Listen to them and let them speak
I had a rough childhood for a lot of reasons. The short of it is that being in a combined family Brady-Bunch situation seldom is the thing that children remember fondly. By biggest beef with my childhood is that people just. didn't. listen. To anything. You were a child. You were to be seen when it was convenient. You were not to be heard. You were not to feel. You were not to complain. Now I dare say that my upbringing was better than that of our parents, who were allowed even less freedom of thought and action. I.e. we were fed and clothed well. We had all the educational opportunities they could provide. So as far as they were concerned, they were doing a bang-up job. But it did not feel good. At all. My brother, after staying with my family a couple of months proceeded to analyze my parenting style. He said, "I've noticed that you set out to NOT raise your kids the way we were raised... You accomplished that". His comments were mostly complimentary. ...