Questions to ask your parents about love
10 questions
Most of us know our parents as parents — partners to each other, sure, but mostly as the people who raised us. We forget that before any of that, they were two people falling in love with each other (or somebody else). These questions are about that. How they met. When they knew. What they would tell their younger self about love. The answers, in our experience, are often the ones adult children remember most.
Love & marriage
- 01
Tell me about your first crush. What were they like?
Ask if that person ever knew.
- 02
How did you meet your spouse or partner?
Ask what the very first thing was that caught their attention.
- 03
When did you know you were in love?
Ask if they told the other person right away or sat on it for a while.
- 04
Describe your wedding day. What do you remember most vividly?
Ask about something that went wrong — and whether it matters now.
- 05
What's your favorite memory with your spouse — just the two of you?
Ask what made that particular moment feel like enough.
- 06
What's the secret to staying married for a long time?
Ask if they figured that out early on or had to learn it the hard way.
- 07
What did your spouse teach you about yourself?
Ask if it was a comfortable lesson or a hard one.
- 08
What advice would you give your younger self about love?
Ask if they think their younger self would have listened.
- 09
Tell me about your first love — even if it didn't last.
Ask what they remember most clearly about that person.
- 10
What's a small, ordinary moment with someone you loved that you've held onto?
Ask why that one stuck instead of all the bigger ones.
How to actually ask these
- ·Pick three or four. Trying to ask all of them in one sitting will exhaust you both. The best conversations come from one question that opens up into twenty minutes of unrelated stories.
- ·Don't correct or argue. If their memory of an event doesn't match yours, that's a separate conversation. Right now you're collecting their version.
- ·Write down what they say while it's fresh — or record it. Phones are good for this. You don't need anything fancier.
- ·If asking face-to-face feels like too much pressure — for either of you — consider letting our service text them one question every few days. Many people open up more easily over text than across a kitchen table.