Really?

garcia wrote:

QUOTE:
does parental love also have a built-in half-life? because somehow or other you do see a lot of people who hate their parents, and parents who seem to hate their kids.

The relationship begins, obviously, with the severe imbalance of total devotion vs. total dependence, which is a very uncomplicated state of affairs. I guess the ideal trajectory would be toward more or less equal devotion felt on both sides, once the kids are grown up. Parental love can and does change a lot as the kid gets older (for one thing it doubles or quadruples going from infant to toddler) and eventually the growing reciprocal nature of the relationship can certainly start to complicate things, ultimately even to the point of one side wanting to disown the other. I would say, almost all of the time, that has to be a result of bad parenting, and not any "half life" inherent in the relationship. Even a parent who ends up disowning his child will, I would think, almost certainly have strong residual feelings for the rest of his life. But the inequality of feeling and devotion that normally obtains from ages 0 to whenever often (my guess is) creates a backlash in the parent, who may resent all the sacrifice having been his, the insufficient gratitude, and so on. When Wyatt says you need to be "up for it" he no doubt means that not everyone is equally able to handle the fairly one-sided, you-give-they-take aspect. (They give in indirect ways, which has its own charm.) I think parents who are up for it are very unlikely to end up with their kids hating them.

I dunno about that last bit, I've seen some single kids in particular be so smothered by there parents because they were so over keen and eager that the kid resented it.

Well doesn't that fall under bad parenting?

adorable pic by the way. I'm tempted to respond in kind.

wyatt - you don't know anyone who has a bad relationship with their parents?

BM, yes bad parenting, I was responding to the 'not up for it' thought really.

C'mon, turn the thread into a 'how cute is my offspring?' thread!

Everyone will love that, right?

You look great, but what about the baby pic?

Back to the first topic. A lot of my childbearing friends whose own parents live nearby have told me that they find the grandparents and their expectations of grandkid time to be far more of a hassle than the kids themselves. It's great to have free babysitting

Once they're sleeping through the night kids' schedule's are usually fairly manageable. One may have to still work in naptime going anywhere usually requires about as much preparation and gear as landing at Normandy, but the parent can usually make the kid conform to their plan.

One's parents (the kids' grandparents, I mean) are usually not so easy to manage. They may drop in when they feel like it or expect to take the family to some elaborate outing on the weekend when all the parents want to do is just hang out at home with the kids and get some housework done.

Grandparents aren't always in tune with the rigid timetables of naps and food necessary to keep the kid reasonably placid. If dinner is supposed to be at 6, and doesn't happen until 7 because gramma is late, the kid may throw a rod.

In that regard, my friends with kids like me as a friend to have around. I'm very flexible. I'm more than happy to show up or leave with little notice and I'm perfectly comfortable in the bedlam of a household with two small children and a dog running amok.

Two small children and a dog running amok is a disaster waiting to happen.

Hopefully for the dog, the alternative is sadly too often the outcome.

Parents must realise the two simply don't mix.

"Amok" might be strong word.

Dogs and children can get along well if its the right sort of dog. My parents got our dog Pocho before they had kids, and she helped guide my brother and I through the first decade of life before passing on to her eternal reward. Then we got another dog who was a bit bigger and faster - more suitable playing with teenage boys.

I have lots of friends with small children and dogs and they get along just fine. The only issue is that the child is often a bit too willing to share their food with the dog, so you've got to watch out for that, but otherwise it's great.

Can't believe no one told me we were hijacking this thread with kid pictures:

Bruno, just a little thing, but I'd find your stuff so much easier to read if you did the paragraph thing now and again.

I get broody sometimes, me. But have never had any pressure, of course. And putting pressure on your kids to have kids is pretty much unforgivable in my book.

garcia wrote:

QUOTE:
wyatt - you don't know anyone who has a bad relationship with their parents?

Hang on: are you saying it happens, or that it's ubiquitous?

Dear Admins.

Please ban all these pictures of babies! Who knows what perverts are looking at them?

Yours


Daily Mail idiot.

Dear Admins

Won't somebody think of the children!

Yours

Concerned of Solihull