Mother and Mother and Child

"Parenting is no different from any other kind of "managing."  The critical issues in raising children have far less to do with proper technique than with the nature of the parents' presence and the type of emotional processes they engender.  I have, for example, almost never seen a mother who had a mature relationship with her own mother have trouble with her daughter.  Similarly, I never saw a highly reactive or hypercritical father who was not distant from his own family of origin (and who, thereby, made the members of his new nuclear family too important to him.)" - Friedman, A Failure of Nerve, pp112-113.

Or, the sins of the fathers are passed down to the future generations.  In ministering to teens and young people interested in getting married, I have made it a practice to get them to see that improving their relationship with their parents, both mom and dad, will have more impact on how well their future marriage will go than almost any other relational investment they can make.  Also when seeking to get to know someone (whether they would be a good match for you or not), I have said that romantic, candle-light dinners will tell you very little; watching that person deal with their parents and siblings will tell you almost all you need to know.