Am I wrong to love my DD more than my DH?

[kimberlina]

I admitted this to DH recently and he was really shocked and offended I think. He maintains that he loves me more than he loves DD. I really hoped that he would love DD more than he loved me. Yes, I know that its a different type of love but I know that if I had to choose then it would be DD without a moments hesitation.

it will always be that way for me always, i will always love the kids more than dh and have told him so

but he forgot this two weeks ago

18 yr old son is giving us grief at the mo ( another story) and dh lost his temper and told him to leave

i was thoroughly devestated, i mean devestated.....and i have two children who have already left home

it then ensued that we had a huge row discussion and i said exactly this to him
"i realise that to you, i am your alpha and omega - i know this, but to me it will always always be the children. they are my alpha and omega"

he did know this, i hae said it before, but he was really taken aback by the pure passion with which i said it.

i do not understand people who love their husbands more and i think its unatural - based on nothing, based on no evidence apart from the deepest unwavering all consuming love i have for my children, a love that could never ever be reached or touched by any other kind of love. i love dh so much i can't tell you, but it isn't even in the same universe as the kind of gutteral love that runs in ever fibre of my being, of my soul - that tis the love i have for my children

They are too different. Don't compare.

Exactly QOD, all are contingent on circumstances.

I would find it odd if my dad loved me more than my mum

When i gave them grief as a late teen and my dad threatened to chuck me out I respected that he protected my mother against the things I was doing against her and them as a family. Now I have a great relationship. I don't think I would have respected him if he allowed a child to go against his wife.

*great relationship with them that should have read

different horses clearly....i would find it odd if my mum didn;t love me more than my dad

Agree with cowboys gal. I wouldnt ever want to be without my husband or my DD. I see us a very, very close team. I think its very weird you would even think about this and then tell your husband tbh.

Agree with others. My love for my children is unconditional, my love for my DH isn't therefore it is not quite as strong.

I am always a bit by women who say they would rescue their DHs from the burning building over their DCs. You'd really leave a 2 year old to perish in the flames to save a grown man who can fend for himself?

I love my DP and my boys equally but differently. The DSs are my world but one day they will move out, get married etc and won't need me as much.
But hopefully my DP will always be with me. We'll always live together and be together.

I'd save the boys in a fire and I know DP would too.

Why? You are a grown woman now, her protective instinct will have diminished greatly, she created you for the relationship that was with your dad, not just to have you, he is her rock presumably? (sorry, totally making assumptions here) and her close friend if not best friend. Assuming a couple have a good healthy relationship I don't see why, especially after kids have grown up and are completely independant, you would feel more for your kids than your partner. I mean really, your love for your kids is not so much pashion as programmed. Having said that this comparing business is completely weird in the first place isn't it?! :o

Totally agree that I would save the kids in a burning building. I would want my kids to be saved before me and would be horrified if they weren't, surely any dad would want the same.

Also surely most dads would be able to get themselves out of a burning building. So wouldn't need rescuing.

Nesbo - I can't talk for mothers that abuse or abandon their children.

What I can say is that a) it goes against nature and b) I'm the most level-headed, unsentimental person you could ever meet but am positively brimming with unconditional, soppy love for my kids. It's not idealistic, it's the truth.

I think it's fair enough, Nesbo, to say that it's difficult to come to terms with parents who didn't find themselves automatically loving their children, precisely because it's a genetically-programmed instinct on both sides. When the parents' instincts fail in that respect, you have children suffering unrequited love for their parents. That's harsh at any age, but a defiance of nature in these cases.

Just realised my last post could be very hurtful to mothers who experienced PND, attachment disorders or other problems at birth. I didn't mean to seem as black-and-white as I did: of course the love can come later and, even if it doesn't, be chosen by a responsible parent.

Odd thread.

Totally different kind of love.

Unconditional love for my DS. My heart swells when I think of him. There is nothing, no matter how heinous, that he could ever do that would stop me loving him. I want the best for him. Fiercely protective of him. I adore him and I am so excited about getting to him him as he grows up.

Conditional love for DH i.e. if he started abusing me like I see some mumsnetters experience, then I am pretty confidfent that my love for him would begin to waiver. However, we have a very strong relationship and I love him completely, I lust after him, I laugh with him, he is my 'bezzie mate' as I told him this morning, he is my lover.

It's not about loving more. It's about a different type of love. If you loved a partner in the way you love your children I suspect it wouldn't be a particularly helpful or long-lasting relationship.

Re the whole fire analogy. There was a case a few years back when an entire family died in a fire except for the father who escaped. When this was first reported in the news all of us in my office were horrified and full of sympathy for him except for our sole male colleague. A father of three he said that there was something very wrong about this situation, that he could never imagine escaping that scenario without at least attempting the rescue of his child. A few days later the father was arrested and then convicted of murder.

As Alice Thomas Ellis said : 'Men love women, women love children, children love hamsters'

nesbo I believe my love for my DC is unconditional, I can imagine very few circumstances in which I would disown/stop loving my DC.

I can think of many circumstances in which I might leave/stop loving my DH.

I love my DH very much. I have been with him more than half my life and I adore him. He is an amazing, wonderful man who I find enormously attractive. He makes me a better person. However if, for example, he cheated on me or hit me he'd be out on his arse. I'd meet someone else and I'd move on.

I can't imagine there is anything my DC could do to stop me loving them and no matter how they hurt me I would never cut them off.

Agree with proud&scary about being generally unsentimental but the love I feel for my DC is unquantifiable.

Of course I love my ds more than DP. If more women put their children before their relationship then the world would be a better place.

When you think of the comparison are you imagining unconditional love for a cute innocent child against a grown man, or are you imagining for example an adult son beating you up, or arrested on multiple counts of rape or child abuse? I think there is a natural imbalance in the image people have in their heads when they feel inclined to make this comparison.

It is interesting that some people posting seem to think that it is natural to be number one in their husband's eyes just as the children are in theirs, or is that just as odd?

I still think it is a bit weird to compare at all. Would you try to compare the love for your partner to the love you may (or may not) have for your parents?

I was trying to imagine an adult son being arrested for rape or child abuse but I will concede that since my oldest is only 6 I cannot really have an idea of what that might be like.

I don't think it is particularly weird to compare, but then perhaps that is because for me there simply is no comparison and the question does come up as a theme in various films and books.

I vaguely recall a book in which a mother had to choose between her DH or her DC being shot. I cannot imagine what sort of person would choose their DH

That was very ambiguous so to clarify I cannot imagine who would choose to allow their DH to survive over their DC. Odd odd odd.

When DH and I married, before DC, I felt wildly in love with him. When we had DS, he in turn took up so much of my love and energy that my love for DH felt muted by comparison. Obviously love can expand to accommodate an extra person, but at the time I was simply overwhelmed with love for DS. I did feel very unsettled by what I perceived as a lessening of my love for DH (but actually wasn't: it had just been somewhat thrown into the shade by my feelings for DS), so I can understand why you brought it up with your DH, although it probably wasn't the most tactful thing to do.

DS is not far off two years old now, and as he grows less dependent, I am finally beginning to feel that I can properly dedicate some of that love and attention back to DH, who has been a rock pretty much throughout. My love for DS was overpowering and immediate, whereas DH's love for DS has grown and grown. At the beginning, when DS was a few weeks old, I am certain that DH would have still put me before DS. I know this is no longer the case. It's obvious from his soppy look as he stands watching our little boy sleeping.

We both know that DS is the centre of our universe right now, but it's an unspoken thing. I think we both know that as DS grows and needs us less, we will have more time to nurture our relationship and properly rediscover why we chose each other as life partners. Having time to go to the cinema or visit an exhibition together (with plenty of time left afterwards for discussion) without having to fork out for a babysitter would be a good start...