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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel I don't love my kids

59 replies

meadowposy · 20/05/2018 08:26

I just don't. I like them and I most definitely do right by them and I put them first but I don't think I love them really.

I suppose as long as they don't find out it doesn't matter does it?

OP posts:
auditqueen · 20/05/2018 08:56

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Marmitesoldiers · 20/05/2018 09:16

People on the spectrum can love people and I think it’s a bit offensive to suggest otherwise!

OP just wondering if you’ve felt loved in your own life, from parents, siblings and other family members. Maybe you’re a bit shut down?

I agree with the overwhelmed comment. When my children were small I didn’t always have the energy to often feel the rush of maternal love as I was too busy dealing with their day to day needs. But at times, on occasion, when I couldn’t see them in a shop momentarily or once I lost one of them at a school fair when they were v small (parent to parent miscommunication!) that gut wrenching sick feeling and panic, showed me how much I really do love them.

I wonder how much of a break you get from them and whether you look after yourself enough so you have the space and energy to care for your children.

Ohmydayslove · 20/05/2018 09:19

You can love your children but need a break from them and feel relived when they are elsewhere and happy op.

Very much so.

toolazytothinkofausername · 20/05/2018 09:19

I love my children. I hate being a mum. When I drop my children at school I feel a huge sense of relief.

Is this also how you feel?

Pengggwn · 20/05/2018 09:25

There are things I dislike about being a mum, too. The way you no longer have any physical space to call your own (someone always climbing on you or grabbing you), the assault on your sleep, the total lack of peace and quiet, the relentlessness of the jobs you need to do to keep on top of everything. Urgh.

But when my DD gives me a cuddle she is my little Halo

toolazytothinkofausername · 20/05/2018 09:25

I call myself "the 3 hour mum". I love my children for 3 hours, then someone else has to have them. I can look after them between 6-9am, then 3-6pm, and that is it.
I hate all the mum responsibilities and mum guilt.
I sometimes wish I was the fun aunt instead :(

YoYotheclown · 20/05/2018 09:28

How do you know what love is? What in your opinion is love ?

Octopus37 · 20/05/2018 09:28

I quite often feel dislike towards my children as they are strong willed. I sometimes dont massively like Motherhood cause I am fed up of my life fitting in with everyone else and I just feel like a housekeeper, with occasional exceptions. But when I imagine how it would be if something happened to my either of my boys, the feeling I have is something else entirely. I lost my Mum 16 years ok, it was awful, in some ways I never completley recovered but I've learnt to live round it. I lost one of my best friends four years ago, it was a terrible shock and I dont think I have ever felt grief like it (even when my Mum died). My MIL died three years ago and I miss her a lot. My relationship with my Dad has been very difficult for the past decade. He is nearly 80 so obviously wont be around forever, when he dies it will be painful, but I sometimes wonder how much more painful it will be than the hurt he has caused me over he past 10 years. If I lost either of my boys, I really dont know how I would go on (not a rare feeling I know), it really is the worst possibility, worse than loosing my husband even. One of my old friends has a terminally ill daughter and I cannot imagine her pain and have mentally asked God to take my Dad and his partner if he/she wants, but to leave my friend's girl alone - sorry know that sounds mental I'm not religious, just aghast at how unfair life is. That is how I know how much I love my boys when the chips are down, which is quite often.

Feckitall · 20/05/2018 09:40

For those saying 'why have more than one?' You often think giving it time will help and it will 'click' and after next child it will not be an issue..
I also don't think it is mental health necessarily. In times gone by families lived near each other and often children spent more time being brought up by relatives. My DGM and her DSis were sent for 2 years to an aunt at the other end of the country because her parents couldn't afford to keep them (after WW1 when her DF came home and hadn't got a job) That was financial, others will have been because a mother struggled.
In those days without the media, pushing the idea of 'bonding' and maternal love, expectations would have been more variable and dare I say it realistic

I struggled with this, hated being a parent to young DC, I still have a close relationship with DC as adults but they very much get on with their own lives.
See the threads on here with all the family angst to see the grief this 'love' gives many.
Don't worry OP, you will either have a point where it does dawn on you that you do 'love' them or will develop a comfortable 'I'm ok with this' as they get bigger' ...I got to this point..

thegreatbeyond · 20/05/2018 09:45

Can people please stop with this 'are you on THE SPECTRUM?'

That is nothing to do with feeling love. At all.

Battleax · 20/05/2018 09:47

Can people please stop with this 'are you on THE SPECTRUM?'

That is nothing to do with feeling love. At all.

This. Seriously fucking offensive. Stop it.

Original poster
meadowposy · 20/05/2018 09:51

I think I have only recently started to realise that I don't love them. After all, I have no real comparison with anything or anyone else. If I loved one and not another it might be more stark to me.

I probably do love them in a way I just don't get these heart melting moments. I feel like if something happened to one of them I'd be very sad for them, not me. Sad they didn't get to experience and enjoy life.

I had ds2 last week and feel nothing.

I think if my others are anything to go by I will like him more when he's older. But dc3 was the one I liked best at birth. I don't know why.

OP posts:
Battleax · 20/05/2018 09:53

Okay so you’re post-partum now.

How big are the gaps between the D.C.?

It does sound like depression, which mutes all pleasurable feelings.

It’s worth noting than not all anti depressants are the same. They don’t all “muffle” and make you even number as per your experience. Go back to your GP.

annandale · 20/05/2018 10:04

Mmmm. That feeling of 'at last I realise something hat has always been true but I just didn't realise it' does sound exactly like depression. One of the nastiest things about depression in my view is the way it rewrites history and drains your past of all pleasure - insists that you didn't really enjoy that day out, that holiday, that time in your life. That's a difficult one to argue of course because it's about perception, but from the outside you do sound depressed and it might be treatable. Depression doesn't want you to think the treatment could have any benefit -it is an evil fucker. Would you try seeing your health visitor or your GP?

Strongmummy · 20/05/2018 10:07

I think I’m a 3 hour Mum too. Anymore more time with them and I get really desperate

Sevendown · 20/05/2018 10:07

You need to tell your midwife ASAP this could be post natal illness- it’s very serious if it is.

Pengggwn · 20/05/2018 10:10

You've just had a baby! Your hormones are all over the place, you're knackered, there's pressure to feel instant, Madonna-like devotion. Really, give yourself a break. If you still feel like this in a few weeks, think again.

BakedBeans47 · 20/05/2018 10:12

I had ds2 last week and feel nothing.

Please speak to your HV my lovely x

As for my children I do love them and would be devastated if anything happened to them but I don’t always like being a mum and have certainly never had the experience of them being “the most fulfilling thing I’ve ever done”, “adding meaning to my life” or similar that other people seem to gush about. I am pretty certain my mum wouldn’t say she felt that about her kids either. It doesn’t mean you don’t love them though x

CheshireChat · 20/05/2018 10:18

It's awfully hard to actively love someone you are responsible for and you never get a break from.

Also, not all people feel that intensely, I simply don't. Doesn't mean I don't love and care for people, I'm just not that empathetic and it takes me a while to process feelings, mine and others.

Love is what you make it really. Plus, not sure I'd describe as 'love' someone that feels intensely, but doesn't handle the drudgery aspects of caring for someone.

DaughterDrowningInJunk · 20/05/2018 10:19

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jamoncrumpets · 20/05/2018 11:18

The fact that you had a baby a week ago is incredibly significant here. I don't want to dismiss your feelings as 'just hormones' but there's a reason that you posted this here, today. Hormones almost certainly do have some role, however small. You're physically exhausted. Mentally exhausted. You've had to adjust your life significantly in the space of just a week.

FWIW I think you do love your kids. Just not in the way you seem to think that you should.

Thewhale2903 · 20/05/2018 11:43

I don't think this is just a case of feeling tired or needing a break even when you need a break from your children you should still feel love for them. People saying they hate being a mum, why did you have more than one child. Trust me children are very intuitive. They will pick up on these feelings. Doesnt matter how well you care for a child they need to be shown real love and affection. For people saying that they know how much they love their children when they think they have lost them, it's shouldn't take thinking about things like that for you to realise you love your children!

Smellyjo · 20/05/2018 11:54

I'd also like to hear what you feel love is. There's many thoughts on that but imo the whole idea of heart wrenching 'I can't live if living is without you' is not love. That's about you, not the object of love. Love is about caring, warmth, affection, wishing to make the other person happy and finding that their happiness makes you happy. Anything about how they need to make you feel is not really love, but often it is dressed up in that way, such as people saying that they can't be apart from their children for a minute - that's a normal response at times and I have experienced it, but it's not love, it's about me and my needs. Like others have said, relief at being apart is normal - also about me but a normal response to the stresses of being a parent.

The bit that may be missing is the warmth and affection bit, which I do believe children need. It's hard to tell from your posts. Do you cuddle them, touch them often, tell them you love them?

Weezol · 20/05/2018 12:02

Given the situation you are in with your husband, you are emotionally and physically drained, just wrung out. Please talk to your health visitor.

Oblomov18 · 20/05/2018 12:30

I agree with Pengg and think it's offensive to suggest this is not normal or a MH issue.

People have varying degrees of loving/liking/not missing them/relief etc.

I have definitely felt all of those.

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