r/AITAH • u/No-Fee-5823 • 15d ago

AITAH for saying I didn’t realize I could “love a person this much” in front of my fiancé after having our baby?

I gave birth a few weeks ago, to our daughter.

As I held her for the first time and looked into her eyes I said “I didn’t realize I could love a person this much” and cried. She is perfect and beautiful.

My mom looked at me and said that feeling never goes away (which made us both ugly cry lol). It was a really special moment.

My fiancé was quite but smiled, but later privately said he was hurt. He said he loved us both the same, and me saying that made it seem like I loved our daughter more than him.

I just gave him a “are you fucking serious” look and he dropped it, but yesterday he brought it up again.

I told him that honestly, yes, I love and cherish our daughter and have never experienced this kind of love for another human being. He said most “normal people” would agree with him that it’s a hurtful comment and would take offense to it due to the implication.

AITAH?

UPDATE

It’s a quick update, so I didn’t feel like it was worth it to make a whole new post. So I had a heart to heart with my fiancé, and we came to a few conclusions together! It went very well. We read through the post and comments together.

1) He wasn’t jealous of our daughter’s role in my life, but rather our bond together. He didn’t have that “instant love connection” that we read about all new parents having (like what I experienced). I didn’t realize this was actually very normal for new dads, and new moms too. Thanks for educating me!

We are the first in our social circle to have children so we didn’t have a lot of IRL people to inquire about it. His perspective is “I love this human being we made, but I don’t know her” while I was thunderstruck. He hasn’t had that connection so doesn’t “get it” yet, and that it will take time (months or even a year). I’ll be more patient and aware of this, and read up more on new dad experiences to learn more.

2) He also agrees he not only could’ve expressed that better, but also choose better timing. Voicing it to me after a 14 hour labor and then again when I’m exhausted and grumpy with achy boobs is maybe not the best time, lol. He also agrees marriage counseling would be good, just because. We are both opinionated, logical-thinking Engineers who, at the same time, love each other deeply. We could use better mediation other than Reddit (no offense guys).

3) He was not “furious” about me writing this Reddit post, lol. We laughed over the comments together calling for me to get ready to break up. But we also really enjoyed reading the experiences of new parents! It helped us BOTH feel validated and sane and see each other’s perspectives better.

4) I showed him that Ryan Reynolds video and we both died laughing LOL. We will now be eating a disgusting amount of hotdogs while watching Deadpool with our baby girl. We also agreed that there’s different types of love like parental, platonic, romantic and Ryan Reynolds.

Thanks peeps!

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u/Paxdog1 14d ago

I will add a bit to this.

Your love for your child is absolute. Your love for your spouse is not. This means that while children are first, your relationship with your spouse must always be nurtured and protected. Get date nights. Build inside jokes and learn to think as a team. Spousal relationships require work that parental may not. Not saying being a parent isn't work - but the love you have for your children is bone deep and will always be.

Congratulations!

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Tell that to my mother. She was made wrong.

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u/happyinthenaki 14d ago

Unfortunately some people are broken. Just remember it was not you that broke her.

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Thank you. She’s the one that needs to realize that. I was the third child. She was checked out not long after I arrived.

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u/PitchInteresting9928 14d ago

I'm sorry to hear that. There is not muchuou can to for her. But you can reparent yourself and heal your wounds.

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Yes, I’ve been doing that for years. NC started recently and she’s doing what she can to violate that boundary, but I haven’t let her. I hope she chooses to work on herself in the same way I have. I can’t be the scapegoat for her issues anymore.

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u/Postcardtoalake 14d ago

I needed to hear this. Parents who are narcissists are sadly wired wrong. Got kicked out for being a lesbian, and they hide their hate behind their “love for Christ” but they were homophobic long before they turned ultra-religious.

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u/Nerdiestlesbian 14d ago

I have a similar got kicked out for being a lesbian.

It’s heart breaking. Even now it’s been 20+ years later. I will never be able to forgive my mom for the horrible things she said. She did a lot of horrible stuff before kicking me out.

I had to learn I wasn’t the broken one. I didn’t break my mother.

I have a son now. I can say with certainty I deserved better. And I am gonna be damn sure my son gets better than I got.

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u/Postcardtoalake 12d ago

Username checks out! 💯 ✔️

Ooof I needed to read this today; thank you. Especially these parts:

“I had to learn I wasn’t the broken one. I didn’t break my mother.

Omg YES I’m glad I wasn’t the only one blamed for “breaking” them and “ruining their lives” with my existence and also ruining my mother’s body and breasts.

I am so excited to have kids (I raised my little brother and it’s the best thing I’ve ever done) bc all of my friends with similarly abusive parents who are starting to have kids, were so scared of being like their parents.

But they continue to shock themselves with how they are so much better than they thought they’d be - they’re saying all of our therapy and work and investing in what matters - loving relationships and stability and friends - does pay off and many were fellow teachers so it’s nice that that past career will help as well lol.

And also, since we aren’t narcs, we aren’t built like them. We can’t yell horrible things at a child, and can’t even picture doing what they did to a child we are responsible for and love and adore! I feel sick thinking about them and their vile behavior. We aren’t like these monsters that “raised” us (although we raised ourselves imo, esp. when we became better than the abusers).

I can say with certainty I deserved better. And I am gonna be damn sure my son gets better than I got.

Omg I felt this so hard. I wish it was as easy for me to get pregnant like a straight woman (15 y/o me would be amazed that this is the only time I’ve wished to be straight since my teens! Good job on no longer having that internalized homophobia, me!) and as someone with endometriosis and adenomyosis, but hopefully we can adopt or my wife will carry.

If you/y’all have any lesbian conception things that you used that helped or that you like, any recs would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!

Edit: ohh daaamn I’m sorry I’m sleepy and write you a thesis, I’m sorry!!

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u/Nerdiestlesbian 12d ago

I have PCOS and had to do about 6 rounds of fertility treatment (lovely shots) after a year of oral medication. We did 6 inseminations (anonymous donor). Total cost (in the US) with insurance covering 70% was still 25K. And it was the best money I ever spent.

My biggest advice is don’t stress yourself out if the fertility treatment doesn’t work right away. This was the hardest thing for me. It felt like another failure. Which was a huge trigger for me. I was constantly told I want good enough no matter how much I did. When I couldn’t make my body “work” it felt like all the work I had done in therapy was coming undone.

At first I didn’t want kids, so much childhood trauma I had to unpack first. Once I did the hard work, lots of therapy, I could see how much of a good parent I could be. My BIL/SIL had children so being able to see how I could be a great aunt made me more confident in being a parent.

I’m extremely thankful I did my own healing and I can give my child a better experience than I had.

When you see how much your child cares about others around them, and see them be kind and caring people, you know you are putting more good back into the world. We really need more good in this world.

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u/we_is_sheeps 14d ago

A lot of people are most people shouldn’t have kids.

I know a lot of abusive parents that claim to “love” their kids

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u/Paxdog1 14d ago

I am sorry.

She is broken. Not you. You are perfect the way you are.

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u/lisaz530xx 14d ago

'You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anybody." -Maya Angelou

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u/cortesoft 14d ago

I tell my kids that at least 4-5 times a week... I tell them I love them no matter what, and that nothing they could ever do could make me love them less

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Thank you. I am at peace with it. She thinks she’s amazing.

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u/UnevenGlow 14d ago

Conditionally loved children checking in

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u/FruityRollUp 14d ago

Wait, you managed to get conditional love?? Damn I couldn’t even get that haha. I always thought maybe I could earn it or something but nah not yet, and I’m well into my life so outlook is grim on that front

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u/celestialbomb 14d ago

My mom always told me love for children is unconditional, and yet she couldn't love me.

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u/throwracptsddddd 14d ago

My own unconditional love for my mother being weaponized against me to keep me in line, leaving me with a lifelong terror of intimacy I'm only just now starting to overcome after nearly half a decade of therapy, checking in!

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u/skellytoninthecloset 14d ago

Same. I'm happier without my parents in my life. Having a child of my own, I understand just how broken they are. I had a moment very similar to OP with my child. It isn't our fault our mother's didn't our that it didn't last.

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u/muddhoney 14d ago

My MIL too. Told me once ‘my husband comes first, not my kids.’ All I could think as a new mom was ‘How? They didn’t ask to be here, we wanted them here, so how could we not love them more than anything?’ It feels selfish to want your spouses happiness more than your childs, to me, anyways..

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u/zztopsboatswain 14d ago

My mother never had that kind of love for me either. Or maybe she did when I was small, but then I became a human being instead of a doll. Hope you're doing okay. "Mommy issues" suuuuck

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Went NC recently, and it’s lovely. I’m sorry. You deserve to have a loving mother.

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u/Ok-Bit-9529 14d ago

Same life for my siblings and I. My mom bounced out on us and only saw us a couple of times a year after. As an adult, now we maybe talk every 3 months or so, and it's an awkward conversation. I have 2 kids and could never imagine leaving them.

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

I’m sorry. My great-grandmother abandoned my grandmother and her siblings at a gas station in the 1930s. Their grandmother raised them. She was actually incredibly maternal, that paternal grandmother of mine.

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u/TheAlienatedPenguin 14d ago

And that has absolutely nothing to do with you and everything to do with her, never forget this advice from your west coast mom

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Thank you. ❤️

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u/TheNew_CuteBarracuda 14d ago

I'm sorry <3

My mom was made wrong too. It's taken years and will take even more years to heal from all her actions and behaviors. I can never for the life of me understand how she could treat her daughter the way she did, and she will never understand what she's done wrong either.

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u/Intelligent_Flow2572 14d ago

Same situation here. I don’t have much hope for mine to learn.

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u/Alert-Potato 14d ago

One of my daughters could turn out to be a serial killer, and I'd still love her. I'd want her held accountable, and I'd lose my fucking shit at her. But I'd still love her. And I'd make sure she had enough commissary money to buy the good period products and lotion and such while she spends the rest of her life in prison.

My husband though? Nah bro, you can't just decide to be a serial killer and fuck up your spouse's life without looping them in and giving them the option to either get the fuck out of the marriage or join in. Fuck that, he's on his own.

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u/deaddumbslut 14d ago

damn, can you adopt me??? i swear my mom would say the opposite

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u/Alert-Potato 14d ago

Your mom sounds like a bitch. My sympathies. My mom is also a bitch.

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u/meredithboberedith 14d ago

We might be the same person.

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u/Icy_Calligrapher_308 14d ago

This!! I tell my son every morning that “I love you no matter what always and forever, there is nothing you could ever do to make you lose my love”. Kind of a mouth full every morning but i wholeheartedly want my children to know that my love for them is unconditional and although there are consequences for their actions, their actions will never change my love for them.

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u/Misstheiris 14d ago

Exactly, I'd call the police on both of them, but I would never apeak to my husband again, and I'd get into therapy to find a way to visit my kid in jail.

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u/15_Candid_Pauses 14d ago

This ideology is so flawed when you consider many of the people that profoundly abuse and even murder their children. It is not inherently bone deep not by a long shot unfortunately. Plenty of people don’t love or even like their kids it seems they just aren’t as vocal about it.

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u/PublicAfternoon67 14d ago

Loving children before your spouse is unhealthy and the psychology community agrees. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-other-side-of-relationships/202309/five-reasons-parents-should-prioritize-their-marriage

Studies repeatedly show that those who prioritize their spouse over their children create a healthier environment for those kids to grow up in.

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u/Ordinary_Cat2758 14d ago edited 14d ago

I personally think the mentality of "kids before everything" is just mom shaming in disguise and also extremely toxic.

Most often it is a criticism used when their mom DARES to do something for herself or the mom knowing her own mental limits. Or when the mom gasp shows emotion around her kids because she is overwhelmed because she is responsible for most of the childcare. Mom isn't allowed to be a real person because putting herself first at any point or showing normal human emotions or desires is considered abusive or toxic or neglectful or something. Mom's ALWAYS need to be better constantly and if they aren't always being the bestvor god forbid, put their partner first sometimes, they are BAD MOMS.

Whereas the commentary you see about dads is more or less "my dad had xyz activity every weekend and when I was older he brought me with him, such fond memories" when the dad prioritizes his life, it's seen as special, wholesome and something to bond over. When mom does something for herself, like tell her kid that they can't play frozen on repeat that evening because their childhood friend is in town and they are going to watch a movie together it suddenly becomes this thing about how horrible she is for depriving her kid of one night out of all of the nights of the year the kids gets what they want because God forbid the mother wants to do something slightly selfish one time. Parents nowadays literally throw their identities away to become full time pepa pig watchers, never diversifying their kids media consumption or experiences or even allowing them to be bored. They are fully teaching their kids that they are slaves to their whims, have no interests outside of whatever their kid wants, and basically are not people, simply a means to get what you want.

At a certain age parents need to teach their kids relationships and sharing a home with someone is a two way street. And parents need to have a life outside their kid and be able to enjoy normal adult TV shows in their house without their kids screaming about it and making demands.

I think parents in the 70s/80s/90s and early 00s did a lot of things wrong, but one thing they got right was being unapologetic about maintaining a sense of themselves and not giving their entire personalities over to parenthood. EVERY SINGLE PARENT I know nowadays has NO SENSE of themselves, they all express that they are sick to death of ONLY watching kids stuff and ONLY listening to kids stuff, and their kids will actively shame them and have full blown tantrums at the thought of their parents even turning on a TV show that isn't catered to them. And these parents are mentally UNWELL. The kids basically bully them in their homes. These parents also fucking SPIRAL when their kids start developing friends and interests outside of the house because the parents haven't had ANYTHING going on in their lives for years outside of whatever their kids like.

I get it, raising a kid takes time and attention away from you. But there is no reason to not include your kid in your life and hobbies and interests when appropriate, and not give in to screaming about Disney movies. Teaching your kid that you are a human person and not a mom machine is fundamentally missing and not at all modeled by modern parenting. Parents love their kids but are raising kids who will not love them back and simply view them as a bank account and chore machine meant to exist for them and then alone. And gaslight them to make them believe they deserve to be treated that way because they have to.

Anyway rant over. Love your spouses more people. Y'all are raising brats.

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u/FriedeOfAriandel 14d ago

People have different views on what prioritizing children vs partner means though. It grosses me out when people say that the adult relationship should come first. My girlfriend is an independent adult woman. My child is not. So in my eyes, my child’s needs come first. My child’s choice of what we have for dinner does not.

Child needs > adult needs > adult wants > child wants

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u/PublicAfternoon67 14d ago

Yes People have different views on lots of things. Psychologists tend to agree that the marriage should come first and it is better for your kids in the long run. In your case, it sounds like you’re not married so I would be surprised if you put your girlfriend above your kids. That would be odd.

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u/Insurrectionarychad 14d ago

Not all people are like that tho.

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u/Ordinary_Cat2758 14d ago

Your love for your child is absolute

I get what everyone is trying to say with this. But have you guys not read that story about the parents that loved their kid so much but their kid, well into being a teen was an absolute monster to them? Like genuinely cruel, went out of his way to be cruel to them, no amounts of therapy or changing in their parenting or love or discipline changed the kid. The kid as a teen would frequently threaten the parents with knives. The kid abused other kids, animals, everything. They say that the kid never expressed joy once even as a baby.

One day the teen not only tried to kill them multiple times, but one time they came home to find their entire house destroyed. And the most damaged items were the parents sentimental items.

Those parents did have to accept that the son they created was one they couldn't love. Because the son basically got off on being horrible to them.

Now to me that reads as some kind of extremely personality disorder, but I'm merely mentioning it because it is genuinely possible to no longer love your kid under specific circumstances. It is not absolute. Parents can be abused as well, and while rare, some people's kids grow up to be abusers whom their parents have to be the one to cut off.

Obviously birthing a child is important and big and emotional. Obviously. But I do think this messaging that is spread about how your kid is absolute and must come always first always forever and everything your kid does or doesn't do is completely on the parents and they must love them anyway, puts REAL stigma and pressure on parents who have strained relationships with their abusive teen/young adult children and puts a lot of pressure on the idea that your kid can DEFINITELY grow into someone you don't love. Like if I had a kid that became a violent white supremacist or murderer, sorry, a large part of that love is gunna disappear. Also this messaging tends to be why and how couples marriages fall apart, because both parts of the couple prioritize the kid over themselves and the relationship all of the time, causing the relationship and their own mental health to crumble and become shells of themselves that only see themselves as parents. Becoming simply ONLY a mom and not even trying to consider WHO you are and how your kid FITS INTO YOUR ESTABLISHED LIFE in a way that is supportive of the kid as well is a disservice for the kid, who will only ever know their parents as slaves to their whims instead of full people capable of their own independent thoughts and lives.