Worried my parents won't love my children as much as they love my brother's children

[awkwardusername]

My brother and SIL have a 2 year old daughter, who is the first grandchild to our parents. They absolutely love and idolise her, which is amazing to see and I've loved watching them take on their new role.
My SIL has just announced they are expecting a little boy, and I'm now worried that my children - if and when I have them - won't be as special to my parents.

When my brother and SIL had their daughter, I knew I'd not have the first grandchild but saw optimism of producing the first grandson, to maintain some element of my child being 'special'.

I know they will love my children regardless, and they'll be fantastic grandparents, but I'm very aware that I was the second child and never felt I got as much attention etc (no photos/baby book etc), and I don't want my children to be treated the same way.

Am I being unreasonable?

Honestly don’t worry. DP & I’s siblings had eight kids between them by the time my DD came along and she’s absolutely doted on, not only by her grandparents but her aunties and uncles and cousins too. She is spoiled rotten in terms of attention. Everyone loves a new baby in my experience!

It is very hurtful!

We live hundreds of miles away from my parents and travel for hours to get there (in normal times). It’s really quite upsetting for the conversation to switch to how wonderful my sister’s DCs are within minutes of us arriving.

My parents have always been emotionally rubbish and wouldn’t understand or accept the hurt they cause. If challenged about their obvious favouritism, they’d be baffled and just expect me and my other sister to accept things.

Just because kids are born first doesn’t mean they’ll always be the favourites. Yes they’re little now, but by the time you have kids they may have grown into brats and your kids may end up being the favourites. Not that it really matters.

My kids are the oldest grand kids in one side and the youngest on the other. I think on DHs side where they’re the youngest they are possibly the favourites. They are on the whole just more likeable the DHs sisters children (as likeable as teenagers can be anyway, at least they talk to them!).

On my side they are the oldest grandchildren. This has in no way made them the favourites. Tbh, my parents were still parents of young kids, two of my younger sisters were 6 and 11, when they were born, and really they (mainly my mum) couldn’t be bothered with my children. They liked them well enough so long as I was there to look after them, but never wanted them on their own or anything. My brother has small children who are very much the favourites. My youngest sister is now 22 and they feel like they’re ready to be proper grandparents as they’re not raising their own young children still. My mum actually sees my dds as direct competition to my youngest Dsis and any achievement of theirs is met with well Dsis was younger, better, got a higher grade etc! Dsis herself is actually very nice, and is very close to both my dds and me.

So my point is don’t worry about it. Just because your brothers DC are older doesn’t mean they’ll be there favourites. And even if they are, what does it really matter.

*the favourites

Ileflottante

This sentence you said was a little odd though:

knew I'd not have the first grandchild but saw optimism of producing the first grandson

It's not odd if you think about the family situation. It probably comes from years of trying to do something, however small, just a little bit different than what the perfect sibling has done to get some to get some recognition form of from the parents. OP seemed to be hoping the novelty of having a boy would have merited some attention from her parents, but now she doesn't even have that.

Sometimes people do have favourites and make no effort to hide it. I'm the eldest of three, my sister is the middle child and had the first grandchild a boy. I also had a D's 6 years later. They couldn't hide their disappointment that I was having a boy. Since he's been born my father has hardly bothered with him at all. He didn't even want to come to his 1st birthday party, he preferred to go play golf. My D's now aged 3 doesn't even know who his grandfather is. But my dad spends loads of time with my nepthew and always has. He plays videogames with him, takes him to football and other sports, takes him to the park. Took him to softplay when he was little. My DM is better and pre covid did spend time with my D's. He still got dropped like a hot potato in preference for my nepthew though. They have even put a large sum of money in their wills for my nepthew, were talking in the 10s of thousands and not a penny for my D's. It does make me angry and sad because my ds's paternal grandparents are not in his life either, they haven't even met him and his maternal grandparents treat him as lesser.

@LyndaSnellsSniff

It is very hurtful!

We live hundreds of miles away from my parents and travel for hours to get there (in normal times). It’s really quite upsetting for the conversation to switch to how wonderful my sister’s DCs are within minutes of us arriving.

My parents have always been emotionally rubbish and wouldn’t understand or accept the hurt they cause. If challenged about their obvious favouritism, they’d be baffled and just expect me and my other sister to accept things.

My mum does the same but I don’t think it’s to be intentionally hurtful, I think it’s conversational more than anything. However it does come across as hurtful when any information I give is immediately batted back with a comment about my siblings children. And usually how they’ve achieved more or done something better/to a higher standard 🙈

I just make a mental note not to do that to my own children if they make me a grandparent.

@NotWithMyShoes

Ileflottante

This sentence you said was a little odd though:

knew I'd not have the first grandchild but saw optimism of producing the first grandson

It's not odd if you think about the family situation. It probably comes from years of trying to do something, however small, just a little bit different than what the perfect sibling has done to get some to get some recognition form of from the parents. OP seemed to be hoping the novelty of having a boy would have merited some attention from her parents, but now she doesn't even have that.

I didn’t mean the OP was odd for saying it. I meant it sounded like it was indicative of a weird and archaic situation within the wider family where perhaps boys have more value, hence the brother and his children seemingly being favoured. However, as the other grandchildren are currently hypothetical, I think it’s premature to criticise the grandparents on that particular point.

If you parents favour your brother, they will probably favour his children whether they are born first or otherwise.

I think where I disagree is in thinking your children would be hurt by it. The desire to be loved by your parents is strong but the same for grandparents isn't really. You may be upset about it because your parents loom so large in your life, but (if your parents indeed aren't interested in gc) to your future children they will just be some old people who come over occasionally, tell boring stories and have a house that smells funny.

It really depends on your parents, doesn't it? I grew up with loads of cousins and my mother's stepmother, who was very given to favoritism, exactly reproduced the hierarchy she'd established among the step/children in the grandchildren's generation. So the question is whether you feel like a second-class citizen compared to your brother and if so, if you can do anything about it.

That aside, though, just because your first child is grandchild nr 3 or more doesn't mean they'll be less welcome.

My mum adores all of her grandchildren the same! No sign of a preference for the first ones. I think you are wildly overthinking this

Hi OP.

From what you’ve said your worry is understandable. It very much depends on the individual grandparents. My parents were always scrupulously fair and made a point of never showing any favouritism. However, sadly DHs parents always favoured his brother. I didn’t really believe DH when he first told me but over the 20 years I’ve known them it’s become patently obvious to anyone that visits their house, it’s like a shrine to their younger son!

We actually had DCs before his brother and the GPs were pretty good with our DCs, very involved. But last year there was an incident where they had already committed to come to a special event for one of our DCs (that had been booked over a year in advance) but dropped it when the favoured son asked them to babysit for their child on the same day.

I’ve always been a laid back DIL and treated them as fairly as my own parents, invited them along on holidays, every Christmas etc and never had a cross word but that situation really got my back up- DH was really upset that our DD had been dropped like a hot potato in favour of the other grandchild and I did speak very plainly to them that if they started showing favouritism among the grandchildren then the dynamics of the family would inevitably change from that point on... they knew they were in the wrong and did eventually do the right thing.

Ultimately I guess some parents and grandparents can’t help how they feel with having a “favourite” child or one they relate to better, but the crucial thing for me is never allowing that sentiment to be detected. Hopefully your parents won’t ever do that but if it does I’d recommend taking a stand at the first sign like we did so it doesn’t set a precedence that continues.

I never felt less loved, as such, but it's become increasingly obvious as we have got older that they have much more pride, respect and overall time for my brother when compared to me.

It's unfair of your parents to make you feel that way. My parents definitely have a favourite child too, but I don't really care as it doesn't affect me any more. Used to bother me when I was younger though.

I don't think you should worry too much about grandparents though. It may be to your advantage if the pressure is off your children - I was certainly glad that the huge first grandchild excitement was out of the way by the time I had mine.

Secondly, grandparents are far less important to children than their parents. As long as they don't deliberately favour one over another, your children are unlikely to notice or care about any slight differences. The important thing is that they feel loved by their parents. Children only have one set of parents but have lots of other adults in their lives..teachers, scout leaders, family friends, uncles, aunts etc can all be more influential to children than their grandparents.