If you go back in the 1800’s or so children were there to be work hands on the farm or around the house. Plus so many died before reaching age 5 I doubt there was alot of “love”.
Abraham Lincoln said his father hired him out to work for other farmers and kept all the money for himself. I got no sense that my grandfather loved his sons (my father). Kids were there to work and sit down and shut up and not cause problems.
Oh, I guess they were still supposed to take care of them when they got old.
As for today, I think some people have children out of obligation or maybe they were an accident so maybe its more a tolerance than “love”.
From what I have seen (Victorian era photos of dead kids’ memorials, things I’ve read about the era), I don’t think that people were numb to the grief of losing those kids even though it was so common. It was just that there was nothing you could do to prevent it back then, so you really had no choice but to keep soldiering on in spite of how hard and sad life was. In my view, life really sucked for most people over most of human history. We are very lucky to live in the era we live in now, where it’s finally no longer “normal” to experience the tragedy of losing some of your children or having to work yourself to death just to survive.
I think the vast majority of parents do love their kids, even if they aren’t good parents. I would estimate something like 85-90%. Not everyone is able to express that love in a healthy way, but if you are capable of loving anyone, I think in most cases you will love your own child.
The percent might be higher for mothers than it is for fathers, since I do think some of the changes moms experience during pregnancy and birth are designed to help us bond with our kids. I was ambivalent at times about having kids while I was pregnant with my first, but when I looked at my son after he was born, all the worries/doubts I had while pregnant with him evaporated. I am pretty sure that the flood of hormones I experienced when he was born primed my brain to love him.
Not every mom instantly falls in love with their child. I was prepared to NOT feel that instant love, but it was a pleasant surprise for me that it did happen.
I had a second child, and I felt like my heart grew to allow me to love her just as much as I love her older sibling. It wasn’t a choice on my part - it just happened.
We are all the product of many generations of people who loved their kids enough to make some sacrifices to provide for them, so I think we are biologically steered towards loving the kids, and it is the exception when it doesn’t happen.
Not necessarily; aside from general incidence of the kind of personality disorders which make that person incapable of love (actual incidence will change by culture and is the kind of thing on which statistics are hard to get, but IIRC personality-spectrum disorders appear to be more common on women than on men), post-partum depression is one of those conditions which appear to be highly under-diagnosed. And if you’re already having any kind of problems with the child (from “my milk won’t come up” to “I… just… can’t…”), the constant bombarding by well-wishers, ads and society in general telling you that everything should be pink flowers and sweet violins doesn’t help.
Neither my mother, nor her sister, nor their mother, loved their children as far as I can tell. My mother doesn’t appear to have loved a single person in her life; even Dad was barely more than a money-delivery, fancy-lastname delivery, social-class delivery system.