Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

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

be honest, were you madly in love with the father of your dcs or did you "settle"?

171 replies

redwhiteandblue · 11/12/2007 11:10

Done a name change here. I've been thinking about this a lot recently given unpleasant things going on in my life and friends' lives
I have some friends who married their dhs because they genuinely adored them, just like in the fairy tales. However, I have others who were in their mid thirties, wanted kids and decided to hitch their star to guys who - if we're honest - they would not have stood for a decade earlier. If I'm really truthful that goes for me as well, if I'd been with my dh aged 25, he would have got the boot after a couple of years, but because my clock was starting to tick I decided to stay with him and make the best of what we had and as a result we do have two beautiful dds whom I wouldn't be without for anything but I can't say we have the happiest marriage on the planet. But if I hadn't had babies with him I might have ended up like several of my friends who missed the boat entirely or are having IVF and are in a very bad place indeed. Plus, I've seen friends who married deeply in love become disillusioned over the years anyway and suffer terrible heartbreak when the man they married turned out to be not quite what they expected. Just wondering what anyone else thinks.

OP posts:
onlyjoking9329 · 11/12/2007 11:50

madly in love, still madly in love.
OJ

ProjectIcarus · 11/12/2007 11:53

Agree with Olive.

Celery · 11/12/2007 11:57

was madly in love, now gently fond of. He's a mate, and we chug along quite nicely together, but I wouldn't say it was mad anymore.

PrincessSnowLife · 11/12/2007 11:57

madly in lust (just found our old letters that we used to send each other and oh my god they are HOT ), followed by madly in love after 6 months in bed, and now very soppy about each other (apart from the usual tiredness moods that everyone gets).

HarktheHarrogatemumissinging · 11/12/2007 11:57

Madly in love, although plenty of bickering (two 3 years olds and a 1 year old do that for you). I met him and went to Australia to be with him aged 21 having only known him for a month. He came back with me and here we still are, now 35....we are best friends, which is hard really as when you want to talk to someone about your DH, who do you go to - your best friend!

zippitippitoes · 11/12/2007 12:02

what an amazing thread...all this love how nice

rudolphdoesntneedbratnav · 11/12/2007 12:05

Yep, I settled, am now divorced and have now met my Mr Right. Funnily enough I didn't realise at the time that I was settling, having met Mr Right I realise that I must have, I never felt as happy as this with exH

Minum · 11/12/2007 12:05

Head over heels in love, baby totally unplanned, tricky times adjusting to becoming parents, very much in love now.

MamaG · 11/12/2007 12:07

COV you could have written my replies

ImBarryScott · 11/12/2007 12:08

maybe it's not so much a case of settling, but more that you become more attracted to the "safe bet" type as your biological clock ticks. As we enter our thirties, I have watch friends part one by one from their exciting, passionate, but maddening partners; to strike up relationships with less exciting, but more stable, loving chaps.

I fell head over heels for DH when I was 20, and we've just had our first DC 9 years on. The love has changed, but is stronger.

Fennel · 11/12/2007 12:18

One of my friends argues you should have the man you marry and have children with - safe, settled, reliable, and the man who is a good lover on the side - Exciting, wild, unpredictable. She has both, not that I am approving particularly (and I'm sure mumsnet on average won't approve) but I see her point.

mumblechum · 11/12/2007 12:20

Fennel, I wonder if you and I have the same friend

moljam · 11/12/2007 12:22

got pregnant with dd 3 months into relationship so didnt know him enough to be truly in love with him.but decided to so how things went.month after dd was born we married.2 more children and 7 years later were still married but i think if i hadnt have been pregnant we wouldnt have married,not so soon anyway!and weve had trouble in our relationship this year which resulted in me only staying because of children.if we didnt have children id be off.sad but true!

FioFio · 11/12/2007 12:22

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

OrmIrian · 11/12/2007 12:23

Don't know. DH and I have been together forever and although we haven't been passionately in love for many years we were very loving and devoted before the kids came along. Nowadays tiredness, stress and lack of time has taken it's toll but I think that deep down we feel the same. It only takes an evening in each others' company alone to remember how we really feel. And I have hopes that in years to come it will return to more or less what it was. Of course there are times when I could happily kill him, but there are times when he is so wonderful that I would marry him again. Well.... time will tell.

I'm not sure I'd want to be madly in love with the father of my kids - whenever I felt like that about someone, anything or anyone who got in the way got pretty short shrift iirc...

mumblechum · 11/12/2007 12:26

Marriage ime is much much easier/happier when the kids are older and do their own thing at weekends. We barely saw ds (13) all weekend, 2 sleepovers, 2 parties.

ItWasOnlyAWintersTellus · 11/12/2007 12:28

I met him 17 years ago and have never fond anyone else who can hold a candle to him.

Have had our lean patches of course, but never doubted he was the man for me, even when I hated him the most IYSWIM.

Children now 6 and 3 and am back madly in lust as well as love, much to his delight

kittylouise · 11/12/2007 12:28

I used to think that fto fall in love would be an absolute nightmare, and couldn't imagine ever feeling so strongly about someone. Seemed like a load of nonsense to me. Hence a very long relationship with someone where we were quite ambivalent with one another. No great feelings of emotion, when he acted like a prat it never used to bother me. Just ended up falling apart due to lack of closeness and bonding between us, the sad thing was after nearly 8 years together I wasn't upset, and I reckoned I would get on with my life without a man, thank you very much.

Cue meeting DP and feeling like I had been clouted with a cricket bat, right round the head. True love (or lust, and obsession) at first sight. And still feeling as strong years later.

pantoinghousewife · 11/12/2007 12:30

I wasn't all consuming heart racing passionately in love with him, no. But I knew, shortly after I met him that he was the ONE and I knew I would marry him and I knew it would be a successful marriage. Don't ask me how, I just did.
Having said that he most definitely was not a 'make do', and with hindsight I would not have wanted to marry either of the two men that I'd previously been madly, passionately in love with.

OComeOLIVEfaithfOIL · 11/12/2007 12:34

(I am not COV, I am Oliveoil, pah, pesky Christmas names)

Original poster
redwhiteandblue · 11/12/2007 12:35

Am feeling better reading your replies, I think my problem was dh and I had the madly in love stage but didn't get married, have kids for four years, by which time we'd move on to the you're OK, but you also annoy the fuck out of me stage. As I say, if I'd been 25 I'd have walked at this point, but instead I thought I'm 34, I may not find someone better and stuck it out. Maybe that was a mature thing to do? After all, reading what you all say a bit of disillusionment along the line is very common, especially once small kids come on the scene. Right now we are at each others' throats but life is unbelievably stressful. I hope it'll get better again

OP posts:
intheproverbialpicklebatman · 11/12/2007 12:35

Biological clock means stark choice between 'settling' and having to accept risk of never having kids (not something everyone's bothered about of course). Maybe we're the generation who refused to 'settle' at all or early enough and therefore have many people with infertility probs; perhaps it'll swing back the other way to people 'settling' a few years earlier.

TheMincePiedMadHouse · 11/12/2007 12:39

I was and still am madly in love with DH. It took a while to get him to notice me initially - he was engaged to be married and buying a house , but that is another story

We have been married 13 years and the only blip has been after DS2, when we were so tired that we had a few arguments - as you do.

I could not have settled my mum and dad were together till the day he died and I was lucky that I met DH when I was young. we got married when I was 21!

hedda · 11/12/2007 12:40

Message withdrawn

SilentBite · 11/12/2007 12:44

Madly in love

We have been together 17 years since we were 23

Had no dcs til I was nearly 36 so def was not thinking about father potential (though he is a great dad without a doubt)

We have had a sticky patch in the past year, lots of probs with his work and various other bits and pieces but things are fantastic (most of the time ) again now. In fact we are in a bit of a new honeymoon period, long may it continue!