should the children be more important than the relationship

Absolutely!

I didn't have to teach a 3 year old to 'stand on their own feet' - they didn't cry- Granny was second home. I was just as happy with my grandad as my parents- it is where you feel secure and loved.

My middle one was begging to have a night alone with Granny, like his older brother.
I think it so sad when the mother becomes the 'senior' parent and never lets the father have time alone, or time without issuing instructions. They are equal parents and the mother should be able to go off for a couple of hours from the start and simply leave him to it.
You can bet that poor Lorna and her dad never got some time to themselves!

Children are all different. My twin grandchildren have never cried for their Mum at bedtime.Perhaps it is because they had each other.

Both of my grandsons, when they were little, used to cry for their mum at bedtime. They were happy as Larry during the day. It was upsetting. You can't teach a three year old to stand on on his/her own feet.

If you love your children you let them go and that means not clinging on to them and preventing them from standing on their own two feet.They love staying with others for a week or two.

Children's needs have to be met, that's the deal when you become a parent. I don't think though, that it's necessary to choose who comes first. Mum and dad work together as a team to create their family. If a child has a bond with a grandparent, i don't think it's wrong to leave them.

I can see why the OP is single.

Terribly unhealthy for the poor child.

I bet Lorna couldn't wait to leave home if that is true!

She has certainly wound me up!

I think it is lovely for the children to have time with loving grandparents. Mine stayed with grandparents from a very young age and it was just home from home on both sides. They then went on to stay happily with friends, school visits etc. The saddest child that I came across was an 11yr old who was so apprehensive about the school residential that it was making her ill and this was all because her mother had never let her stay anywhere without her. Luckily she managed it and it did wonders for her self confidence, but it was all so unnecessary and her mother's fault that she was so worried.
If you know some dysfunctional men there is no need to think they are all the same. I adored my grandfather when I was a toddler and apparently was his shadow- luckily my parents didn't have to be glued to me at all times!
The children are gone in what seems a very short time, looking back, but you are on your own (hopefully) with your partner for decades after that and it makes sense to keep the relationship fresh with time alone, especially if you have family only too willing to have the children for a night, or weekend.
If you are rushed off to hospital it is nice to know that your children are happily with someone else. I remember when my brother was born and my mother was rushed off to hospital in the middle of the night, I woke up to find my aunt instead but was quite relaxed with that, having often stayed with her.
And my husband is not 'like a big toddler'! ( Quite probably because his parents had a relaxed attitude about him having close relationships with other adults when a child- much healthier IMO)
You only get men behaving like big toddlers if the parents didn't let them grow up!
Give them roots and give them wings. It is a gradual process and a weekend with grandparents is a great way to start.
Since it is your DD going away she obviously doesn't think that her mother needed to spend every minute with her until she was 7yrs!

greenfinch I most certainly believe what I say. I don't write stuff that I don't believe in. I do think that maybe the odd overnight stay with GP is ok for the little ones but any longer and they need their mums. Why should the parents want time to themselves, they are a family and should remain so.

New name but the op still enjoying winding us up ?

I think you are playing devil's advocate . You cannot really believe what you are saying.There is no sense in it whatsoever.

I have a friend who always signed her Christmas cards, Susan smith and John and before the DD grew up it was Susan Smith, lorna and john.
btw, not the real names

I never left mine until the oldest was 15 because there was simply no-one to have them.. DM was an invalid and DMIL wasn't able to. I have looked after the DGC occasionally for a night or two, but it is quite a big responsibility I feel.
Children do need a lot of time and attention but so do relationships - yes, some men can feel their noses are pushed out of joint after the children arrive and can behave like spoilt toddlers, I agree.

But I think it is a balancing act, and yes, I agree also that todays' s young parents do seem to want more 'me' time than we ever did.

Under 5s don't really have that much sense of time so could get upset if mummy isn't there unless they have been eased in gradually to spending time apart.

But jingl you didn't consider your husband redundant once you had a child. You went as a family, not as a mother-and-child pair, with a husband as much valued as a spare wheel hidden in the boot.

Reiki I have spent the last 39 years married to the same man and you can take it from me I have ALWAYS stood on my own 2 feet. I don't NEED my husband , I choose to be with him. And maybe that's the difference between us.

My husband has never hung onto me like a toddler . He is supportive and kind and we just fit. But I have never felt I didn't have my freedom. I make my own choices , always have.

Your experience sounds very different and maybe that is down to the men you have known. I think you're generalising about men.

My mum had my girls for a week every summer as they lived near the sea. Not because I wanted a break but to have a relationship with my girls who adored her. Sometimes my husband and I stayed home to decorate , sometimes we went away. My girls seem remarkably I damaged by the experience

I didn't regard my husband as a big toddler, any more than he regarded me as his mummy. You extend your memories of your own relationship to cover the whole male half of humanity. You do have a jaundiced view, perhaps inevitably if your own marriage failed, but please don't use it to criticise those who have places in their hearts for both husband and child. Love expands to cover more as more are added to the family.

We took our children with us. Never crossed our minds that we needed a break from each other. Odd concept.

How do you know that by your DD and partner going away on their own, that they are not putting their child first?
Do you not consider that their relationship is very important to your DGC?

I do reiki.
I don't think that it is necessary for parents to have to have 'time on their own'. It did not do me any harm we always took our bairn with us.

My opinion is not just mine, I see couple every day, where the men are just whingeing little boys, shouting for attention. Older men too, I have heard a friend want to know where his wife was every minute of the day and he is almost 90. You can be too dependant upon a partner. If one dies then the one left is absolutely lost.

Don't assume that everyone's experiences with men is the same as your own, ethel, or that every child has to be with its mother 24 hours a day 365 days a year or it has been abandoned. Don't assume, either, that everyone thinks their partner is expendable once they have impregnated them. Spiders mate like that - they eat their mate to nourish their eggs.

Better for a child to spend a little time with a loving grandma and have parents who have enjoyed a few days concentrating on each other and come back happy and "together" to be a family again, than to have two people with separate lives because one of them is always concentrating their love and attention on the child and neglecting their partner.

Do you do reiki?

Anne I dont have a jaundiced view, I just have spent my life mostly man free and I can stand on my own two feet, I cant stand men who want to be cosseted by their women and who feel left out when a child arrives, women just have to get on with it.

I see older couples every day going shopping together, going out and I feel it is not my scene, I like my freedom Im glad I dont have a man hanging on to me like a big toddler.

Back to the OP, I just think that children come before partners.