A mom looking through photos of herself and her husband with their one-year-old toddler was left in no doubt as to who his favorite is.
It’s not uncommon for kids to have a favorite parent. In 2019, a survey of 2,000 adults commissioned by ChannelMum.com, found that 40 percent of respondents considered their mom to be their favorite parent, while around one in seven preferred their dad.
Such allegiances can chop and change though. The same study found that while many were initially closer to their mothers, as many as 35 percent of respondents considered their dad to be their favorite by the age of 13. Things switched around again for many once they reached the age of 20, with 35 percent admitting they switched back to preferring the company of their mother at this point in their lives.
Those findings should be of some comfort to Nathalie Blue, a Canadian mom of two young boys who recently shared a video to her TikTok, @_nathb, in which her elder son, who is 18 months old, makes his preference abundantly clear.
Nathalie’s 18-month-old son was looking through photos of mom and dad. He only had eyes for one of them though.
TikTok/@_nathb
It all started when her son began going through a bookshelf in the living room and came across a surprise.
“My son grabbed the books off our shelf and started flipping through them,” Blue told Newsweek. “He loves reading books, but I don’t think he was expecting a book filled with photos of his mom and dad.”
As he leafed through the photo album, Blue noticed her son was pointing out his “dada” time and time again. Though she made efforts to try and get him to say “mama” while pointing to the pictures of her, he only had eyes for “dada” time and time again.
Blue ended up filming the interaction and posting it to her TikTok. Though she feigns annoyance, Blue said she found the interaction more amusing than anything else and definitely isn’t taking it personally.
“He loves his dad,” she said. “I think anyone who has a toddler knows that the favorite can change on a dime. Some days dad is the favorite and sometimes it’s me… usually he wants whoever is not readily available to him.”
Blue also thinks her son may have been deliberately avoiding saying “mama” to try and get a reaction out of her. “I think he knew he was being funny, he’s got a cheeky little personality,” she said.
Whatever the case, she has no regrets about filming this hilarious and adorable encounter.
“I love filming him doing cute things like that, I love being able to look back on those moments and share them with my family,” she said.
Blue also hopes that the moms out there who might be going through similar things take solace from the clip. “You’re not alone if your child only wants to say dada, even if they can say mama,” she said.
