When Talking to Aging Parents Feels So Hard

I was at book club the other night, and, as usually happens, we eventually stopped talking about the book.

One woman mentioned something her mother had said. Another woman immediately had a similar story. Someone else chimed in about her father, and before long, our carefully chosen book had been completely abandoned in favor of a conversation that felt much more relevant to all of us: what it is actually like to talk to our aging parents.

There was a lot of nodding around the table.

Not because we all had the same relationship with our parents, but because so many of us recognized the same feeling. The frustration of trying to have a real conversation with a parent and somehow never quite getting there.

You share something meaningful that’s happening in your life, and instead of asking a follow-up question, they respond with a story about something similar that happened to them. You tell them about something you’re excited about, and the conversation quickly moves to something they can relate to. You mention a challenge you’re facing, and suddenly you’re talking about the weather, someone’s health, or what they had for lunch.

And sometimes the conversation isn’t difficult at all.

It’s just…surface level.

You hang up the phone and think, Did we actually talk?

When the Conversation Never Quite Gets There

I don’t think most of us expect our parents to suddenly become completely different people. But that doesn’t mean we don’t wish for something more.

Maybe you want your mother to ask how you are really doing. Not just whether work is busy or whether the kids are doing well, but how you are.

Maybe you want your father to ask about the decision you’ve been wrestling with and actually listen to the answer. Maybe you want them to be curious about the things that matter to you, even when those things have nothing to do with their own lives.

Instead, you get the checklist.

How’s work? How are the kids? How’s the house? Are you still doing that thing? Did you talk to so-and-so?

Those questions aren’t necessarily meaningless. In fact, they may be your parent’s way of showing interest. But sometimes it can feel like you’re being asked for a status report rather than invited into a conversation.

And there is a particular kind of loneliness that comes from realizing that the person who has known you the longest doesn’t necessarily know how to ask you about the person you’ve become.

Sometimes they aren’t changing the subject. They’re trying to find a way into yours.

When They Turn Your Story Into Their Story

There is another version of this that can be particularly frustrating.

You tell your mother about something happening at work, and she immediately tells you about someone she knows who had a similar job. You mention a trip you’re excited about, and suddenly you’re hearing about the trip she and your father took thirty years ago. You tell your father about a problem you’re having with one of your adult children, and he launches into a story about what you did when you were that age.

Sometimes you just want to say, Can we stay with my story for five minutes?

But before we decide that this means our parents don’t care, it may be worth considering another possibility.

Maybe this is how they connect.

Finding something from their own experience may be the only way they know how to say, I understand.

It doesn’t always feel like understanding. Sometimes it feels like they hijacked the conversation.

Both things can be true.

They may be trying to connect, and we may still wish they would simply stay curious about us for a little longer.

They May Know the Facts Without Knowing Us

I think this is one of the things that can be hardest to explain.

Our parents may know a lot about our lives. They know where we work, where our children went to school, where we’re traveling, what our house looks like, and what our latest project is. They may be able to give their friends an impressive little report about everything we’re doing.

But knowing the facts isn’t necessarily the same thing as knowing the person.

Sometimes it feels as though our parents can tell someone everything about us without really knowing how we’re doing.

How are you feeling about the changes in your life?

Are you happy?

What are you excited about?

What are you worried about?

What are you figuring out?

Those are different questions.

And sometimes those are the questions we wish our parents would ask.

Maybe They Care More Than They Know How to Show

This is where I think we have to give our parents, and ourselves, a little grace.

Many of us in Gen X grew up in families where love was expressed through doing. Providing was love. Working hard was love. Making dinner, showing up, fixing something, remembering your dentist appointment, or asking whether you had enough gas in the car were all ways of saying, I care about you.

Emotional vulnerability wasn’t necessarily part of the family vocabulary.

Now many of us have spent decades learning a different language. We talk about therapy, boundaries, relationships, emotional needs, personal growth, and vulnerability. We have learned to say things like, That hurt me, or I’m struggling with this, or I don’t know what I want.

Then we call our parents.

Suddenly, it can feel like we’ve walked into a different era.

That doesn’t necessarily mean our parents don’t love us. It may mean they learned a different language for love and connection.

Maybe asking whether you’ve eaten lunch really is your mother’s way of asking whether you’re okay.

Maybe telling you about something similar that happened to them really is your father’s way of saying, I’ve been there.

Maybe giving advice instead of empathy is simply the only response they know.

That doesn’t mean we have to pretend it feels the same as being understood.

Intent and impact can be two different things.

And Still, It Can Hurt

Understanding where our parents are coming from doesn’t magically erase the disappointment.

We want our parents to see us.

Not just as their daughter or son. Not just as the person who lives in a certain city, has a certain job, has children, or owns a certain house.

We want them to know the person we’ve become.

We want them to know what we’re thinking about, what we’re excited about, what scares us, and what we’re still figuring out.

And sometimes it feels as though they are collecting information rather than actually getting to know us.

That can be especially painful when we see them enthusiastically telling other people about our lives.

Oh, she’s doing this now.

Her daughter is at this school.

Her son just bought a house.

She’s going on this trip.

They know the facts.

But we may quietly wonder whether they know us.

There is a difference.

Maybe We Need to Stop Waiting for the Conversation We Wish We Could Have

This may be the hardest part.

How many times have we gone into a conversation hoping that this time will be different?

Maybe this time Mom will ask the question.

Maybe Dad will open up.

Maybe they’ll finally understand why something matters to us.

Maybe this story will make them see things differently.

Maybe they’ll respond the way we wish they would.

And then the conversation follows the same familiar path.

There is disappointment. Then frustration. Maybe even anger.

So we try again. We explain ourselves differently. We ask a different question. We hope that if we can just find the right words, the conversation will finally go somewhere new.

But what if the goal isn’t to finally have the emotionally open conversation we’ve been waiting for?

What if we stopped measuring the relationship against the conversations we wish we could have and started paying attention to the conversations we actually can have?

That doesn’t mean giving up on connection.

It means releasing ourselves from the exhausting job of trying to make someone communicate in a way that may simply not be natural to them.

Look for the Pockets of Connection

Maybe the meaningful conversation isn’t the profound heart-to-heart you’ve imagined.

Maybe it’s the twenty-minute drive when your mother tells you a story you’ve heard before, but this time you ask one more question.

Maybe it’s cooking a family recipe together.

Maybe it’s looking through old photographs.

Maybe it’s talking about the garden.

Maybe it’s sitting outside while your father complains about something he’s complained about for twenty years, and somehow you both end up laughing.

Maybe it’s asking your mother about the dress she wore to her wedding.

Maybe it’s asking your father about the first car he ever owned.

These conversations may not look like the emotional intimacy we have with our closest friends. But they are still moments of connection.

And sometimes, especially as our parents age, those small moments become more meaningful than we expected.

Sometimes You Have to Change the Question

We may also need to change what we’re asking for.

If asking your mother, How do you feel about everything that’s changing? results in a five-minute monologue about the neighbor’s new kitchen, perhaps that isn’t the question that will open the door.

Try asking about something she remembers.

Ask what her mother did when she was the same age.

Ask what she wishes she had known when she was raising children.

Ask about the house she grew up in.

Ask what she remembers about her first job, her wedding, or the years when you were little.

Sometimes the easiest doorway into meaningful conversation is through memory.

And sometimes you learn something you never expected to hear.

This is one of the gifts of this stage of life. Our parents may have decades of stories inside them, and we don’t know how many opportunities we’ll have left to hear them.

Acceptance isn’t giving up on the relationship. It’s letting go of the version of it we keep wishing would appear.

We Don’t Have to Make Them Someone They’re Not

This may be the hardest lesson.

We can wish our parents were more emotionally available without making that the requirement for having a relationship with them.

We can wish they asked better questions. We can wish they listened longer. We can wish they understood some of the things that matter deeply to us.

We can even be disappointed that they don’t.

But we may also have to accept that our parents are unlikely to suddenly discover an entirely new emotional vocabulary simply because we’ve learned one.

And perhaps that acceptance is less about lowering our expectations and more about releasing ourselves from the exhausting job of trying to change them.

Because there is a difference between accepting someone’s limitations and pretending they don’t hurt.

We can do the first without doing the second.

Find the Connection They Can Give

Maybe your father will never sit down and have the heart-to-heart you’ve imagined.

Maybe your mother will never ask the question you wish she’d ask.

Maybe they will never fully understand some of the choices you’ve made or the things you care about.

That doesn’t mean there is nothing left to share.

The goal isn’t to force a modern emotional breakthrough. It’s to find the pockets of joy, safety, humor, affection, and mutual respect that exist within the boundaries of the relationship you actually have.

That might mean asking different questions. It might mean talking while you’re doing something together instead of sitting across from each other trying to have a conversation. It might mean telling them a funny story about your week rather than hoping they’ll ask about it.

And sometimes, it might simply mean letting the conversation be what it is.

Not every interaction has to be meaningful. Not every phone call has to produce emotional intimacy. Not every visit has to prove that you have a close relationship.

Sometimes you can just be together.

Give Yourself Permission to Want More

There is one other thing I don’t want to lose in all of this.

You are allowed to wish for more.

You are allowed to feel disappointed when your parent doesn’t ask about something that matters to you. You are allowed to feel frustrated when the conversation becomes another story about them. You are allowed to wish you had a different kind of relationship.

Acceptance doesn’t mean convincing yourself that everything is fine.

It means recognizing what is true without spending all of your energy wishing it were different.

And perhaps that is especially important now.

Because our parents are aging, and so are we. We are changing. They are changing. The relationship between us is changing.

Maybe the goal isn’t to finally get the parent we always wished we had.

Maybe the goal is to make peace with the parent we have, find the places where we can genuinely connect, and stop overlooking the moments of love simply because they don’t arrive in the form we expected.

That may not be the relationship we imagined.

But it can still be a relationship worth having.

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Explore More

If you’re navigating the complicated, beautiful season of aging parents and changing family roles, these are a few more stories from The Well Spent Life you may enjoy:

• The Woman in the Middle: When Your Kids Are Grown and Your Parents Are Aging
• The Invisible Mourning: When You Miss a Parent Who Is Still Here
• When Your Parent Doesn’t Want Help
• Books That Help Us Understand Dementia, Memory, and What Remains

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