"Respect your mother!", my Dad yelled as he heard me stomping up the stairs while arguing with my Mom.
I recall back when I still lived at my parents house. When my parents fought, I see no mercy in my Dad for my Mom! It's a constant yelling and cursing. My Dad cursed up a storm while my Mom just cry and say a lot of bad things that happened in their marriage, in our family. I can even remember a time that their fight became physical and my Dad almost hit my Mom, but I came in between them which stopped him from doing so.
He never respected her! Yes he does what she tells him, but he always degrades her, tells her she is stupid, and she does not know what she is talking about when she attempts to share her two cents. And when he gets provoke, it gets worsed. That's what I've always remembered all my life.
It is hard learning respect towards my Mom when the norm has been seeing my Dad disrepecting her. Trust me, I've tried. In fact, I have respect for mothers. I have no issues with my Mother-in-law, not with any other mothers I know. But it's hard at home, with my Mom. It may also be because I've got my character from my Dad - impatient, stubborn, hot-headed.
When I became a mother myself and moved in with my own family, I thought things would change. I thought that I would understand her as a mother myself. It was seven years living away from them but still communicating and talking to my Mom and listening to her constant whining about each and every single issue with my Dad. Unfortunately, nothing has changed between them. He even got worse since nobody could stop him from doing nasty things to her. He even cheated on her and lied to her over and over again!
Then, they moved in with me and my family.
It's like living the past. When I see her and talk to her in flesh, all I could think of is how little he made her become. All I could hear is my Dad constantly cursing at her about how useless she was - but she isn't.
How I wish that it was all different in our family or that I never saw him treating her bad or even hear his taunting words to her. Wish it was never how it is now.