to think it's pathetic, the way people make out you can't love your child inlaws as much as your own children

[tigergirl]

just been reading a thread where they are saying that you love or worry about your own dc's more than your dil/sil.
surely it depends on your relationship with them.
what is it with some folk trying to win mother of the year award or something.

good point about conflict, anna

i was also thinking of the scenario where your ds and dil divorce. you may never see your dil again. is that really going to leave you as racked with grief and loss as never again seeing your ds...? i doubt many mothers would say yes

Not rude at all. Just trying to get you to wake up to your maternal responsibilities.

hm...but my dil child would become my grandchild (and as have no dd's, I can only imagine that I would worry, AND EVEN MORE SO ABOUT MY GRANCHILD)...NOW, MY sil CHILD WOULD BE A NIECE/nephew (sorry caps lock), and well, of course I would worry, but not hte same way...iykwim

sil also equals son in law thats how i used it

how dare you say poor dd.

what the hell do you mean anna
"wake up to your maternal responsibilities"

oh right...duh me...lol...getting it now...I think...
hm...don't think I would care/love my son in laws ever as much as my own sons... (but, I probably won't ever find out....well, unless any of my sons is gay.....that is)

Surely the love for your own flesh and blood or for a person that you raised from being a Baby/ young child (if steparent/ adoptive/fosterparent)is different compared to a person you usually meet when they already are grown up....

Anna, I was actually thinking that maybe something was missing with the DD rather than having the extra with the DiL.

Treeny - that's sad. I can understand that a DIL isn't the same as a DD, but I would have thought that grandchildren are all the same. After all, they are as related to their grandparents, and the grandparents have known them all their life. Why would it be different?

Although in our family SIL has bagged all of MIL's time for DN, so my DD doesn't see much of her, whereas my parents only have DD, so she gets a lot of attention. So I suppose that we fit the mould, even though we don't want to.

i can accept that tigergirl feels this way tho i do find it a rare and magnificent thing that her son has managed to find a partner she could feel so much love for too

but i find it weird that tigergirl cant understand that it would be rare to feel like this

did you love your dil deeply before she was pregnant? tigergirl

i am still curious re ages etc

that what I tried to say Zippi (and failed miserably)

From talking to my mother, my aunt and other women in my family in the generation above - many women do prefer their daughters' children to their sons' children, and many have very special feelings about their daugther's daughters - and even more special about their eldest daughter's eldest daughter...

I don't think that you can expect grandmothers to not have these feelings. You can expect them not to express their favouritism openly, however.

i was absolutely not upswet when my ds split with his gf of three years

and almightily relieved that they didnt have a baby

I don't for a second think my mother prefers my sisters children to my brothers or mine. I think she feels closest to whichever of the grandchildren she is currently spending most time with (which would be my DS atm but until then would probably have been my brothers girls).

Do you have brothers Anna? IS your mum not that close to them?

her parents were horrified at the relationship to the extent that they threatened ds with triads cutting his hands off if he tried to get in touch with her

so no love lost there

Does that follow for son's sons too Anna? For fathers?

KC - my mother only has daughters, as did her mother, so the issue hasn't arisen for her. She adored her first born grandchild, a grandson, but now her grandsons are growing up she has a particular bond with her two granddaughters.

Her sister, my aunt, has a daughter and two sons. She clearly prefers her daughter's daughter to her other grandchildren (though she does a lot for all of them).

anna you really talking rot now.

I cannot imagine loving anyone as much as I love my DC. Certainly since I had them I have realised that my love for my DH pales into insignificance in comparison (I still love him - I just realise now how much more strongly I love my children) This is not wrong, or weird - it is as it should be. Your love for your grandchildren will be this strong too as they are children in your family and in your care. Whether they are your DD or your DIL they will have the blood of one of your children and you are genetically programmed to love them. I can't see me saying I will love my children's partners as much as I love them though. How can anything compare to the bond you have with your own children?
Sorry Tigergirl, but I don't understand why you seem to think it is wrong to love your own child more than anyone elses. Yes, you will love your grandchildren equally but it doesn't change the fact that your DD and DIL are unlikely to be of equal improtance. At least for most people....

YAdefintielyBA to call what appears to be the vast majority of people "pathetic".

I can now say that there is no way I would love a dil as much as I love my dd. I would be unable to love a DIL as much as I love my son.

I don't think that that is pathetic. I think that is biology and the fact that our own children, whether adopted or biological, have been "made" by us, by being nurtured from an early age.

I'd imagine mothers of the daughter who is pregnant bond easier and quicker with the baby because they are likely to be more involved with the pregnancy, but I'd like to think that's as far as it goes.

MiL definitely dotes on DS2 (her only gc) as if he were her very own PFB and I don't think that has anything to do with whose mother she is.

Not rot.

I agree it's not PC to write this kind of stuff. But I frequently feel pretty insensed at how PCness and feelings get confused on MN.

has anyone else on this thread ACTUALLY got a dd and dil?

well maybe you will realise what im talking about in the furure then.