<p>Time magazine came out this week, 10/3 issue, with an intriguing article (for me at least) about playing favorites. It got me thinking, “do I play favorites?” </p>
<p>I kinda think it’s all in the temperment, sex of the child, and timing. I know my mom played favorites even though she swore she didn’t and I was not her favorite. I wasn’t easy and, besides, I was the sixth kid. But now that she is older and completely dependent on her children, she prefers the girls over the guys and by far, she definitely likes me best. </p>
<p>I am not sure how “playing favorites” is defined. I certainly don’t treat my kids the same, or like them the “same”. I like them differently, but I like to think pretty equally. I am pretty sure my D would say my S got to do things she didn’t, and that he was rewarded for things we took for granted from her. I think that is true, as it was for my brother and I. I don’t think that means he is my “favorite”, but I wonder what she would say. It is clear that when she was younger, she was jealous of any attention he got,and when I was a child, I noticed that my brother got so much attention. But I also understood it was all negative, and THAT I could do without.</p>
<p>My D has always been mature and self-sufficient. As a fictional character, she’d be Hermione.</p>
<p>Her older brother, however, is 25% Jeff Spicoli, 50% Ferris Bueller, and 25% Ritchie Cunningham. He needed more managing as a child and teen. So, he ended up with more attention. </p>
<p>Did that make him the favorite? Gee, I hope not. But, I suppose it could appear so. The truth is they’re equal to me.</p>
<p>My kids were so different that it seems like an impossible question to answer. It’s not that I love them just the same or equally, but I appreciate different things about them. My oldest was one of those precocious kids who teaches themselves to read at two and amazes everyone around them. He was an absolute delight when he was little, but became more of a loner as he grew older. He got the computer bug and is basically a classic computer geek, when he’s not programming he’s playing games (both board games and ones on the computer) or reading sci fi and fantasy. He was a hard act to follow. </p>
<p>My younger son was charming when he was little, but always seemed to be about six month behind the program in school. Eventually he got it all figured out and did quite well. He’s quite social and got to be more and more interesting the older he got. He’s really more fun to hang around with now because his interests are less technical and less narrow. It’s just easier to talk about nuclear disarmament or global warming than timing issues in the Linux kernel.</p>
<p>I would be very interested to know how the researchers decided who was the favored child.</p>
<p>Since children differ, I would argue that good parents treat each child differently. (For example, one child may love lots of attention whereas another might interpret too much attention as unnecessary and cloying hovering.)</p>
<p>So who is to decide what connotes favoritism? Who the parent brags most about?</p>
<p>Does it say in the article whether or not the researchers were parents?</p>
<p>My kids are so different that if I gave them the same amount of anything, including attention, it wouldn’t even work…</p>
<p>My oldest can talk about anything for days and in staggering analytical detail. I often think it might be exhausting just to be her.</p>
<p>My youngest would rather do anything besides talk about anything, at all, and acts as if any conversation is a punishment.</p>
<p>What would a researcher conclude from that? </p>
<p>about me as a parent?</p>
<p>The one thing I have definitely come to understand with time, as I’m sure we all have, is that our kids change us and effect us as much if not more so than we do them. </p>
<p>Each of my two grown kids thinks that I favored the other.</p>
<p>I think this means I handled the situation badly.</p>
<p>I don’t actually have a favorite. The two of them are, and always have been, very different people, and I enjoy different things about each of them. I also worry about different things regarding each of them. I know that I treated them differently when they were growing up, but it would be hard not to. It wouldn’t have made sense to treat them the same way, just as it wouldn’t make sense to treat your cat the same way you treat your dog.</p>
<p>My dad always said that his mother-in-law always managed to treat each of her eight kids as if s/he were an only child. (Although I suspect the daughters, who picked up a lot of the household slack, might not agree…)</p>
<p>My cousins have some trouble with this. The oldest is the most successful professionally, and I think they get rather fed up with her paying for everything and having the parents brag about the doctor in the family (she is also the only one who never married or had kids).</p>
<p>Skyhook, my brothers and sisters have an ongoing joke. Whenever we call each other for a special occasion, like birthday or Christmas, we’ll always ask “what did you get?” And invariably someone will say something like, “Oh Mom was so generous this year and gave me an extra $$$. Did you get that too?”</p>
<p>I kinda wonder if favorites start because a child has most needs. My oldest has Asperger’s and anxiety and wears his emotions on his sleeve. On the face of it, he sure fits the category of “our favorite”. OTOH, my youngest is so easy-going and loveable, it would be no wonder to think he’s my favorite. And then there’s my middle child: he’s so fully aware of who gets attention and hates to miss out on his “fair share”. So I just don’t know if i really play favorites or if it depends on the circumstances.</p>
<p>I have an only child so no conflict there. My mom played favorites, she still does and it’s not me. My older sister was neither of my parents’ favorites, but was grandmother’s favorite. The funny thing is my mom is still bitter about being her mom’s least favorite and her siblings are still smarting over my mom being their dad’s favorite. My mom still gloats about how it bothered her mom. She is 71. I didn’t set out to have an only child but I have to wonder if crazyson benefitted from it, of course if you ask crazyson he’ll say the dog is the favorite.</p>
<p>With only two kids who are as different as night & day, I think they both think they were favorites in their own way. We have a different relationship with each and know that both know they were and are loved. I think that’s the best any of us can do. Measuring how anyone is a “favorite” seems pretty tough to me. My kids claim I’m clearly mom & dad’s favorite of 7 kids and in some ways I probably am. In other ways, I can see how most of my other sibs are “favorites” as well. In H’s family, it’s pretty cloudy as well. S was clearly favored among the nieces & nephews of my SIL, but D & the others don’t seem to let it bother them much. SIL also very obviously favors the niece over the nephew in my BIL’s family. I think marked preferential treatment as well as criticism of the disfavored makes it uncomfortable for everyone–it sure made my kids uncomfortable to be present during it.</p>
<p>I guess we all do the best we can & hope our kids can feel the love and not try to measure it and compare it. That seems the most comfortable way to live, IMHO.</p>
<p>Of course I play favorites! My only child is by far my favorite child…although the dogs come in a close 2nd and 3rd.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t say my parents played favorites when we were children but as adults they clearly like my sister better as a person. I was a hellion as a teenager and I feel that wound has never fully healed. For example, my mother once disowned me when I was an adult which she would never, ever do to my sister. But we’re all in a pretty good place now. I’ve learned to accept the relationships for what they are and enjoy the good parts, of which there are many. But it took a lot of therapy!</p>
<p>Each of my three kids would tell you that one of the others was the favorite. I do not, however, have a favorite - and I’d tell you guys if I did. Really! I like poetgrl’s question in post 8 about whether the researchers were themselves parents.</p>
<p>A friend of mine who had several kids used to say that her favorite was whichever one was causing the least trouble at the time. I think that I became the favorite in high school because I always did my homework, was home before curfew, and generally gave my parents less to worry about. My brothers, however, led far more interesting lives.</p>
<p>I do think that parents can love their children “the same” in one way - in that it wouldn’t be possible to love them more.</p>
<p>This question upsets me because it reminds me of the movie, “Sophies Choice,” which left an emotional scar on me. I can’t imagine ever confronting a more horrible decision, but let’s face it, it made us think, and not necessarily like our thoughts.</p>
<p>When I was in my 30’s I finally told my mother about the incest I’d suffered as a child. Her only comment was to ask if the abuser had abused my sisters as well. When I said no, she said “Thank God” and changed the subject. That confirmed my place!</p>
<p>I get along with one kid better than the other, but I feel closer to the other one. And I treat them very differently. One gets a lot of financial support still, and the other refuses any help at all. But that one still lives close to home and took a vacation with us this summer (and her father and she and I agreed not to let the older one hear about the horseback riding and kayaking; the older one used to count presents every Christmas to make sure she had the same number or one more gift than her sister…).</p>
<p>Wow, KKmama! How painful for you to get such a reaction & have such a relationship with mom. I hope you have had help in your continued healing, to get the understanding and support you deserve.</p>
<p>I’ve always found it sad when folks need to count, weigh and measure to figure out if they are loved as much or more than another. Counting presents is like Dudley in Harry Potter! I don’t identify, thankfully. I know there are folks who do, including some of my sibs, but it seems pretty pointless to me.</p>
<p>I do believe that sometimes need factors into what is given. It makes sense to me but I know it bothers others. We’re all so different & complicated.</p>
<p>I once read a great quote from a mom that admits, “of course I have a favorite”. She then explained that the favorite varied according to which kid happened to be at an “easier” age at the time.</p>