Rejection is hard. Rejection from your own two year old is harder.
As a new mother to a precious baby girl I would spend hours looking forward to days of lovingly combing her long hair after a bath, reading bedtime stories and whispering sweet little nothings to each other. But most of the time I don’t do any of that. Her father does. And he is a wonderful dad. But couldn’t he be a little less wonderful?
My daughter chooses – no that’s the wrong word – my daughter screams, kicks and cries for her dad in almost every single scenario. And I’m jealous. I am painfully jealous of this special bond between my husband and our daughter. What about my bond? I’m the one who does everything day and night, the dirty nappies, the late night feeds etc. I’m the one who pushed her out of my vagina!!!!!! All that yucky stuff Daddy Dearest gets out of. I should be the one who gets to enjoy the fun stuff! She should choose me over anyone. Love me more than anyone, right?
I want these moments with my daughter.
Truthfully, I don’t want to take this special relationship away from dad and daughter. Can’t she just love me the same? Why does she have to play favourites?
Please baby girl stop pushing me off the bed. Please baby girl stop telling me to go away. Please baby girl let me hold your hand.
Maybe she craves more of my time? No, I don’t think so. I’m home every day. She has ALL of my time.
She has such a special bond with her dad
I wish I could say the birth of her new baby brother only months ago triggered this behaviour. The truth is it started a long time before that.
She’ll snap out of it my own mother tells me. It’s only a phase I tell myself, over and over.
So many ideas on how to fix this run through my busy mind. Am I too available? Should I pull back and give less? Less time, less affection, less love? Do I love my daughter less so she can love me more? No, of course not. She’s only two for goodness sake… TWO! I love this little girl more than the world and I will remind her of that each and every minute so that she can find her way back to me.
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I do understand this. I recently split up with my husband of nine years and moved out of the family home. I have a two year old son and a three year old daughter, who stay with their father on weekends. Recently, my three year old has been crying at bedtime, saying she wants her daddy and wants to stay at daddy's house all the time. I think she blames me for leaving him and moving away - she has asked me many times why I don't like daddy's house any more.
I understand that this is an adjustment period and try not to take it to heart, but it's hard. I know our stories aren't the same, but I just wanted to let you know that I do empathise. I try to remember that she's just a very little girl, and that I was closer to my dad when I was younger, too. Now I love spending time with both of my parents. At the end of the day, I am my baby's mother, and that's a really special bond that we will always have, regardless of her relationship with anyone else.
It sounds like this is really bothering you and if it continues much longer it's going to be a serious problem for you and your family. It's good that you are expressing your sadness about this and not just letting it eat away at you, that's the first step to solving the problem. She'll probably out grow it but there's no shame in speaking to someone about this. You could find an appropriate family or parenting counselor in your area, or your GP could refer you?