<story><title>How relationship satisfaction changes across your lifetime</title><url>https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_relationship_satisfaction_changes_across_your_lifetime</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>PragmaticPulp</author><text>&amp;gt; Once kids enter the picture, they they are the priority. Not giving up the &amp;quot;authentic life&amp;quot; to give your children the &amp;quot;best life&amp;quot; is pure selfishness. Once you have kids, your life is no longer your own...it&amp;#x27;s theirs.&lt;p&gt;This mentality is not only wrong, it&amp;#x27;s extremely unhealthy. Your personal life doesn&amp;#x27;t end when you become a parent. Parents shouldn&amp;#x27;t let their children&amp;#x27;s lives become the all-consuming center of your universe to the exclusion of all things self.&lt;p&gt;This mindset is actually extremely unhealthy for both the parents and the children. It&amp;#x27;s true that you need to provide attention and love and care to children, but you also need to grant them some space and autonomy as they grow older.&lt;p&gt;Take care of your kids, yes, but take care of yourself too. Everything in life is about balance and moderation. Go too far in any one direction to the neglect of other important things and you&amp;#x27;re only going to create problems for yourself, no matter how well-intentioned you thought you were.</text></item><item><author>stronglikedan</author><text>Once kids enter the picture, they they are &lt;i&gt;the&lt;/i&gt; priority. Not giving up the &amp;quot;authentic life&amp;quot; to give your children the &amp;quot;best life&amp;quot; is pure selfishness. Once you have kids, your life is no longer your own...it&amp;#x27;s theirs. It&amp;#x27;s been proven myriad ways that kids are better off with both parents for many developmental reasons. I&amp;#x27;m not against divorce, but it should be an insurmountable rift that leads there.</text></item><item><author>dpweb</author><text>The relationship has to come first. It precedes the marriage and family, and I think societal norms are to put the children and the piece of paper first.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s a living thing that needs to be fed, and when times get tough what do people often do. Stop being kind to each other, stop having sex, building resentment and accelerating the decline.&lt;p&gt;The goal is not to keep it together at all costs. The goal is to live an authentic life, and if that is going to be with a partner, don&amp;#x27;t lose sight of that fact it&amp;#x27;s the two of you that&amp;#x27;s important, not all the other stuff that comes along.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Broken_Hippo</author><text>You can&amp;#x27;t take care of your kids well if you don&amp;#x27;t take care of yourself. That being said, if there is only enough for one of you to eat... well, the kid eats first and you get leftovers. Taking care of yourself has to work around the child&amp;#x27;s needs as well, especially when they are young and simply cannot do for themselves.</text></comment>
<story><title>How relationship satisfaction changes across your lifetime</title><url>https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_relationship_satisfaction_changes_across_your_lifetime</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>PragmaticPulp</author><text>&amp;gt; Once kids enter the picture, they they are the priority. Not giving up the &amp;quot;authentic life&amp;quot; to give your children the &amp;quot;best life&amp;quot; is pure selfishness. Once you have kids, your life is no longer your own...it&amp;#x27;s theirs.&lt;p&gt;This mentality is not only wrong, it&amp;#x27;s extremely unhealthy. Your personal life doesn&amp;#x27;t end when you become a parent. Parents shouldn&amp;#x27;t let their children&amp;#x27;s lives become the all-consuming center of your universe to the exclusion of all things self.&lt;p&gt;This mindset is actually extremely unhealthy for both the parents and the children. It&amp;#x27;s true that you need to provide attention and love and care to children, but you also need to grant them some space and autonomy as they grow older.&lt;p&gt;Take care of your kids, yes, but take care of yourself too. Everything in life is about balance and moderation. Go too far in any one direction to the neglect of other important things and you&amp;#x27;re only going to create problems for yourself, no matter how well-intentioned you thought you were.</text></item><item><author>stronglikedan</author><text>Once kids enter the picture, they they are &lt;i&gt;the&lt;/i&gt; priority. Not giving up the &amp;quot;authentic life&amp;quot; to give your children the &amp;quot;best life&amp;quot; is pure selfishness. Once you have kids, your life is no longer your own...it&amp;#x27;s theirs. It&amp;#x27;s been proven myriad ways that kids are better off with both parents for many developmental reasons. I&amp;#x27;m not against divorce, but it should be an insurmountable rift that leads there.</text></item><item><author>dpweb</author><text>The relationship has to come first. It precedes the marriage and family, and I think societal norms are to put the children and the piece of paper first.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s a living thing that needs to be fed, and when times get tough what do people often do. Stop being kind to each other, stop having sex, building resentment and accelerating the decline.&lt;p&gt;The goal is not to keep it together at all costs. The goal is to live an authentic life, and if that is going to be with a partner, don&amp;#x27;t lose sight of that fact it&amp;#x27;s the two of you that&amp;#x27;s important, not all the other stuff that comes along.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jklinger410</author><text>Putting your kids first doesn&amp;#x27;t mean you can&amp;#x27;t take care of yourself. You are implying that, but no one else is.&lt;p&gt;Of course children need a happy and healthy parent to care for them, so your needs are still included in the mix, in case you were worried about that.</text></comment>