To love my DD more than my husband

[NadjaCravensworth1]

She's 16 months and I just love her so much. She fills my heart up to bursting. Once she's asleep I look at photos and videos of her like a lovesick teenager. Having her has totally redefined what I thought love was. I feel like it's completely unconditional for her but I can't say the same for my DH. Our relationship is good but the depth of feeling just doesn't compare. Has this happened to anyone else?

That's normal

In what world are people going to be presented with a binary choice of saving their kids or their partner in a fire?

Surely, anyone sane would save both.

The love people have for others varies completely by the dynamics of the relationship. This is healthy. What isn't healthy is to rank them according to status or to indeed use this term "unconditional". No love is unconditional because if it is, that's how people stay in abusive situations and get damaged. All healthy, functioning relationships have limits. Every single one.

@Frabbits I 100% love my children unconditionally. How is there no such thing as unconditional love? There definitely is and I feel it for my children completely and undeniably.

Ryan renolds has a quote like this about how he would have taken a bullet for Blake but now he would use Blake as a shield to protect his kids 😂

This thread is starting to remind me one years ago, where a poster said she’d save her dogs before anyone else’s children (I don’t think it was her own children she meant, but it was a long time ago). That was a popcorn worthy one!

I think as a few people have mentioned it often indicates that you didn’t love your partner that much in the first place, or that you have an unhealthy emotional reliance on your children that they won’t thank you for in the long run.

@MiddleParking No one’s mentioned emotional reliance on their children though, what most posters have talked about is having v. few ( if any) conditions for loving their children, even when they’re independent adults.

My BIL lives over 7,000 miles away from my in-laws on another continent and they haven’t seen him since about 2018/2019 (can’t remember exact date). They still love him and obviously aren’t emotionally reliant on him.

Yes, some parents do have conditional love for their children, but I think it’s a minority. And it has nothing to do with the strength/happiness of their own relationship.

Every relationship has a breaking point. That point might be incredibly high and you'll likely never come close to it, but there is always a limit.

@Frabbits What would your breaking point be with your children?

Well obviously they’ve not mentioned it, no one, even where it’s very much applicable, says “I am emotionally unhealthily reliant on my children”. I also wasn’t talking about the conditionality of parent-child love, I was talking about people insisting they love their children so much more than their spouse (the subject of the thread). I’m sure your parents in law do love your BIL very much, but it would be pretty bleak if they both felt their love for each other was totally inferior to their love for someone they’d not seen since 2018. Which is my point - both types of love are different and, for most people, necessary.

Although I think the same point applies to the conditionality thing - most of us will never test the conditions of our love for our children, so it’s a bit pointless to argue the toss over whether or not it’s truly unconditional. What people generally mean is that their love allows for some highly poor behaviour on the child’s part in a way their romantic relationships don’t (which is obviously necessary to the survival of the species, otherwise we’d all leave the little sleep thieves to the wolves after night one).

@Frabbits I'm sorry but I know me and how I feel and the love for my children is 100% unconditional. There is absolutely NO limit or breaking point. I will love them completely and unconditionally for the rest of my life and nothing will or could ever, ever, ever change that.

I don't understand parents who continue to love children that turn out to be serial killers or who commit monstrous crimes.

I really could not have guessed how much I would love DS before he came along, and therefore presumably how much my own parents love me...

I dont think it is anything to feel guilty about, its the most natural thing and quite a beautiful revelation

And lots of parents in real life choose a partner over their kids. Often the ones who tell everyone they would die for their kids.
I see it lots. Parents move n a new partner, child is very unhappy with this, but the parent says they deserve their own life.

Exactly. If a teenage child becomes physically abusive towards their parents (or vice versa), is that still unconditional love?

Like I said, that bar is incredibly high for the parent-child relationship and most people never reach it, but it is there. It has to be, for the safety of all involved.

If you love someone unconditionally no matter what, that is how women end up getting hurt and killed by abusive partners.

I mean, it’s a nice sentiment, but largely meaningless in the context of this discussion when you’re talking about very young kids.

Expecting first child in a month or so, and DH has said a few times that he’s a tiny bit sad because he knows he’ll no longer come first with me.

I’m fairly certain he’s correct, although I think baby will come first with him too but he says it’ll always be me first. I’d rather it was baby though!

The baby should come first. But different when the baby is an adult

Love isn't something you can turn on and off like a tap. You could say the same about women who love their abusive partners.

I've never been in the situation so I've no idea how I'd react. I wouldn't judge a mother who still said she loved her child if they murdered someone. Providing they didn't help cover up the crime for them or anything.

That's a bit odd from him.

I love my children unconditionally but I do not want to spend my life with them. This is something I choose for myself and this is my DH.
The love is equal but different. I do not however love my husband unconditionally.
I think once they are adults the crazy love you have when they are small changes - and this is how it should be. I feel differently about my adult children to how I feel about my young children.

I think those saying otherwise are in the middle of just having small kids.