Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

The relationship with your dh/dp is ultimately more important than that with your dcs - discuss

120 replies

mumblechum · 23/01/2007 13:33

It has occurred to me lately that once your children get more independent - say 11, they want to spend more and more time with their friends, leaving you with time to really get back in touch with your dh.

I'm really loving this phase. After all those years of feeling knackered, juggling little kids and holding down a responsible job with virtually no help from dh (travelled constantly), we spend lots of time now going for long walks, playing golf, talking for hours in bed at the weekends, it's a new lease of life.

I don't mean you should neglect your kids to focus on your dh/dp when they're young, but you should remember that they're going to fly the nest at 18, when you and your dh still have (hopefully) 30 or 40 years together.

Anyone else feel this way?

OP posts:
pianist · 23/01/2007 14:08

OK, so you people who are nurturing your relationships with DPs, what exactly would you advise?

DumbledoresGirl · 23/01/2007 14:08

My mother once explained it to me in this way: when the children are young, they are your priority because they are fully dependent on you, but when they leave the nest, your dh becomes the most important person again because they are the only person who is there for you constantly.

I think about this a lot. My children are in a kind of halfway place I feel. The eldest is 10 and the youngest is nearly 4 and starts school in September, so although they are not yet at the stage of being out with friends all the time, equally, the care of them is less full-on than it once was, and at the weekend, dh and I quite often lie in for an hour or two while the children play downstairs without us - those days of a little face appearing at the door needing milk or a nappy change are thankfully over now. I worry that when they leave the nest, dh and I will be left with nothing in common, and we talk about this sometimes, which is in itself a good thing, I feel, as I hope it means that we will do something positive to avoid that situation.

OrmIrian · 23/01/2007 14:09

We always do the catch-up thing at the end of the day - it does tend to be more like a bulletin from the front most of the time

DetentionGrrrl · 23/01/2007 14:09

My DS is the most important person in my life (although he's not my ENTIRE life), and my love for him is different to the love i have for DP.

I have a greater duty to my son to nurture, feed, love and care for him- whereas my relationship with DP is one of equals. I wouldn't say that i love one of them more than the other, and can't imagine being without either. I know it's important that DP and I do 'couple' things aswell as family things, so we do. I don't want my kids to leave home one day and for DP and i to look at each other and wonder who we are.

But DS is 7mths old, so i think it's ok that i put more energy into him than DP right now!

hunkermunker · 23/01/2007 14:10

I don't think you can quantify it as more or less important - it's different.

Original poster
mumblechum · 23/01/2007 14:13

You're absolutely right, Detention Girl, when they're little, of course most of your energy goes into the children. Nor is it a question of loving one more than the other, I love them equally but in different ways.

OP posts:
noddyholder · 23/01/2007 14:13

I think you should do things together that you both enjoy and try to maintain a seperate intimate life which is completely yours.I try to think back to when we first met and what we liked about each other and sometimes I just look at dp and see that person is still there.But ds is 12 and so we do get time although we have always tried to make time even when he was little.Small things do get noticed Sometimes dp brushes my hair and it really does something to me and reminds me why I love him.

JackieNo · 23/01/2007 14:13

Good thread. I don't think you waffled, Twiglett, and I agree with what you said. I do feel that DH and I have grown apart a bit, and am aware that I (we?) ought to make more of an effort to reconnect. But I'm not sure where to start. On the very rare occasions we go out as a couple, without the DCs, I'm aware that there can be times when we're struggling to find things to talk about, and that makes me sad. But on other occasions it all flows well.

Original poster
mumblechum · 23/01/2007 14:16

Things like massaging my dh's feet at the end of the day, booking regular child free weekends away from when the kids were tiny, having dinner out together once a fortnight or so.

Last week, I had some granite worktops fitted in the kitchen and I made a point of thanking my dh. He couldn't give a stuff about things like worktops, so I said I appreciated the fact that he works very hard (he earns 6 times as much as me) so that I can buy nice things.

He always tells me, every single night, that he liked his dinner, even when it's crap.

OP posts:
hunkermunker · 23/01/2007 14:18

Maybe I'm unusual - I feel utterly connected to children and to DH and like we're exactly right where we are, comfortable with each other and our places in the family.

I'm getting divorced soon on that basis, aren't I?!

JackieNo · 23/01/2007 14:20

Child free weekends. I don't see us getting one of those for the foreseeable future. Grandparents too old/frail to look after them, unfortunately. But we should do more evenings out, I think.

Heathcliffscathy · 23/01/2007 14:22

making time for each other, putting time aside for cuddling, talking. trying to go out as often as possible as a couple and if that isn't possible, having special dinners in with each other and the telly off.

considering each other at least as much as we consider ds....doing things that we know make each other happy.

sex. not letting that get lost in the quagmire that is young parenthood.

Fireflyfairy2 · 23/01/2007 14:26

We play scrabble every night As soon as dinner is over, I tidy the kitchen, he gets kids sorted for bed. We both read stories & then play scrabble. After that we have a couple of hours chill time on our PC's. Have a coffee & then bed. I'd say we chat lots, easily as much as we did before children.

Yesterday I booked us a weekend away in april as we will be married 9years. I am pathetically excited at getting to wake up naked as I wear nightt clothes at home as the dc's come in our room!

OrmIrian · 23/01/2007 14:29

We have a night out planned for tonight. Mum coming over for a few hours to look after DCs. But I'm already dreading the effort involved in getting 3 of them fed, bathed and in bed - plus hw done - in time for DH and I to go out. It will be a mammoth effort and I'm ashamed to say I'm not sure it will be worth it.

anniemac · 23/01/2007 14:33

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

suzycreamcheese · 23/01/2007 14:36

think it has to be most important relationship
and cannot compare them really

w/ ds i cant wait for the more independent stages but really loving all this too..

fennel · 23/01/2007 14:39

I don't know. I tend to feel that there would be other possible DPs. but only one set of children for me. I'm fond of DP but really, if we did grow apart when the dds grow up, he's more replacable than my dds.

Original poster
mumblechum · 23/01/2007 14:44

Fireflyfairy, what an excellent way to spend your evenings! Have a fab weekend away you hussy!

OP posts:
potoroo · 23/01/2007 14:53

I agreee that relationship with DH is different to DCs. DS is only little (not quite 2) so he is our focus, but we like to spend time together once he has gone to bed.

We're also already planning on places we want to visit once the DC leave home.

Interesting my parents have retired and are living it up - have an incredible social life, studying, travelling and reconnecting.
My PIL seem to be the opposite - have nothing in common. DH and his sister are MIL entire life and she always seems so sad that we are not there with her.

I know that in the day-to-day routine I probably take DH for granted, so having read this thread I sent him a mushy text for first time in months and got one back! (He might even get some lovin' tonight if he is lucky!)

pianist · 23/01/2007 14:58

Agree with Fennel!

noddyholder · 23/01/2007 15:03

Fennel I think that is so sad You can have both How would you feel if he felt like that about you?I think you would be upset You do only have one set of children but they will not be with you forever and you will still want love and affection and fun

Bozza · 23/01/2007 15:12

firefaeriefly - you must be fantastic at scrabble with all that practice. DH and I play occasionally on a Saturday. But we have too much other stuff to do in the week.

Bozza · 23/01/2007 15:13

Sorry got your name all wrong.

fennel · 23/01/2007 15:14

if DP and I are still happy together in 10 or 15 years, then great. But really it doesn't concern me whether or not that happens. People do change, partners and spouses do grow apart and stifle each other. I just find it impossible to know or care whether it's DP I'm with in 20 years, or someone else, or if I'm on my own. There will always be people around to have love and affection and fun with. It just doesn't, for me, have to be always with the same DP I'm with now. We've been happy for 12 years, I count every year a bonus, but my feelings about DP are not as important as how I feel about my children.

chocolatequeen · 23/01/2007 15:34

DH and I were talking at the weekend, and both struck on the idea that when we are retired we want to live in Paris. It seemed so natural to be planning so far ahead and for it to be with him. In the meantime, the focus is on the children, which I think is where it should be. Once they have branched out on their own, then the time is ours again. That is what you sign up for when you get married and produce children - you make a commitment to a family, not really just to one another. Hopefully if you choose the right person in the first place, your relationship will survive the waxing and waning of the attention. TBH DH pays a lot of attention to his work to the point that sometimes I feel he spends more time worrying about his career than me, but I don´t find that unsettling. His career is of vital importance to all of us, in the same way the children are and both deserve time and devotion that has to come from somewhere. It would be impossible to focus entirely on one person for your entire life, from 20 to 100. And probably bloody boring too....

Waffling here....