Jack Osbourne has opened up about the difficulties he faced in his relationship with his late father, Ozzy Osbourne, and how addiction created distance between them.
Speaking about the Leave the No Doubt Fatherhood podcastJack reflected on growing up with a father who was sometimes “not the best parent.”
“There were times when [Ozzy] wasn’t the best parent.
“He came from a time when fathers weren’t really parents back then. They went to work, they closed the deal. And when we were kids, there were fights, and as a teenager you had a fight with your dad, kind of like a ***.”
“And I remember one time he looked at me and said, ‘What have you got to complain about? You never wanted anything. [everything]’.
“And I thought, ‘I want a father. I want a relationship with you.’
“Because he had his own struggles, he had his own addiction issues that he struggled with most of his life. And that’s a huge wedge in any parental arena.”
Despite these challenges, Jack believes his upbringing has shaped how he now raises his own children.
“I think a big part of parenting is that you ultimately learn from your parents’ mistakes, and you pick and choose, ‘Hey, I liked that my parents did that,’ ‘I didn’t like that my parents did that.’
“And that’s okay, because our parents did the same thing. And my dad didn’t raise me at all the way his dad raised him.
“And the same goes for my mother — she was very different from her parents. And that’s kind of, whether people realize it or not, I think that’s the gift that we give our children.
“Once they’re aware enough, we give them that playbook to work with when they’re ready to become parents.”
