“There was no way my son could have done those terrible things.”
“He’s a good boy.”
“He works really hard – has two jobs.”
Etc., etc., you’ve heard it all before, parents defending, protecting their children. Parents who know nothing about their children but protect everything about them, even though it has been years since they moved out and have been living on their own as adults, years since they were children. Now that they are grown the parents really do not know why they are anymore.
I remember my mother-in-law once remarked how my husband, a grown man, would always be her child. And I reminded her that he isn’t a child, he’s a grown man. I understand. You raise your children the best way you know how so you don’t understand how they could have neighbors who press charges against them, or ex-roommates who sue them for refusing to pay their share of rent. Or even an ex-spouse accusing them of abusive behavior. You didn’t raise your child to behave this way. And of course, you will always side with them no matter what lies they may tell you. Even if you know, deep down, that they are lying to you.
I remember a relative telling me about their son who got in with some kids and they caused a fire to a piece of equipment on someone’s property. ‘He was with some bad kids.’ And years later when a variety of tools were stolen from her husband’s business, the woman quickly blamed the son’s wife. She told him to do it, was the excuse this mother had. It was never her son, always someone else who is responsible.
I, for one, am sick of parents defending bad kids. I believe some people are just bad. And parents defending them certainly are not helping them, particularly when issues come up against their (adult) child again and again.
Parents also don’t know, despite their upbringing, how that child turned out. For example, the quotes I started with, the first quote is from Ted Bundy’s mother. Disregarding all the evidence against her son, and even when he admitted to these crimes, she still could not believe he killed all those women, even a couple of children. As she said “there was no way my son could have done those terrible things.” And yet, he did.