Your fundamental assumption seems to be that, as the child of your parents, you owe them both loyalty, affection and emotional support for the rest of their lives.
I can't accept this is the case (and, BTW, I speak as a parent). You didn't ask to be born, so you owe them nothing by virtue of your existence. You might be grateful for the care they showed you while you were growing up, but that's a duty all parents commit to when they decide to have a child. If you grew up knowing you were loved by them, then you should appreciate that, but this also is what any caring parent should provide their child, and there's no moral requirement that we must all be eternally grateful and beholden to anyone who loves us at some point in our lives.
You're an adult now, and you have the right to come to your own conclusions about the people your parents are. You have the right to decide which - if either - of them you agree with in any given situation, if you're willing to provide emotional support to one or both of them, or if you think one or both of them is not the sort of person you'd welcome into your life if you'd only just met them.
I understand your wish that they had a more positive relationship and your desire to "fix" them, but you can no more do that than you can fix the relationships of anyone else you know. For whatever reasons, they're still together. As long as one of them isn't keeping the other chained up in the cellar or so terrorising them that they fear for their life if they were to leave, staying together is their choice, and you have to respect that. You don't have to approve of the relationship or even try to comprehend the dynamics at work, but you do have to accept it.
If you feel sympathy for your father and believe that listening to his complaints is helpful to him, then do so, but it's not your place to suggest what he should do. If you find listening to his complaints difficult to handle, then you should tell him this, and suggest that he consider seeking help from a relationship counsellor.
If you find that time spent with your mother opens old wounds and invariably ruins your day, then avoid spending any time with her. If she is indeed some variety of toxic personality, then she'll probably resent this and try to manipulate you into spending time with her. Remember that it's your life, and you have the right to decide who you expend your time and emotional energy on.
It seems to me that about all you can take from your current understanding of your parents' relationship is a few ideas of what you _don't_ want in your own relationships. We all form our first concepts of how relationships work from how we see our parents interacting when we're growing up. If the relationship is positive and loving, that can form a solid basis for us creating our own positive and loving relationships. If a parental relationship is dysfunctional, that can lead us repeating the scripts we learned as a child from the parent of our gender, and being inclined to choose partners who will fill the role of the parent of the opposite gender. Overcoming these deeply embedded ideas can be difficult, but the first step is recognising where they come from.
When did you realize your parent(s) were toxic?
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Your fundamental assumption seems to be that, as the child of your parents, you owe them both loyalty, affection and emotional support for the rest of their lives.
I can't accept this is the case (and, BTW, I speak as a parent). You didn't ask to be born, so you owe them nothing by virtue of your existence. You might be grateful for the care they showed you while you were growing up, but that's a duty all parents commit to when they decide to have a child. If you grew up knowing you were loved by them, then you should appreciate that, but this also is what any caring parent should provide their child, and there's no moral requirement that we must all be eternally grateful and beholden to anyone who loves us at some point in our lives.
You're an adult now, and you have the right to come to your own conclusions about the people your parents are. You have the right to decide which - if either - of them you agree with in any given situation, if you're willing to provide emotional support to one or both of them, or if you think one or both of them is not the sort of person you'd welcome into your life if you'd only just met them.
I understand your wish that they had a more positive relationship and your desire to "fix" them, but you can no more do that than you can fix the relationships of anyone else you know. For whatever reasons, they're still together. As long as one of them isn't keeping the other chained up in the cellar or so terrorising them that they fear for their life if they were to leave, staying together is their choice, and you have to respect that. You don't have to approve of the relationship or even try to comprehend the dynamics at work, but you do have to accept it.
If you feel sympathy for your father and believe that listening to his complaints is helpful to him, then do so, but it's not your place to suggest what he should do. If you find listening to his complaints difficult to handle, then you should tell him this, and suggest that he consider seeking help from a relationship counsellor.
If you find that time spent with your mother opens old wounds and invariably ruins your day, then avoid spending any time with her. If she is indeed some variety of toxic personality, then she'll probably resent this and try to manipulate you into spending time with her. Remember that it's your life, and you have the right to decide who you expend your time and emotional energy on.
It seems to me that about all you can take from your current understanding of your parents' relationship is a few ideas of what you _don't_ want in your own relationships. We all form our first concepts of how relationships work from how we see our parents interacting when we're growing up. If the relationship is positive and loving, that can form a solid basis for us creating our own positive and loving relationships. If a parental relationship is dysfunctional, that can lead us repeating the scripts we learned as a child from the parent of our gender, and being inclined to choose partners who will fill the role of the parent of the opposite gender. Overcoming these deeply embedded ideas can be difficult, but the first step is recognising where they come from.