What would make you afraid of meeting somebody's parents?

Fears? That one or both are prejudiced against my ethnicity of my religion. That one or both were abusive, or are practicing alcoholics. That one of them is full of rage.

Make me feel at ease? Talking it over with my sweetie before going there. Making sure I have a way for us to leave if necessary.

The most reassuring thing is meeting them and realizing we’ll get along.

Nah, they’re either going to like me or they won’t. If they don’t I would make the effort to find out why and address it, but I’m not going to knock myself out for someone other than my sweetie.

That the father or mother are irrational people who don’t get along with their kid. In that case, you are walking into the lion’s den.

I would have fears about meeting someone’s parents if I thought those parents were going to hate me.

A case of unintentional impregnation.

My girlfiends parents have not met me yet, from what I have heard they hate me. They are very conservative and don’t like their Asian daughter going out with a “rude alcoholic unfaithful white guy”.

My fear is that when I do meet the parents eventually, is that ill be some place in Asia with some angry parents that run a butchers business, with plenty of access to ways of ‘processing meat’ and ‘distributing’ it.

As long as I’m given a change with parents I’m ok, and don’t ask for more.

@mazingerz88 That’s why I always preferred meeting the parents on the first date.

I’ve been worried that things would be awkward, that all of us would have nothing to talk about. I’ve been worried that they wouldn’t like me and would convince their son to stop dating me. I’ve been worried that they would like me and that they would feel betrayed when whoever it was and I broke up. (But this has happened.)

Parents are just intimidating. It is a big deal to be introduced to them, in my opinion.

I would think that most people would be concerned that they wouldn’t be accepted and/or judged harshly.

My MIL declared out and out war on me for years. I was patient and respectful and eventually led her to grudging respect.

In some cultures it means something very different to meet the parents. Depending on the background of your significant other – it may mean something very different to them..

Case in point – where I came from in the Midwest in the US it was very common for (ALL of) my dates to meet my parents – even as I grew older and wasn’t living at home anymore. My parents were interested in meeting any and all of my dates – but it didn’t mean anything more than that my parents were interested in meeting anyone I thought was a worthy person to date.

When I lived in Japan it meant something entirely different! I met the parents of a man I’d been dating for a while and then all my (Japanese) friends & colleagues congratulations me & told me this meant we were engaged to be married! Apparently meeting the parents in the (deep south, rural) part of Japan where I lived meant a very serious commitment!

Some parents have ridiculously high expectations of their children’s potential spouse, and this is especially true when it comes to a guy meeting the women’s parents. Depending on what you do for a living, whether you went to college (or the right one), how much money you make, age factors, etc meeting their parents can be a very daunting task.

I can’t remember ever being afraid to meet anyone’s parents and can’t think of a situation in which I would be afraid. My own father was the scariest person I knew and, while I couldn’t confront him, I could be polite and sociable. He was extremely judgmental and intimidating, but not dangerous.

There are a number of reasons but, I’ve always believed that a good person has nothing to fear. However, I think the number one reason people fear meeting the parents is that, your love interest may hold the parents opinion in very high esteem. Especially if dealing with a daddy’s girl. They may not be able to over-ride the feeling to not disappoint dad and dad may have very high standards. So in that case you can only hope to pass the test with the parents.

Jehovas witnessesessesss with an inferiority complex.

Well…maybe if I found out before that these parents do not think of me as a good match for their child from what they’ve heard, or if the person whose parents I am meeting has a difficult relationship toward them/ has told me about some unpleasant traits the parents have.