I think my parents have a great, loving relationship, but I don't model my marriage after theirs!

Absolutely not. My parents have been married for 35 years and I've never heard them fight, but they are super conservative Christians who believe that women should submit to men. My mother is very submissive and will go along with anything my dad says. I know they love each other very much, but there is no way I'd want to be in a marriage like that. Example--my mom dropped out of college to marry my dad, she supported him while he got FOUR masters degrees (she never went back to school) and has followed him wherever his job takes the family. I don't even know if my mom has her own opinions. For the longest time I was anti-marriage because of their relationship.

i am one of the lucky ones whose parents have an amazing relationship. i wouldnt say i model my relationship from there..but there are alot of cues i take from them. my parents usually only fight about the big things... my parents also balance themselves out... so while i mite not look to them as the be all of 'how a good relationship is' it did help knowing that two people can be together for almost 30 years and still hold hands when walking down the street.

i actually do quite the opposite. i make sure to not do whatever it is they did. working out so far

I wouldn't say I model everything to them, but I definitely look up to them.You can tell they love each other so much and have always been a 'team'. I would love to find a guy like my dad (okay, i know that sounds weird lol).

My Dad just ADORES my mom, as well as me and my sister. He would do literally anything for us at any time. He is just amazing. I sound like a cornball haha.

Hell no, not on purpose or accident. My parents don't even like each other and if my mom wasn't so cheap she would get a divorce!

Not unless I want to go through a bitter money-hungry, painful divorce that's lasted 8 years so far.

I'd like to be able to, seeing as how they have a loving relationship that's lasted a long time (even though they did separate for a while). But in this day and age, I don't see how that's really possible.

Hell no! I could never handle that much dysfunction and chaos in my life...

My parents have been married for 31 years and my in-laws have been married for 32, and they are still happy- so it makes sense that of course I want that too. We were raised in a similar fashion and we agree that we would want the same things for our kids- so I guess we are sort of modeling them, but who doesnt want to still be happily married after 30 years?

I learn from my parents mistakes, they were horrible about communicating and telling each other what they needed from the other person. My Mom would yell at everyone and my Dad would get angry. I'd really like the be exactly the opposite.

My mom cheated on my dad, and my dad didn't pay her any attention anyway, so I definitely don't try to be like them. My in-laws, however, are very happy and good at communicating. Their relationship has had a big influence on mine.

Is it bad that I'm honestly surprised that 30+ year marriages still exist? I was practically born into a "broken family"

NO. My parents are two conservative, leveled people that take marriage as a part of life and as a responsiblity. I however am on the 'madly in love' bandwagon.

Austerity, same with my family. It's not even like, reasonable to them to question why they remain married even when though they don't really seem that into it. It's just what you do in their minds. They don't even expect marriage to be great or beneficial.

I see how different it is with my fiance and I, so I am very excited to be married and think we will succeed. The sad thing is, his parents were really similar to us, you can see it in their pictures from when they were engaged, and they also had dated around five years before getting married. But his dad cheated 10 years ago, and they've seriously spent the last 10 years on the verge of divorce. It scares me that two great people who were so madly in love can't even make it work.

My parents have been married for 30 years and have a terrible relationship. My father acts like a spoiled child, and my mother lets him walk all over her. I've always done my best to learn from their bad example and not end up repeating it.

Hello NO. I do the complete opposite.

my parents love each other and are happy. i hope i can one day have the same.

My parents divorced when I was seven, but I have certainly picked up some tips on what NOT to do!!!

I'm with the "hell no" group. My parent's marriage is so toxic, it's laughable. They've been unhappily married for over 30 years, and still counting.

My parents are divorced, and they were never really happy. Their marriage was arranged, and they only saw each other twice before the marriage. Marrying someone/ dating someone I love is the most important thing to me. I learned that from my mom's unsatisfactory past marriage and current marriage.

My dad died when I was 7, but I think my parents were very happy before that and my mom never remarried. I'm not actively modeling my relationship after theirs, but just as them, we're going to get married after 7 years of dating and I'll be the same age as my mom was.

hmmm...my parents just finalized their divorce after 38 years of marriage, so I really don't think they are a very good example. Also, they pretty much had a sexless marriage..uhh no thanks. My fiance's parents also had a really bitter divorce. However, he has not let it affect his view of marriage. He said he would marry me tomorrow, but I am nervous to get married because of what I saw my parents go through. I think the lesson I learned is that you cannot expect things to just be good, you have to work at it, and work at really communicating.

I learn what not to do from them. My parents are wonderful at being parents, but no so good at their relationship with each other. There's just zero communication and a lot of misunderstanding.

When I find myself acting like one of them in my relationship with my husband, it's like a red light for me to stop what I'm doing so I don't end up like that. Also, I have to hear all about their fights, and I really hate it. I've told my husband that when we have kids I want to make every effort to avoid fighting in front of them. If we disagree, I want them to see how to respectfully disagree with someone and how to reach a compromise.

I would LOVE to have a relationship like my parents - they've been married 35 years and are so happy together. I also happened to fall in love with a man who is exactly like my dad

Uhh it really scares me that on top of the divorce statistics so many of us have parents that have remained unhappily married. So 50% of people get divorced, and then maybe 30% of those remaining married have unhappy marriages? Or, at least marriages we wouldn't want? Yikes.

My parents have been happily married for 36 years and have an amazing relationship, but I don't think anyone should "model" their relationship after someone else's. Everyone has different needs and relates to their partner in a different way. Every relationship is unique.

Although my parents have been married for 27 years almost and his parents for 30+ years, my relationship with my husband is very different from theirs because, namely, we are different from both parents. We need to do what is right for us, not what was right for another couple.

I definitely look to their relationship to see what I would want to do and what I would never, ever, ever want to do!! But because a lot of people in my family are divorced, and because the divorce rate being what-99.99%? (might as well be), I totally expect to divorce. I know that's terrible and a negative way to look at things, but at least I'll be prepared. I'm still hoping I only have one wedding and marriage to work through!

Although I don't model my relationship after my parents', I am reminded that just because me and my boyfriend have our differences doesn't mean we can't work really well together. My parents are total opposites; my mom is really high strung, pessimistic, sarcastic, and liberal while my dad is the most laid back, nonjudgmental, positive guy with very conservative morals (not religious, though). A lot of times my mom might get stressed out and start screeching at whoever, and my dad just rolls with it and gives her space, then shows up with flowers and a bottle of wine even though he didn't do anything. She also can kick his butt into gear to get him working on everything he puts off because he has no sense of timeliness. Anyway, they've been married now for 25 years and are still really happy and in love even though they aren't carbon copies, and that inspires me to really understand and work with my differences from my boyfriend instead of picking at them.

I don't model but I am sure there are some similarities. We do everything together, as do my parents. But there are a lot of differences.

yes. whatever my parents have done in their life, i do the opposite.

Opposite. My parents hate each other, but stayed married for 20 years "for the kids." My mom now admits that was a stupid idea and was actually harder for my sister and me to have parents that fought constantly than if they had divorced earlier.

I can only pray that my marriage will be as blessed as my parents'!

Oh God I hope not...

God I hope not.

I am so different than my mother. There's no way my life could ever be the same. How could I model my life after hers? First of all she got married after getting pregnant at 19. That didn't happen to me. I got married and had kids because I planned for it. There's a few good things she taught me in life and I try to keep those things in mind when I need some wisdom. I think maybe that counts for a lot. She would say her marriage is good, but I always felt she and my dad and aren't exactly two peas in a pod.