Did you ever witness your parents fight when you were a kid?

All the time. Did it damage me? No, I'm resilient.

My parents used to argue. They did not see eye to eye politically at times, and I can remember some heated debates between them at the dinner table at the time of Watergate. My Mom thought Nixon was the biggest crook alive, while my Dad defended him. But at the end my Dad knew that Nixon had to go. I was born in '63, so I was around 10 or 11 at the time.

It did not damage me. I still love a good argument. I have three siblings. My younger brother still does not like discussing politics, so it may have affected him differently.

My parents were smart, interesting people who hated each other, treated each other with contempt, and fought constantly and dirty. My sister and brother have been able to enjoy good relationships, but I have not.

They only fought once. It was weird, but it didn't have any real effect.

Yes because they fought constantly and violently. Occasionally they would give each other the silent treatment and that could go on for months. I suspect my mother was mentally ill. There were just so many frightening things about her. Was I affected. Yup.

I do not remember them ever fighting. They occasionally expressed annoyance with each other. However I witnessed them fighting as an adult and it upset me deeply. My dad is not a yeller and he was screaming. My mom is a yeller but not especially dramatic. She threw a platter of food across the kitchen. I left and I think I cried on the way home.

They’ve been married 60 years.

My parents fought daily. It completely damaged me. I couldn’t wait to get out of that rancid house

Pretty much everyday of my life. Shouting and bitching about dumb shit. Drove me away to the point I dread visiting them. In the 10 years I’ve lived on my own never spent a night with them once. Gee I wonder why!!

Yes—my mother was good with a bayonet but my father was a better shot.

I remember a lot of financial stress, moving nine times, and being very cognizant of how fragile our financial situation was. I’m still very anxious about money and security. I know my married siblings chose wealthy partners to insulate themselves. I probably have enough money, more than most, but can’t shake that creeping feeling that I could age out of my assets and lose my freedom and privacy. Interestingly, my broke friends could give a shit about their financial future, and they will probably live healthier longer lives than me. D’oh!

They never really argued other than a few HUGE fights.

But they hated each other. They could barely be in the same room together. Very little warmth or affection. The chronic, low-grade hostility always simmered just beneath the surface. In some ways, that type of environment felt much worse.

My parents fought a lot. There were daily shouting matches and occasionally things were thrown.

They were very different people. My father was relaxed, verging on lazy and complacent and he occasionally drank too much. My mother was highly-strung and paranoid, which I think was caused by deafness, which wasn’t diagnosed until her late teens. She spent her first 20 years feeling slightly out of the loop, surviving by lip-reading and pretending.

Their fights never bothered me. It was just the way they communicated, and it was always obvious that they loved each other very much. They needed each other. I used to find it slightly weird to visit friends at home and see how their parents were polite to each other. To me, that indicated a certain coldness, whereas my parents were sarcastic and snappy. Our house was always full of giggles, which were not alwas kind, but usually were good fun.

Their fights never bothered me, but they were very poor, and that has left a mark on me. I know what it’s like to need new shoes and know that I wouldn’t get them for a month or two. They didn’t leave much of an inheritance, but I grew up with a respect for education, and that has served me well. I’ve never earned a lot, but I have always had savings, own my own home. My background has left me craving financial security, but rather risk-averse.

Mine started shouting at each other when I was a teenager. My favorite line from my mom was, "Don't you throw that toaster at me!" So my dad kicked the kitchen counter instead and tore it off of the wall. They got divorced shortly thereafter and I was glad for some peace in the house.

Never. Which is why--to this day--I'm unable to fight with anyone. I mean, I can disagree. But fight? Never.

I wish they did fight. Instead we got to experience icy glares, cold shoulders, absurd guilt trips and passive-aggression. My father had no problem beating the shit out of me and my sisters but he and my mom quietly disagreed and we had to deal with the tension. I spent most of my childhood in my room.

All the time. I once saw my (alcoholic) father hold my mom down on the floor, then put a knife to her neck, threatening her life. The police were called that night. I was eight or so. Most of my long term relationships have been abusive of some sort. I'm now 33 and remember it vividly. I'm single, never married.

You should have asked, “Did you ever see your parents not fight?” I think two times, that I can remember before they divorced.

Yes. and yes

Yes. They were split up by the time I had some awareness, and would sometimes get back together so I lived in this state of false hope. My mother was... difficult and my father was a passive alcoholic. The worst fight was when she was screaming and he said that she was frightening me with her rage and she focused it all on me and screamed “GO AHEAD AND CALL POLICE IF YOU’RE SCARED OF ME. HERE! I’LL DIAL FOR YOU!”

It could have been a lot worse, of course. I have had peaceful and amicable relationships for the most part, and am happily married for 19 years. My husband had a mom just like mine, and we agree that we want a harmonious home with civil disagreements and no yelling. So we do. A handful of times we have raised our voices, but it’s still civil. No throwing, hitting, name-calling, saying things we can’t take back. It’s very nice.

My parents bickered for 60 years, then he died. Really nasty, mean, personal stuff- going for the sore spots. Something out of Virginia Woolf.

There were a few physical altercations, but mostly swearing like sailors. They especially liked an audience, and would do it in front of friends, telatives, strangers.

I didn't like either of them, so it was thrilling, scary and/or entertaining.

I hate to confess sometimes I would start it by tattling on one or the other. Hey, we only had six TV channels...

My parents fought regularly. My mom nags about something until my Dad blows up and yells at her and then she starts crying. But they also have tender moments and I guess they enjoy each other, having been married for over 50 years now.

Im in a 20+ year relationship and we fight occasionally but I guess I learned how to deal with that and stick with it from them.

I growed up in flyoveristan. My mom was never no oil painting, but she done put on a dramatic amount of weight after she had her first kid (my older sister). By the time I can remember, she must've been 300 pounds of blubber. She had fata wings, and rolls of fat, and shit. She'd wear a moomoo or caftan round the house. She made gross, fattening food, and everything was doused in grease. I put on weight too as a kid, and was always chubby. My daddy on the other hand did farmin and ranchin work and so was always in great shape. He was an alcoholic too. When he came home, often after dark, he'd drink hisself a fifth of JB in about half an hour, and then go on a rampage. He'd beat my mom shitless if she dared say anything. Even the smallest shit could set him off.

Once, she didn't have no ice for his whiskey, so he took the phone receiver and smacked her upside the head with it. She grunted, collapsed, shat herself, and passed out, and he just done leave her lyin there, like a piece of trash. Whenever she was out or all beat up, he'd take his rage out on me and my brothers - he never done nothin to my sisters. He would beat us severely. He didn't want no cooze no more from my mom on account of her weight, so he'd do it to us boys instead. He'd lube up with gun oil, and fuck our assess while we screamed and begged for him to stop. There wasn't no one to help us on account of us livin on a ranch. The terror rapes was compounded by him forcing us to wear our sisters' old clothes. I was paraded round town in a gingham dress and patent leather shoes. The towsnfolk was cruel, and they'd point and laugh and make homophobic and misogynistic blame language comments at us. I was once forced to dance for change outside the town pharmacy. My daddy choreographed the moves. It was an aggressively degrading, sexual dance. The truckers, hobos, and ranch hands who were the town's main inhabitants threw quarters at me and made lewd, homophobic remarks. Some even jerked off. The sheriff didn't do nothing.

And was your tiny puny cocklet erect all the time from all these masc hormones in the air R22?

Is r22 some sort of literary allusion that is lost on me?

My mother could become an insane shrew and drive my pacifist father into a rage. It fucked up my sister more than me but since I'm living with her (or was until recently) she drove me to the same rage. I knew i had to leave before i swung at her! She's a 95yr old widow!

Did I! At least they didn't punch each other. I was his choice for that.

When I was a little kid my dad went to the bar instead of home. When my drunk dad came home and my drunk mom said she was going to feed his dinner to the dog, my father promptly picked up our Chihuahua and started choking it.....I am assuming that happens in most families? My brother has an amazing job and wife---but they have no kids. Probably because he didn't want to pass our parents genes to any future offspring.

#22, is from the unproduced screenplay, "Ennis: Before Brokeback".

Hardly ever, and even then it wasn’t real fighting. Usually just my mom spouting off at my dad about something he did or didn’t do, and she was usually right and he knew it, so no real argument. I do remember some arguing what estimate to be about 16 years into their 65 + year marriage. I think perhaps they had a wee bit of a rough patch there, but it didn’t last very long. Didn’t have any effect on me or my brother at all.

"You only married me because Sarah wouldn't marry you" my mom to my dad during one of their many fights. she didnt know I was within earshot. I never said anything to her.

Yes, all the time. It wasn't until I became an adult that I realized they had a high-conflict marriage. As a kid, I just thought it was normal. That said, I hated it and would hide in my room til it blew over.

Their relationship definitely affected me. They would fight about my brother and I. Well, mostly it was my mother haranguing my dad for not "doing enough," with my brother and I. Which I don't understand as, though he was a bit on the shut-down side emotionally, he still was there in our lives and took us everywhere with him when he ran errands in the evening and to do fun stuff on the weekends. My mother never went with us. I grew up thinking mothers were all sticks in the mud, lol.

It affected me in that I often felt stressed at home due to the tension in the air, and I felt guilty thinking that since they fought over me, I thought they'd be happier if I didn't exist. I guess it's no shocker that freeze and flight are my responses to perceived conflict.

I have no clue why most of the adults in my family were married. My grandparents and aunts and uncles argued and picked on each other constantly. My mom was mentally ill, and she and my dad would have violent fights and had a spectacular War of the Roses style divorce. My sister is somehow undamaged by this. She found an amazing guy and they’ve been happily married for years. I, on the other hand, am terrified of relationships. I don’t want to end up like my parents or grandparents, so I use any little argument or disagreement or incompatibility as an excuse to end things. I know on some level that this is total nonsense, but I can’t seem to shake it.

My parents were completely devoid of parental emotion...Never told us they loved us. Never said they were proud of us. Never hugged or even touched us. It was just a miserable youthful existence. They fought...They boozed...As an adult, I have no emotional attachment to them in any way. I could care less about them.

Yes, many times. My mom once pulled a shot gun on my dad and I stood between them trying to diffuse the situation.

Nope. I don’t know if terse words were exchanged in the master suite, but we never heard a thing. It was a large house.

They didn’t seem invested in each other at all. My mother seemed happier after my father died.

My father used a razor strop on at least three of my brothers. One time only.

Childhood was somewhat confusing. My only real attachment was to my best friend. And to Birdie, our housekeeper.

I feel like I might be channeling Truman Capote.

So many unhappy parents.

The teenager needed her phone so she could get some TikTok likes....Killing a man and surviving a car crash has got to go viral...Why is she being deprived of her Social Media fame that she deserves?

Not really. No actual fights, and only a very rare argument. My Mom couldn't stand arguments, and I still hate the silent treatment to which I became accustomed.

I responded to a prev thread on "Did you experience domestic as a child" About my mom and grandmother having terrible knock-down drag out fights. I didn't think I was damaged but now positive I had to have been. I have a deep-seated hatred of most women def trust issues with them. I never got to know my father. It was some new story every time I asked. When I was about 11, my mom told me she was raped. Then He left her for another Man then she didn't know who he was.

[Quote] I was once forced to dance for change outside the town pharmacy. My daddy choreographed the moves.

I’m laughing so hard that I just woke my partner

Not one time, ever.

The closest was the aftermath of some argument where my father didn't speak to my mother for a few days.

Yes, but it was fairly intermittent. They weren't constant fighters. But, there was also times when they were upset with each other and weren't fighting where you could sense the tension. All in all, nothing abnormal IMO.

I was privy to a few knock-down-drag-out fights as an adult - like years of pent up "i need to get this off my chest" shit that once it started just blew up. That was more traumatic than anything I experienced growing up.

[quote]They would fight about my brother and I.

[quote]Well, mostly it was my mother haranguing my dad for not "doing enough," with my brother and I.

Stop.

not doing enough for eye!

GASP!

"They would fight about my brother and I."

Sorry for the off-topic remark but I don't understand seeing this grammatical mistake over and over. Would you say " They would fight about I" ?? Why would anyone say "about my brother and I" ? I'm not a native English speaker and it drives me nuts. I also hear it in TV shows !

Grammar, fuckwits!!!

Arguing now and again is healthy. Abuse is never ok. People who don’t argue have checked out of the relationship emotionally.

Never. But also have begun to understand the cold, no emotion, no love environment I grew up in. We were never hugged, said I love you or able to ever talk about or show emotions. Probably why I never do any of it either unless alcohol is involved.

Sorry, "my brother and me." And I was an English major.

Bickering was the only way my parents communicated. Stupid shit, stupid arguments which could escalate quickly. As kids, sometime we would just lie in bed, covers pulled over our head, and shake from the scary adults downstairs who screamed at each other. I try not to be the one who is always right in my relationship, if I see myself going down that rabbit hole, I’ll just drop it.

I've seen my father pull a rifle on my mother and my mother with a knife against her wrists during their fights. So, yeah.