Not a parent, didn’t have bad parents so take the below for what it’s worth.

All I can seriously offer you are my deepest sympathies for your situation. I really hope you find the answers you are searching for.

From an armchair philosophical standpoint, I don’t really feel like anyone should truly owe their parents anything. We didn’t ask to be brought into this world even though many people say life is a blessing. In the end, we all face death though and have to reconcile it in our own way. And if this person is truly one of the worst people in your life and mistreated you as a child then fuck em.

Just because they are blood doesn’t mean you have to bleed for them.

Toxic people are a waste of your time and energy, both of which could be spent on the ones you truly love. I have my wife’s family that has filled the void from my own. You will find yours.

I had a parent who was terrible. It really sucked because out of my siblings I was the one who was really willing and able to deal with the end of life bullshit. She was mentally and emotionally abusive throughout my life. I did my best to be fair and make sure she was treated with dignity. I think any human being deserves that. But I couldn’t bring myself to tell her I loved her when she said it to me towards the end. I wasn’t angry towards her or anything. I just tried to deal with it without emotion. My brother did help handle a lot of interaction with her. I’m very thankful he was there with me.

I’ll be honest, I am glad she is gone. I stressed out over her and things she would do. I couldn’t have made the future choices I did if she was still around. Everyone in my family is better off and their lives are better because she is gone. I think feeling bad for their suffering means that you are human and have empathy. I think back still, at times, and feel for her. I think about the things in her life that made her the way that she was. It also fucked me up for a while after my child was born because it made me think of the better times with my mother when I was young. Still does sometimes. But she is gone now. It’s okay to mourn that person so you can move on. You are mourning the good things about the person, and maybe even the bad. To move on past the things that fuck with us, sometimes we have to forgive because it is what is best for ourselves. I at least know I will never have to endure the suffering she inflicted upon me through her abuse again. For that I am greatful.

Complex emotions are normal for complex situations. You can be sad and relieved at the same time, it’s normal and healthy. You can thus accept this complexity.

You may be grieving two different things

One is the permanent loss of any possibility of receiving the parental love that every child deserves.

The second is the actual human being that was your parent.

Separate the two.

Grieving the first does not require you to grieve the second.

And remember that there are no "should"s in grief: we might grieve over something that has no logic behind it, and we might not grieve when someone else thinks we should.

Ignore all of that.

Focus on what your grief is telling you is important, and use any future opportunity for growth to grow in that direction.

It’s all that any of us can do.

Why do you think you should feel bad for them passing? Is it because they were responsible for your birth, because a life will cease to exist? There may be different reason why you think you should feel sad, but they only matter if it’s something that matters to you specifically.

The relief you feel for them about to die is genuine and given your description, nobody could blame you for having those feelings either.

Most likely you’re feeling a mix of both but feel more strongly about them passing than you feeling sad for someone dying. There’s nothing wrong with that.

Are you my in my family?

I’ve given it great thought… both of my parents were … bad; and are not doing well , I live far away from them and have pondered what I’m going to do.

Honestly as I’ve cut them out of my life, for me and mine, I could not care less about them. When they go, I’ll be fine. Yes I’m a cold jerk when it comes to them.

Whatever you’re feeling, it’s all valid. Nothing is ever really black or white, and you don’t have to try and keep your emotions in clearly defined boxes. Just feel what you’re feeling, acceptance is key. Having conflicting emotions is a common and understandable thing.

For a more personal opinion: this idea that someone being related means you owe them something… well, frankly it’s asinine. We don’t choose our blood relatives, we get stuck with them. Some people win the family lottery, others get stuck with a bunch of assholes. Take the whole blood thing out of the equation, is what I’d say. Missing what you might have had is only human, but separate this from the people they actually were. I guess, ask yourself this: if you weren’t related to them, would you have chosen to have them in your life at all? Your real family is the one you choose. Some people just really aren’t worth your time, even if only because you have to protect your own mental health and happiness.

In your case, if I understand correctly, you’ve already decided not to have them in your life. Maybe it’s just that the finality of death makes you doubt your own choices in this? I’d say trust your instincts and the choices you made. We cannot control or change other people, only the way we respond to them.

Going through that now. My dad treated my sister worse than me but was mentally abusive to both of us. He’s in a home now with moderate dementia. She’s pretty much cut him off and only sees him during family dinners once a month.

It’s fallen to me to interact with him. I usually take him out to lunch once a week and buy him some soda, snacks, etc. It’s stressful has fuck though.

OP: I sympathise and I can empathise with your situation. My advice would be to stay away and to move on with your life.

The problem is that whenever you discuss this sort of situation in public or with people who haven’t been there themselves you always feel the burden of proof is on you to show how terrible the parent is- a burden that is never defined nor met. There’s always some new person to say “oh but she’s your mother” which is frankly irrelevant- if your ex became your stalker for example, nobody would say equivalent things. It doesn’t matter that you’re the one standing there and not the parent, people want to put them on the pedestal, not you

IMO you should:

• Accept and make peace that you explained yourself at the time on more than one occasion
• Accept and make peace that parent won’t change- the site you’ve linked explained how narcissists can’t ‘hear’ you
• Accept and make peace that you can’t continue to or return to dealing with them.
• Realise that you won’t be able to discuss with or get validation from most people, even those supposedly close to you
• Realise that this guilt/conflict is simply more narcissistic control/manipulation

In my own case things that contributed towards finalising my position were:

• Becoming a parent myself, so less time for other people’s rubbish and more awareness of ‘how should a parent deal with…’
• That in the final few years we were corresponding mainly by email and so there was a written record to reflect on that clearly demonstrated a repetitive pattern

Good luck

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Our parents are who the people they are. Yes, they brought us into this world and we owe our existence to them, but they have/had a responsibility to us.

We are who we are because of them, for better or worse. Who we are is because of who we became due to their influence. If they were the best parents and served our best interests, or the worst and failed us, they are still our parents.

We don’t have to forgive them, we don’t have to love them, we don’t have to respect them, we only have to acknowledge them for how we turned out and that doesn’t depend on how good or bad they were. If you are a good person, or aren’t who you feel you should be, be greatful for their reference point.

Bad or good are just subjective references to something else, how you feel about something or someone is up to you. We don’t know your life, we don’t know your parents, and we can’t decide how you should feel because we can’t tell you how you should feel about them.

You have to live with what you feel about them, do and act as you feel you should, and be validated in knowing that being better than your worst instincts makes you better than most.

You are your own person, be the best person you can be and act accordingly.

My mom died a decade ago, and my dad about two years ago. Neither were great, and to a certain extent, their passing left a bit of relief that I was no longer responsible for them. However, with them gone, there is no longer a chance to fix those relationships. They are both dead and my relationship with them will forever have been shitty.

It is sad to think about those times when my dad would tell me he wanted to try to be a better parent, but I’m the end, he never followed through. I don’t look back and think about how he doesn’t have any more chances to fulfill those promises, I see it that he can no longer break that promise to me that he would try.

I know that my parents would not change, they would never take responsibility for how their choices hurt others, they would always continue with their selfish behaviors, and they would never be the parent that every child deserves. Some people can’t be fixed.

I understand your feeling of relief.

Thank you for that missing missing reasons link! I feel ever-so-slightly wiser for having read it.

I’ve heard missing missing reason stories from coworkers and acquaintances without knowing exactly why they seemed off. The details about why they do it were very illuminating.

I highly recommend this video, it’s by a therapist who went through a similar thing and he breaks it down very well:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zcRUj8H3rc4