Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr Tonka
I didn't mean to offend anyone.
By life and death i meant if a psychopath held them both at gunpoint and said chose. Or if you prefer, a situation where both needed assistance and which ever one you assisted would live and the other would die.
Also, and again, no offense, but i don't think you really can weigh in on the spouse vs child thing. It's not as if you chose to make a life with your boyfriend, married him, then decided to produce a child. These were circumstances you were saddled with against your will. There is no other choice for a decent person than to make the best of it as possible. And while you haven't fully committed to each other, i commend you and your SO for making strides to build your relationship together. In your case, a child is the anchor of that and done correctly, i think the child can be the beneficiary as well. Marriage isn't for everyone one and i'm not slamming your or judging you for not being married. People have to do what works. But make no mistake, just being together will not produce a well rounded child. Your life, decisions, attitude, words, etc... will always influence your child and his character.
This last part leads back to my point. Children aren't dumb, they are quite intuitive and KNOW if you love them more than your spouse. They can sense this and exploit it when possible. But the worst part is that they grow up thinking that a spouse isn't as important as a child. Argue that all you want with being chemically designed a certain way, but in most cases this breeds a lack of respect for their future significant others or spouse.
A lot of people will say if you want to see how a man will treat you look at how he treats his mother. A better clue is to see how his father treated his mother. The same goes for a woman; see how her mother treats her father and you're likely in for a similar dose.
Of course there are exceptions to all rules so try not to take it personally.
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I wasn't taking it personally, just using "I" for ease of conveyance. No "no offenses" needed, we all have different opinions!
You're right, I'm in a very different situation, but I did want to show that kids aren't always the destroyer of worlds, even in the most unplanned situation. Our being together has pretty minimal bearing on his shaping as a person, but I don't think it hurts not to be in a situation where the parents are poisoning the kid against each other.
It's funny, because I was always trained to think you'd pick the kid. When you consider that you can always make more kids (not quite the same) but that without your SO you'd have to start over completely with some pretty devastating consequences, it doesn't really make sense to. Hard to balance emotion and logic sometimes, though.
You make an interesting point at the end there; I'd never really thought about it like that. My mom always put me first, partially because my dad is a selfish jackhole, but I don't think I feel any less respect towards spouses toward it. They say women tend to seek men who are similar to their fathers, and so I think if anything it's put me in places where perhaps the men are selfish but I feel the need to put in extra love, so sort of the opposite. Hmm.