Is There A Favorite Parent?

Posted on April 22, 2010 
Filed Under Focus on the Family, Marriage, Parenting

Until this morning, I’d always thought that kids go through seasons when they naturally tend to pick one of us parents instead of the other. Specifically, for the first several years my children have been “all Mommy, all the time.”  If I wanted to hold them, the answer was something like this: “No Daddy, but MOMMY can hold me.” I attributed such preferences to Dena’s natural nurturing personality. And it was okay.

As they’ve aged, my kids have made me the “go to” guy for a lot of things, and I know they like spending time with me.  So it has seemed reasonable to view such preferences as somewhat seasonal and related more to our giftings and strengths as parents.

I’ve not really thought much about these things, until I saw this rather provocative headline: “Are You The Favored Parent?” Author Ellen Weber Libby suggests there are many reasons that Moms and Dads actually seek out the “favored parent” status, and that such approaches to parenting might be more related to our own adult insecurities or emotional needs, and less to the preferences of children. She says,

“Why can it be so important for one parent to feel favored? …It is normal to want to be chosen or selected. Some parents are deliberate in the desires to be the favorite parent.”

Libby goes on to say that such intentional efforts to be “number one parent” could be tied to rejection we felt from our own parents, or from feelings of inadequacies within our marriage.

So ow I’m examining my own approach to parenting the six kids we’ve been blessed with, and to ask myself about the motives for my own behaviors. Not a bad thing…a little self-examination is usually helpful in sorting out those  underlying reasons for doing what I do.

What do you think? Are you a favored parent? Are you trying to be one?

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