YES! i see so much of my mother in myself now. my parents were married almost 32 years. my mom was waaaaay  more dominant and my dad was much more soft spoken and passive. mom made the decisions, mom was the disciplinarian. my dad rarely stood up to my mom when he really should have and he was also the one who let me get away with everything! i also feel that my parents could have handled some of their conflicts alot better than some of the ways they choose to.....my FI is no where near passive so i have learned that me being dominant in our relationship just wont' work lol!

i STRONGLY believe that what we see in our households growing up is our first exposure to what our perception of a relationship should be like. this was discussed at our pre-marital counseling session as well and it was definitely eye-opening. FI and i came to the conclusion that even though we both were fortunate to grow up in mostly happy households with little drama, there were still 'issues' we saw within our parents' relationships that we do not want to have in our own (none of us are perfect and marriage is HARD work!). we are grateful for and love the examples that our parents provided for us, especially knowing that they did the best that they could with what they knew about marriage but we also want our relationship to be even BETTER than our parents'! Great topic!!  :-)

Wow - this group has such wonderful topics! So thought provoking!

I have to admit that I've inherited some of my mom's PMS-yness but I try to keep it in check. FI is pretty good about my PMS stuff b/c it rarely comes up. I feel like FI has inherited the way his parents argue - he shuts down which is what his dad does..and he can also flare up like his mom w/a bottled anger. We're both working on this stuff b/c we see how it's affected both of our parents relationships'.

Chica, Amen!  I came from a VERY similar situation!  I love my dad of course, but sometimes it scares me how much his opinion still means to me. 

For ex, we got into a HUGE hour long debate the other night about whether or not being gay is a sin.  He will think it is until the day he dies, and I feel strongly convicted that the complete opposite is true.  He told me I may as well just throw the Bible out the window and be an athiest if I believe that.  While I KNOW his beliefs are very extreme (IMO) it still bothers me so much that he said those things to me and that he is disappointed that I disagree with him.  I guess I'll never be able to stop caring about his opinion, no matter how much I disagree with it.  :(

I don't know.  To some degree, but it's not irreversible.  My parents divorced when I was 2 and my mom never remarried.  They were not hateful about each other in front of me, but I really didn't ever see them interact at all.

My FI's parents were married for 30-something (at least) years until his dad passed away, but FI and his sister both had failed marriages.  

I don't think it's necessarily true that the relationship will mirror your parents'.  I do think our marriage will mirror his parents' marriage a lot more, though.  He is a lot like his dad and I am a lot like his mom.  I find that strangely reassuring because his parents had a good, strong marriage.

I see a lot of my mother in me.... She was horrible at hiding fights between herself and my dad (now divorced) I started to notice this bad quality in myself and started on the path at changing it.... I have learned that I just need to walk away from the situation and calm down before talking, me and DH call it the 5 minute rule.... 

I am preggers and DH and I have talked about how if we are in a disagreement that it needs to be talked about behind closed doors and not in front of her.... I remember the tension that I felt when my parents would fight and I don't want our kids to ever feel that way.... Also, the stress that fighting brings on when preggers can't be good for the baby so that has helped when we are in a disagreement....

@BlingBride - I agree to an extent. I don't think it's good to have an all-out fight in front of your kids. But they do say it's good for kids to see their parents disagree and then work it out and everything be okay. It's an important part of resolving conflict. They don't have to see every moment of how you work it out, but they need to see that mommy and daddy can be upset with each other and work through it and still love each other when the spat is over.

If you shield them from all disagreements, you don't equip them to resolve things in their own relationships.  You know?

Lol, @Laura I meant BIG fights.... My parents would have full on yelling matches in front of us.... I don't think that fights like that need to take place in front of the kids....

=) I agree.

On the positive side, yes, my parents been married for 40 plus years and through the good & bad, they hung in there. I like the fact that my mom shown me examples of how to be a wife, even if & when he gets on your last nerve.  

On the negative, I see how as people grow older, they can grow apart. My parents bicker about about stupid things IMO. Those are things I'm scared of and I constantly tell my FI these things because I don't want us to go through these things as we grow older.      

This is a fascinating topic! It's been interesting reading all the responses.

My parents have been married 36 years and have a wonderful relationship, not perfect, but they do their best to make sure they are happy. With 4 kids, my mom was the disciplinarian and the visibly dominant half of their relationship. While my dad is more soft spoken and calculating. My mom is the talker, my dad is the thinker. But when important decisions need to be made, my mom won't make them without my dad. As a child, I never saw them fight, ever. I know they did, but they made sure that we never knew it. The key to their happy marriage is honest, open communication... and to truly know the other person, know what irritates them and what makes them happy.

My DH's parents on the other hand are quite different. They have also been married 36 years and I believe they are only married because of their money... and because a divorce would be expensive. I have never seen them show the tiniest bit of affection towards each other, and I've known them for over 10 years. My FIL is rude and has no care or concern for other people's feelings, or that his actions affect the people around him. My MIL is the same in some aspects, but not nearly as bad. FIL treats MIL like crap and seriously thinks she's an idiot... and she's not. They don't communicate and they clearly don't love each other, heck I don't even think they respect each other. Based on stories I've heard from when DH was growing up, it amazes me that DH turned out to be the thoughtful, wonderful man that he is.

I don't believe that you will have the same relationship as your parents. But, we should all take them into account. I consider my parents' relationship to be a role model... and my ILs as a "what not to do" example. DH and I have talked many times about how I won't take the same kind of crap that his dad dishes out to his mom. We both agree that honest communication is really important. And I did marry someone who's very much like my dad.