I don't think anyone will be able to change my mind on this.. mums love VS dads love

[footballinterferingagain]

I honestly don't see how a dad can feel the same about a child as a mum..

You carry that child for 9 months, push them out, breast feed them, spend 24 hrs a day with them..

How can a dad possibly feel the same intensity of love for a child

(I know there are exceptions to the above and not all mums bond/ breastfeeding/ stay at home etc etc, I just mean generally) and also, my kids do have a loving dad.

Does anyone agree with me, or am I alone?

Is there a father in your children's lives OP?

FWIW I think the examples you give of a baby wrecking your body and all the pain from childbirth and breastfeeding wouldn't make me love someone more?! I didn't get the rush of hormones, I was just exhausted each time. My DH got the joy of holding his babies and looking after them without the physical drag of pregnancy and labour. Arguably he loves them (and me) all the more because he didn't have to experience any of those negative side effects. Don't u think?

@Bishybarnybee Excellent post 🙌

OP, you win Goady Thread of the Day prize, and it's only 815. 🏅

I’m not sure about mother’s intuition either. I certainly didn’t feel that. I got to know my baby really well and then had it after that. But there wasn’t any of that thing of automatically knowing what to do just because I was a mother.

I do think dads love as much if they’re good dads. But the stats on how often dads see their kids after a split aren’t great.

You can't measure love, you absolute dingbat. But if you could, my dad would win hands down, as he didn't have an affair and walk out on us at a vulnerable age. And continually priotise a new relationship over us.

Oh this makes me so angry. My dad was a beacon of certainty, love and sacrifice in my life. My mum will always put herself before her children, it is just how she is.

So fuck off with your narrow, reductive crap.

I can assure you breastfeeding did not make me love my children more. If anything it really inhibited my ability to bond as I found the whole thing invasive and uncomfortable. (BF them both until 9 months).

Then there's PND. Not everyone likes pregnancy. No journey to parenthood is the same.

OK, calming down from my angry post that will doubtless be deleted, OP try opening your mind and your heart with this wonderful poem by Robert Haydon. It calls to mind my dad's unwavering presence in my life, that backbone of total, unconditional love and reliability my mother lacks:

Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he’d call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love’s austere and lonely offices?

Interesting OP. If we take people’s personal emotions out of it, I think that evolution has an impact on behaviours and instincts. A man, in theory, can father limitless progeny at no risk to himself. A woman can only have a certain number of progeny because of the time and resources it takes to grow, birth and ween a child. Each time she risks her own life through the process. She therefore has more invested in each individual child.

Obviously there are amazing fathers and terrible mothers, but like a PP said, in a divorce a woman is more likely to maintain contact with a child than a father.

As a personal observation I find men more laid back about children’s safety. They are the ones saying “it’ll be fine” where the mother is more conservative. I think this is due to the biological investment of the mother by spending 2 years + of your life in growing/birthing/caring the child. Her instincts are probably more defensive because she has more to lose.

Nope. I pushed both of mine out and handed them to their dad straight away, saying 'your turn'. They are adult now, so he didn't get the same leave as he would have got now but other than breastfeeding, which I only did for a fortnight, there was nothing I could do better than him. In fact, he had far more experience with babies than I did, as he already had nieces and nephews. The first nappy I changed ever was my Dd's. It's a dangerous myth to perpetuate that a mother's love is somehow superior to a father's. It keeps women at home and makes it difficult for men to enjoy the best possible relationship with their kids.

No I don't agree. I have wondered the same thing but know and can see my husband feels the same as me.

Your view is very offensive to adoptive mothers, and to fathers in general.

i also know divorced couples where the previously devoted father doesn’t care about the dcs anymore at all.
No one could have guessed that the fathers would be like this.
I know there are exceptions but think generally, yes, the mother has a deeper connection to the child than the father.

Completely disagree.

This was proved to me when my husband and I went for our first scan. When I saw my little baby kicking about I honestly thought nobody could ever feel love the way I felt at that moment.
.. then I turned around to look at my husband and he had tears streaming down his cheeks with the silliest big smile on his face. He is such a reserved, quiet person normally who keeps his cards close to his chest. So yeah, from that moment on I absolutely knew he loved this baby completely as much as I do!

I have 2 children. 12yrs and 15mths.
My youngest was somewhat of a suprise, in 2015, after several failed attempts, including the usual fertility treatment and IVF, we was told it wouldnt happen, I was the issue, not DH. Low and behold, it happend. I wasnt particularly happy about it, we didnt find out until i was 15 weeks. I had come to terms with the fact our family would never be complete and as my eldest (from 1st relationship) was getting older, I had started to get a bit of my life back, I had just been on my first girls holiday and found out I was pregnant the day i got home. I hated being pregnant and had very mixed feelings. You would think after all I had gone through for 3 years I would be over the moon, but I wasnt. Obviously, I love dd to bits and would not be with out her now. I had a csection and didnt breastfed. My DH loves her differently then I, no more or less, but differently because it finally happend for him, he became a daddy.

My point is, I dont think the love we feel is more or less, its just different and for different reasons. Not every women also gets that feeling of love and bonding from conception and throughout preganancy......I didnt, but my DH did from the moment that test said 'pregnant'..........

I agree with you in a way op. But I think it's more that we as women as ultra maternal. So no matter how that child arrived in our arms, we as its mother love it unconditionally.
Of course dad's can feel that love too though.

Yabu. But I think a lot of women feel like this, which is why many dads are not given 50:50 on divorce.

Many threads on here - a father wanting 50/50 is generally assumed to be trying to get out of paying maintenance. Not wanting to see his children

I definitely felt more loved by my own father. He took an interest in me as a person, rather than expecting a perfectly behaved little automaton in a pretty dress that could be taken out in public to impress friends.

Are you the mother of a baby OP? In that case I can understand your perspective. As they get older and their personalities emerge, relationships change.

Alone. I heavily disagree with you, and your rationale. Your opinion sounds like a superiority complex mixed in with a heavy dose of condescension

In fact, I wonder why you associate greater love with going through hardship and pain OP? Have you only had (romantic or family) relationships that were "hard work" and "got to take the rough with the smooth" and "no love without pain"? Life doesn't have to be like that, in fact it really isn't healthy.

My father lacked any paternal feelings. Left a few month after my birth and kept having babies he abandoned right from the beginning.

However, one of my neighbours(woman) two years ago left her three kids and husband out of the blue....she met someone else and packed and leaved when nobody was home. No contact with the kids ever since and they are like 7-11 years.

Maybe mothers feel more responsibility for the children and this is why it's quite rare for the mother to leave her kids whereas men do this more frequently.
My mum definitely felt more responsibility than love.

I think people are being a little unfair, although understandably your comments have caused some offence. I think you can't imagine that you'd love your children as much if you hadn't carried them, given birth to them etc etc because those are all inherent parts of your relationship with your children. But if that wasn't how you came to be a mother, of course you'd still love them as much.

But Peter Andre really LOVES his children.

If you could spend some time working for Social Services you might change your rose-tinted view of all mothers. Giving birth does not make you an angel.

YABVU. I find it really sad that you need to self-justify in this way and feel sorry for your DH.

I agree that perpetuating the myth that women are somehow better at child rearing/know what to do instinctively/mother's intuition helps keeps women firmly in the primary carer camp.

How do you feel about grandparents OP? Because DM absolutely loved DS even before he was born (and openly admits “she never felt that way with me and DBro”). You look at her with him, and she is clearly absolutely besotted with him (he’s 3 now). There’s no way she feels any less for him than I do - I love DS more than I love anyone, but I honestly think DM loves him just as much as I do.

Now clearly not all grandparents feel like that - DGF barely sees him. But that depth of love is not unique to mothers.