Emotional capacity for parenting

Hallo,
is ti true that capacity of love that we got from our parents is equal to the capacity of love we are able to give our children?
For a while, I'm avoiding my father cause I have a deep feeling that when we meet, and in general in past, that he takes more emotional energy from me than he gives. He drains me. My sister more.
He is a child of an alcoholic and he was always bleeding emotionally, constantly with a corner of his eye was watching if we are paying our attention to him.
He always needed a parent he never had, and not children. That is not so good plan with such a low energy.
For example, I've noticed that I have a fear to have a children. My sister has no patience towards children, has no plan to have one and she is almost 40. My father still drains her and emotionally manipulates her cause of his fear of abandonment. I am few months out of my parents house and my batteries are filling, no one is draining my attention, no one needs desperately to be fixed - his childhood issues and deep emotional hole from childhood.

Now, I would do anything to fill my own hole, cause it causes fear of having children and making the same mistake - needing to meet parents (my) emotional needs instead of children needs.

Any thoughts on this emotional capacity? How to fix that?

All I can tell you is that my husband came from a hugely dysfunctional family with extremely abusive, unloving parents, yet he is the most marvelous father to our three sons . . . so I call B.S. to that sentiment that a person cannot have the capacity to love and be a good parent if their parents didn't have that capacity. He didn't really have to do anything to "fix" the problem because it simply wasn't a problem. He was a natural as a great dad from the very start. He did have a very firm determination to never turn out like his family though. He is VERY different from them. Yes, he has problems that linger from his childhood that affect him, but they haven't affected his parenting ability in the least.

I don't believe that to be true. I think everyone is different and there is no rule of thumb when it comes to giving love. tc

When you as a child take care to your parents emotional health and emotional needs, in time you get pissed off cause your emotional needs are neglected. Logically, that parent had no capacity at the beginning to fulfill those child's needs. Later, when you get older, when someone else shows you emotional neediness, you start automatically as triggered to resent him, and it fits most easily to children cause they have a lot of needs and are easy targets to manifest your covert and repressed anger that wasn't resolved towards your self-absorbed parent.
My fathers eyes are black, full of fear of abandonment, anger, sadness, neediness; they are as a black hole where you fall into and you are drained and deprived of all your happiness and optimism. He tricks you with his acting of victim-hood and suck you into pity and lock your attention, making you feeling guilty for not taking care of him in that state of his. The more time you spend with him, the less you have will to live your life. He is very good emotional manipulator.
Personally I don't know what to do with my anger towards his denial of his emotional state and self-absorption. He blames me with his black eyes for not filling his emotional hole without the bottom that his alcoholic father created.
Now I am so tired of searching for boundaries of my responsibility and guilt cause that is a very close person. I'm afraid that I am repressing that anger and it will come out on some innocent person who will only trigger it.
I need principles, rules, explanations, answers, how far goes my responsibility and where my guilt stops. I don't want to start my own parenting without the solutions to these questions.

There are times where we repeat our parents' bad behaviors. Hopefully we catch ourselves in the act and don't do it too often.

There are also times when we absolutely see what's happened to our parents and vow to all that is holy that we will NEVER do that to our kids.

Hopefully, the latter is for the really bad stuff... and the former for easily forgivable parenting mistakes.

Don't forget that we are combinations of both parents, just as future generations will be combinations.

Absolutely!!

We do have capacity as humans to learn from our parents mistakes.

When I became a mom, I would say that I might not know what to do, but I certainly know what not to do.

Yet, I also reached a pinnacle where I knew that I needed to address certain things about my upbringing, was dealing with much more than just childrearing, but reentry of my father into my life after a decade of not wanting him in my life because he can bring a toxicity, was dealing with alcoholism affecting my marriage with his moods also part of the equation later going from emotional darts to physical , was dealing with a needy mom then as I was butting heads on being my own woman/mother she fell ill, so there was not just that, not just my upbringing, my own health issues to address.

I wouldn't have it (exception aside) any other way.

Dysfunction in childhood doesn't automatically mean there's no capacity to be a parent.

hi there
i agree with the other's, i grew up with a controlling and maniuplative father, to this day he still feels like he is a victim. i hardly heard any i love yous or i am proud of you.

i vowed when i had my own kids that i would be there for them, love them and try to be a better parent, so far i think i am doing a pretty good job.... yes i can be abit controlling at times so i guess i get that from my dad but overall i think i am more involved with my own kids than he ever was with us.