an a*hole, and so forth. nothing i say is right, nothing i do is right, or constitutes any kind of approval. i can't talk to them about anything, because then they would remind me of my past mistakes, and remind me of all the times they put food on the table. little things compared to the big picture. nor do they treat their children equally. there are responsibilities at home, and my older sister went off to europe for three years, when she had no business being in europe in the first place. she left the family when she knew there were all these problems. she comes back with an english husband, has a baby, and what do my parents do? they give her a condo in the sky, for which she pays rent but they could have let anybody live there, and they let her and her family live there, and my mom lends them her car all the time. what do i get? i have to fend for myself, and live in a basement suite full of leaks and spiders and paper thin walls through which i can hear my neighbors' every move and bodily functions and bad musical tastes. i have to ride the bus everywhere, and i have a much busier life than my sister or my brother-in-law. they only use the car to galavant, i have actual career needs. when i brought this up to my mother, she got mad at me and said that they didn't "give" my sister a place to live, she still pays rent after all. well, if that's the case, why not a terrible basement suite like mine? i don't feel needed by them either. they never call just to talk, they only want to call when they need me to do something for them. if i called, they would ask "what do you want? why did you call?" it's never a case of calling or talking for the sake of wanting to hear each others' voices. it's never about simply wanting to know how the other is doing. i can't stand the fact that my parents don't love me as equally as they do my brother and sister. i don't know what to do about them. i can't help but feel abandoned, and even more lonely, because my parents don't really care about me.

Hollywood - I'm sorry you are feeling bad. IMO, there is nothing worse and nothing as difficult to get over as feeling rejected by your own parents.

They are different than you. They deal with things differently. They were brought up in a different world and expect you to live by a different time.

Accept them as they are and acceptance of yourself will follow.

I know it sounds totally corny, but its very true. Until you recognize and at the very least, acknowledge the differences, you will always be at odds.

What a shock it would be to them that suddenly you just accept things and carry on with your own life as if what they do or don't do doesn't affect you...

Well...some people should never have had children. I happened to get born to a set of those.

My childhood featured a lot of yelling, screaming, "you can't do anything right" and "why can't you be more like (insert name of "perfect" school mate here)?" When I moved in with my bf in my early 20s, I was told how "ashamed" my mother was because I was "living in sin." She called me a few choice words the profanity filter will remove...so, let's just go with I was called what you call a woman who charges for her favors. The last straw was when they falsely accused me of breaking into thier house and stealing stuff. That was about, oh, 7 or 8 years ago now...

After that, I decided I'd had enough, and I haven't spoken to them since. They just aren't part of my life anymore and I doubt they will ever be again. Period, end of sentence. I cannot tell you how much more stress-free my life has been since I did that.

I'm telling you this not to get into a "I had it worse than you" contest, but rather to tell you that I know first hand that:

1. You don't need your parents approval, support, or love to have a healthy level of self-esteem/self-acceptance/confidence. You can build those things up on your own with a little effort and determination.

2. You can live a happy and fulfilling life without your parents being in it.

3. "Family" doesn't have to be limited to those you are related to, but can include those you choose. I'm not related to anyone I consider "family" with the exception of my husband...and that's only related by marriage.

4. Sometimes, the sanest, healthiest and best thing you can do for yourself is remove negative, toxic and abusive people from your life and never look back.

Your parents may not love you, but you need to love,support and believe in yourself. Your feelings DO matter, and its still not to late as you have people here who will listen to you and help you along the way. This is what you have to learn, how to do it?

Its like this, you have to understand that your parents are on a different 'frequency' then you are, its a total different zone and world where they come from as into comparison to you, who are a 'very emotional' person. You feel left alone, because your parents never gave you attention. If no one in the world supports you, then you better stand behind you and support yourself. The difference between a winner and a loser is that a winner believes in himself. But that goes even further, even if you are a loser in life, you are still a winner if you keep on going even if you lose. With that attitude you can go thru walls, and instead of life walsing over you, you walse over life.

You see life is like a boxing game , when it comes to confidence just go for gold in your life, being afraid that you are going to get hurt is useless, because you WILL GET HURT. So you might as well go for the kill and kick the hell out of your opponent which is life itself.

Ask yourself the question, Personally if someone is not benefitial to your life what is that person doing in your life? You really didn't have much on your parents, id give them that much credit for still putting food on the plate, but that was more of a militairy duty for them. Kids need love too. So for you its important to understand that the 'real meaning of life' is to love and help others.

It works like this , you probably feel empty,abandonded and zoned out in some dark area. You see the universe acts like a mirror, if you put love and light into the lives of other people , happyness and love will be casted back on you. But why would you love,believe, and support yourself? Obviously because no one else is gonna do it for you. With anything you want to achieve, if you don't stand behind it, then the effort has no fundament to stand on and it will collapse. This is why so many people are in the slumps and are condemned by society as losers.

Then you can ask yourself the question, do i want to live the high life, or the low life? Well of course higher is better, in terms of spirituality the more love you have for yourself and for others, the more enrichened you are. In the afterlife love is what money is here on earth. Its what defines and distinguishes you from being poor or rich. So you better support and love yourself because otherwhise you can't move forward.

You see you are like a salmon, you need to go up against the stream of negativity that always goes against you, this in order to reach the finish on top of the mountain. You can learn so much from nature, despite that the currents are always against the salmon, it never gives up, if it reaches an obstacle like a waterfall it will jump against it till it conquers it, if it doesn't manage, it will rest for a while, then take a giant leap and climb to the top.

Life is very simular like that, you need to pursuede that path of the salmon so you can get outta the slumps. This higher lifestyle of living is enrichening and opens up new pathways to happyness,which should be for you the motivation to pursuede and invest effort in it.

You see, no action = no reaction. So if you don't put effort in your life, you won't get any further. And standing still in life in fear is a form of hell ,

What is needed in life is not fear, nothing can grow from that ,

Cast off your fear!

Look forward!

Go forward!

Never stand still.

Retreat and you will age.

Hesitate and you will die.

hi hollywood, i can relate to how you`re feeling. the part about feelings and emotions being irrelavant really hits me. i don`t know the reasons for your parents attitude and your situation,but i was stuck in the middle of a lot of bitterness. i`m still dealing with the effects. make a clean break if you can. give yourself a new start.

Well...some people should never have had children. I happened to get born to a set of those...

 

They just aren't part of my life anymore and I doubt they will ever be again.

I am very close to doing this. My mum just brings too much stress into my life and lowers my self-esteem every time i speak to her. She is always in a hurry to get off the phone and then makes excuses such as "i'm not good at talking on the phone"... mind you, she used to talk for ages a few years ago.

I just want my mind and sanity back. I am supposed to be cooking dinner for her and my stepfather early next week, but have a good mind to call her tomorrow or friday and ask her straight out whether she wants me in her life or not, because i am sick of wasting my time.

I am not a bad daughter and it never ceases to amaze me how just about everyone else in my family can give me compliments, but she cannot.

The more i talk about it, the more i agree with Shes2Smart... some people should have have had kids and my parents are those too.

I want my mum out of my life.

when i was reading this i got all choked up because for once in my life for once.... i knew that someone is feeling like i am. My parents are absolute critics. I feel alone and unloved and especially unimportant. Whenever i try and tell my mom mostly that i am feeling exhasporated she goes "okay okay ________ I understand but this is not all my fault.." then goes on about how i screwed up or sometimes she goes "Okay i am going to work on it.." And it goes in one ear and out the other. It is ridiculous how she makes me feel and i cant even change it until i move out. and that's is a while from now. i want to love my parents but they don't seem to want to or try to show me that they love me back. My dad is the perfectionist when he himself is absolutley no where near perfect. He is always telling me to be better, i feel like i am NEVER good enough. And for a person to feel that is very hurtful and it breaks down someones self esteem. I ask myself, WHY NOT JUST END IT ALL. I could really go on and on and would like to talk more about this.

Mz.exhasporated n unappreciated

dnt worry im going through the same they always put me down and my sister somehow always gets wehat she wants .all my friends say i think bad about myself but thats only because my parents make me believe what they say about me ...im trying to move on and just try to atleast ignore everything but right now is when its really bothering me and its getting harder .

but i understand everything just try to move on .

Things really change once there is a grandchild. Your parents probably don't want their grandchild living in the basement type apartment. So that's why they offered your sister the apartment to rent.

When I had kids, my parents pretty much forgot about my existence and fully concentrated on the kids. I would talk to them and they would ignore me outright and go talk to one of the grandkids. My mom even told me that grandparents and grandkids have a common enemy. I suppose the common enemy was me. And my inheritance was going to the grandkids instead of me.

If you ask me, your sister is paying some other price tags such as having to let your folks visit whenever they want, putting up with intrusive advice about how to raise the grandchild or face having to get kicked out of the decent apartment by your parents and losing any and all possible inheritances. This is very scary when you have kids. If your mom is a controlling type, then your sister might have to be under her thumb in order to keep that apartment and stay on good terms. She may have even been demaded to live there by your mom. It may not be all that rosy as it seems to you.

It's just that when one is married and has kids, it is not wise talk about certain things among other family members because of the quick judgements. You have to put on a show so that no one starts picking on you and your husband. So she can't really talk to you about the realities of her situation.

This is just a possibility of why all this is happening and the unfairness.

This thread is three years old.